The world is in the midst of an information revolution. For many, the use of the internet has created an unparalleled opportunity to create “one language” by which people everywhere can communicate with each other. Some have even gone so far as to see this global movement as a giant step in reversing the “Tower of Babel”1 effect.
As of the end of January 2020, there are more than 4.4 billion social media users2 which represents more than 56% of the world’s population. Social Media is a general term that applies to any websites and applications that enable users to create and share content or to participate in social networking. On average, people have 7+ social media accounts and spend close to 2 hours a day on social media.
The global statistics of internet use are staggering. As of January 2020, there are more than 1.8 billion websites, 2.4 billion Facebook users, 782 million Google accounts, 355 million Twitter accounts, and 272 million Pinterest users.3
The daily usage of the internet is even more mind boggling. In a single day there are over 200 trillion emails sent, 4.8 trillion Google searches, 5.0 billion videos watched,4 500 million Tweets, and 250 million Skype calls.5
As K-House, we mainly focus on using YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter to reach the greatest audience we can. We also monitor social media trends for new platforms. 70% of all of our online content is viewed from a mobile device (phones & tables). For us, these Social Media platforms are the modern-day Mars Hill in ancient Athens.6 The apostle Paul went to the place of public discussion and oration to present the Gospel to a people who were worshipping an UNKNOWN GOD.
You and YouTube
YouTube.com is the largest video sharing platform in the world. We started Koinonia House YouTube channel in 2012 and as of January 2020 we have more than 130,000 channel subscribers.
YouTube recognized that momentous achievement by awarding K-House the Silver Play Button award for having and maintaining more than 100,000 subscribers.
During this short period, we have had approximately 18 million views and more than 240 million watch-time minutes. That’s a whopping 4 million hours of people watching K-House videos. We also gained over 100 million impressions (video thumbnails shown to users on YouTube).
In 2019 things went ballistic for us as we gained 52,000 of those subscribers and accounted for almost 8 million views and 2 million watch-time hours. In other words, the viewing statistics for 2019 was more than twice that of the previous 6 years. Praise the LORD!
Koinonia House has more video content freely available than we have ever had in our history. The people online LOVE what we are doing. We have more than 160,000 video “likes” and 16,000 comments left on our videos in 2019 alone and while we may not respond, every single comment is read by a member of our team. Daily we are flooded with testimonials of changed lives, faith being built up, and heart-felt gratitude for our freely available Christian teaching material.
The reception of our videos is amazing. Bob Cornuke’s video “Temple” tops our chart with over 8 million minutes watched (519 thousand view). The “Learn the Bible in 24 Hours” is our next most-watched video. Hour 1 of LTB24 has almost 7 million minutes watched (395 thousand views) and Hour 2 has more than 6.3 million minutes watched (237 thousand views). This shows the amazing worldwide reach of these timely materials to a world that is dying to hear the truth.
But wait, there’s more. As this is a Social Media tool, you can participate with this whole effort of spreading the Good News to your family and friends. What can you do to participate? By simply subscribing to our Koinonia House YouTube channel and turning on notifications, that allows you to get instant updates on more than 620 videos.
Then, when you watch a video you like, do these three things:
- click the “Like” button,
- Leave and encouraging “Comment” or maybe respond to someone else’s comment,
- share this video through your Social Media outlets and encourage your friends on followers to do these same three things. If more K-House partners did this, it would make a HUGE impact.
We will continue to share a weekly study on our YouTube channel and plan on adding more scheduled content in 2020 and as always, we will keep our channel de-monetized (not allowing any advertising) to make sure that none of your viewing is interrupted by ads of any sort.
Facebook, Twitter & Instagram
Facebook, Twitter & Instagram are different kinds of Social Media platforms that ultimately achieve the same goal of allowing people to connect with like-minded people. In these platforms, the individual can communicate with a selective set of people they are “friends” with, or they can simply follow and watch what others have to say regarding topics that are interesting to them.
When you ‘follow’ our Koinonia House account that allows you to see our content in your feed and, if enabled, get notified whenever we post. On our Facebook, Twitter & Instagram pages we make announcements of upcoming events and new products, offer time-sensitive articles, and sometimes just words of encouragement.
How are we doing? Currently our Facebook page has more than 40,000 page likes. Twitter has seen a steady increase in followers which is currently at 12,600.
As you may have seen discussed online and in the mainstream media, social media platforms use algorithms to determine who or what to show, even to people who “like”,“follow”, or subscribe to a page, account, or channel. This means Facebook pages like ours have a low number of responses--less than 1,800 “interactions” out of 40,000 “page likes.” We believe this is because our sites have been “tagged” as Conservative and Christian which we believe mutes our messages to our followers.
What can you do to help our effort? Well first, “Like” our page, or account, and our posts. Second share or retweet what we have posted. Third, comment and give us feedback on what we say and do. This is a bit like a comment card. By doing so you will make a BIG difference on how far our message can go.
Amazon Prime & other Smart TV Outlets
Recently we have opened up a few premium outlets for our teaching material. We began with “Amazon Prime Video” which is currently only available in the US and UK. Toward the end of 2019 we began loading our content onto Amazon Prime Video and we have seen a tremendous response. In just a short time we have close to 400,000 streamed minutes a month and we have only just begun to load content.
Your Part to Play
Like many media mediums, they can be used in powerful and terrible ways, but they can also be used to touch lives in ways not previously possible. We don’t need a mailing list or an e-mail database, we don’t need to know what country you are in or even your real name. By interacting with us on any of our social media accounts, you have access to a wealth of knowledge , but we can’t guarantee you will always get an answer to comments and questions you leave. That would be impossible. However, we have been able to respond to comments left from people who have lost loved ones, those who were considering taking their own lives and people who have given up but want to be restored.
Yes, social media is filled with ‘trolls’ and ‘negative opinions’ however, “we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.” Ephesians 6:12
You can effect change in others with what you do with your social media. You can engage with ministries like ours and interact with content, share it to your friends and family
If you are experienced in social media, graphic design, video, or animation and you would like to volunteer your time with content creation for Instagram, Facebook, and twitter posts, or intros for our YouTube videos, feel free to e-mail social@khouse.org
