Rejoice for “Read Receipts” are coming to Facebook Groups!

I was delighted to learn today that Facebook will soon be releasing read receipts for Facebook Groups. As someone who uses a Facebook Group to lead a committee, I can tell you this will make my job as committee chair much easier.

Facebook Groups are notorious for killing off time-sucking meetings and eliminating redundant communications. Can I get an Amen?

The only trouble is I can never really be sure EVERYONE saw the communication. For instance, when I put things to a vote or post extremely important updates, I want to be sure that everyone on the committee, at the very least, read the communication.

Hold people accountable for reading and staying current with group news and updates.

When new activity occurs in a group, Facebook: (a) prioritizes the update in the newsfeed (b) creates a notification (the red number) and (c) shows the number of updates in the newsfeed sidebar. Even still, I’m not confident that everyone got the message.

There’s the catch.

If people aren’t reading, then Facebook Groups are pretty much worthless for our churches. Now, with this new feature, people can be held accountable for engaging with Facebook Group content. I sometimes spend up to 30 minutes preparing documents and orders of business to be posted inside of the group and I want to be sure that EVERYONE took the time to read it.

If they don’t then what’s the point?

Read receipts for Facebook Groups are a big win for churches.

In our continued effort to relieve the burden on volunteers and manage our teams effectively, this new feature may be just thing to help us get the most mileage out of Facebook Groups (or decide if we need to try something else).

As leaders, we need to be able to see who is getting the message. We will now be able to identify people who are consistently not reading group posts. This will allow us to zero in on those folks to determine if there is a priority problem or a platform problem. The bottom line is that we need everyone plugged in and on the same page to make these newfangled social media group management tools work.

On the flip-side, people on your team will know that they can be “watched”. Their absence will be duly noted. This of course has a funny way of getting more people to read in the first place.

Net win for leaders. Net win for churches.

Photo compliments of incase.

Question: Do you believe read receipts are an invasion of your privacy?