Bern August 20, 2018. [CD-EUDNews]. The annual meeting of Global Adventist Internet Network (GAiN) Conference, was held in Kintex Convention Center in Goyang, Seoul, South Korea from August 8 to 12, 2018. About 250 participants from 40 countries, who work in the area of media, attended the meeting organised by the General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists (GC) Communication Department.
The people attending GAiN are communication directors from their local regions as well as Hope Channel and Adventist World Radio producers, administrators, internet developers, journalists, IT, software producer, etc. All of them are looking for ideas, suggestions, projects, etc. that will help them run their occupation more effectively.
The program focused on internet evangelism, under the motto “Mission First. Go forward!”, identifying the purpose of "How to find people, establish relationships, and take them to baptism," according to Williams Costa, GC Communication director.
Speakers like Kurt Kennedy, founder and CEO of Kennedy Global, Sam Neves, GC Communication Associate, Brent Hardinge, Communication Associate, David Sharpe, Center for Online Evangelism, presented topics like “branding,” “funnel marketing,” “call to action,” “digital marketing,” and “search engine optimization.”
Kurt Kennedy’s presentation focused on how the power of a brand helps give a company its value.
Sam Neves argued on the Adventist brand which doesn’t promise freedom, healing, and hope; it simply promises help in understanding the Bible. “It is Jesus who brings the freedom, healing, and hope,” explained Neves. In this way, nobody can say the Adventist brand promise failed them.
Brent Hardinge gave a presentation about the updated Adventist.org identity project. He showed participants the design principles operating on the latest website version, and its flexibility and variability. He talked about more features buttons such as signing up for a Bible study, asking for help finding a local church, etc.
David Sharpe offered two presentations about search engine optimization (the Center for Online Evangelism provides resources for church organization for their better market online) and copywriting. Sharpe presented a new pastor, Pastor Google, which he described as “the most popular pastor in the entire world, who is believed by most people before anyone else, and who freely uses non-Adventist sources to describe Adventist doctrine.” And he concluded “we need to do all we can to take control of our own story.”
Besides the presentations, digital projects have been presented to improve the “resources box” of the attendees. Some are related to a better orientation of Facebook, that resulted in about 200 baptized people and about 3159 activated Bible studies, both in South America; others are related to a better use of WhatsApp, as in Japan, where Neville Neveling showed how more than 14.000 Japanese asked to study the Bible on their cellphones.
Williams Costa gave an update on a proposed project called Adventist Communication Training, ACT, created to train local church communicators to share the gospel more effectively. The material includes study guides, interactive games, eBooks, quizzes for trainers to evaluate students, etc. The content for the training has been finished and the graphics production and all the visual characteristics are currently being created.
Words were also been spent to inform the GAiN participants of a new European General Data Protection Regulation presented by Jennifer Woods, GC General Counsel Associate. She underlined that it is important to be familiar with this data regulation and, because of its restriction, it should be given serious consideration. Infringing these new privacy laws can prompt hefty fines.
Brent Hardinge, and Costin Jordache, Adventist Review Ministries Communication and News Editor, presented the Enterprise Content Library (ECL), a shareable database for text, images, video, and metadata. The goal is to develop a culture in which Adventist news from every part of the world is available to a global audience, in various languages on a consistent and timely basis. A Global News App is going to be created where all stories will be available in one place.
GAiN Conference ended with the release of two awards. This award was established in 2008 by the GC’s Communication Department and acknowledges meritorious contribution to the church’s online ministry through internet technology. Pastor Ted Wilson, GC president, presented the awards, after confirming how much he appreciated the work of the communicators in using media to spread the gospel.
The first 2018 Award was given to Roberto Roberti, a Brazilian whose work is interacting with thousands on the South American Division’s Facebook pages.
The second 2018 Award was given to Neville Neveling, from Namibia, for his work in using WhatsApp and other social media platforms to send short sermons and other evangelistic content to many thousands of people.
GAiN conference attendees have been joining the Northern Asia-Pacific Division’s International Mission Conference for morning and evening worship programs. These are held in a large hall at the Kintex Center, and on Sabbath, everyone came together all day for special church and afternoon programs.
After a full Sabbath program shared with the Mission Congress, all GAiN attendees were taken on a trip to the Demilitarized Zone, the border with North Korea, on Sunday. Obvious comments were raised by the participants confronted with a reality that is incomprehensible, considering the social contrast between North and South Korea produced by this situation.
Williams Costa finally invited all the participants to attend the next GAiN Conference that will be held in Jordan, next February 2019.
