6 Reasons to Have a Dedicated Guest Website for Your Church

Over the years the Auxano Design team has helped churches think more strategically about guest engagement. (Read 10 Mind Blowing Facts to Fuel your Hospitality Ministry). One great idea is to create a separate website for guests. At Auxano, we call this a “buzzsite.”

To catch an example, check out Gateway’s WelcomeToYourJourney.com or First Baptist’s ExploreFirst.org

Why have a dedicated site just for guests at your church?

1) Make a Bigger Front Porch: Eighty-seven percent of your guests will click-thru before they walk-thru. Having a site dedicated to guests enables you to communicate more guest information in a more useful way.

2) Smooth the Path: Guest have mini-hurdles coming to your church for the first time. They don’t know where to go, or what to do.  A guest site will enabling them to “get a feel” ahead of time, as a simple way to make them feel more welcome.  Notice how Gateway walks your through these key guest decisions from parking lot to checking in children.

3) Show you Care: When a guest enters the dedicated site, it will show that you are expecting guests and that you care about their experience.

4) Resolve Conflict: Having a dedicated guest site alleviates the burden on your main church site to speak to both members and guests.

5) Show Some Personality: A guest site can introduce your church with with a story, promise or creative element. Gateway Community Church used the tagline “Welcome to your Journey” as their URL. It enabled the moment of introduction to include something to spark the imagination and draw people in rather than just saying “visit our church.”At First Baptist Dallas, they creatively use a “Plan Your Visit” form on their ExploreFirst.org to make the welcome experience personalized.

6) Evaluate Your Investment: A guest site can measure the effectiveness of external communication initiatives or campaigns that point to the guest site and not the church’s main site. For example, when Gateway Community Church opened its building, they could know exactly how their six-piece direct mail invitations worked by monitoring web stats when the mail dropped.

Have used a similar site? Let us know about it.

Download PDF

Tags: , , , ,

| What is MyVisionRoom? > | Back to Environments >

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Will Mancini

Will Mancini

Will Mancini wants you and your ministry to experience the benefits of stunning, God-given clarity. As a pastor turned vision coach, Will has worked with an unprecedented variety of churches from growing megachurches and missional communities, to mainline revitalization and church plants. He is the founder of Auxano, creator of VisionRoom.com and the author of God Dreams and Church Unique.

See more articles by >

COMMENTS

What say you? Leave a comment!

Recent Comments
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for this information. I'm going to use this article to improve my work with the Lord.
 
— Abel Singbeh
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you Ed for sharing your insights into the Church Growth Movement. I have my reservations with Church Growth models because it has done more damage than good in the Body of Christ. Over the years, western churches are more focused on results, formulas and processes with little or no emphasis on membership and church discipline. Pastors and vocational leaders are burnt out because they're overworked. I do believe that the Church Growth model is a catalyst to two destructive groups: The New Apostolic Reformation and the Emerging Church. Both groups overlap and have a very loose definition. They're both focus on contemporary worship, expansion of church brand (franchising), and mobilizing volunteering members as 'leaders' to grow their ministry. Little focus on biblical study, apologetics and genuine missional work with no agenda besides preaching of the gospel.
 
— Dave
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for sharing such a good article. It is a great lesson I learned from this article. I am one of the leaders in Emmanuel united church of Ethiopia (A denomination with more-than 780 local churches through out the country). I am preparing a presentation on succession planning for local church leaders. It will help me for preparation If you send me more resources and recommend me books to read on the topic. I hope we may collaborate in advancing leadership capacity of our church. God Bless You and Your Ministry.
 
— Argaw Alemu
 

Clarity Process

Three effective ways to start moving toward clarity right now.

Warning: If Your Brand is You

Here’s a principle you need to understand in leading a church, team or organization.

I see many church planters, pastors, and other leaders who build their organization closely around their own identity. They brand the church or the organization, very closely associated with their personality.

When you think of the church…you can’t help but think of them.

In fact, you may think of them even more than you do the church.

It has their flavor, their culture, their stamp. That happens naturally in leadership. It’s unavoidable to an extent. People like to follow a leader. People follow a person. But, these leaders seem to do so purposefully.

I’m not saying that’s wrong. It is certainly one option. I even encourage personal branding in this post. And it often works.

(Unless, of course, it’s done out of arrogance or in the case of the church it’s done at the exclusion of the real brand of a church…Jesus!)

But here is the warning…

If you brand something around you….

It will be harder to hand off should you ever or when you ever need to.

You can build a brand around your name, your personality, your particular flavor…

You can probably be successful at it…maybe even more successful at it.

The problem is that when you build around yourself…when you don’t give others a seat at the table of leadership…when you don’t let others share the “brand”…

…and then you leave.

What happens to the brand?

It often leaves with the one it was branded upon. Then others have to build a new brand.

Makes sense, right?

I’m not saying it’s impossible to brand around a person…lots of organizations have…some continue to be successful…it’s just more difficult. Take this blog for example. Who else wants the brand, right?

If you want the vision to last long after you are gone…

Build your brand around a vision that is bigger than you….known for more than just your name.

Read more from Ron here.

Download PDF

Tags: , , ,

| What is MyVisionRoom? > | Back to Communication >

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Ron Edmondson

Ron Edmondson

As pastor at Immanuel Baptist Church a church leader and the planter of two churches, I am passionate about planting churches, but also helping established churches thrive. I thrive on assisting pastors and those in ministry think through leadership, strategy and life. My specialty is organizational leadership, so in addition to my role as a pastor, as I have time, I consult with church and ministry leaders. (For more information about these services, click HERE.)

See more articles by >

COMMENTS

What say you? Leave a comment!

Recent Comments
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for this information. I'm going to use this article to improve my work with the Lord.
 
— Abel Singbeh
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you Ed for sharing your insights into the Church Growth Movement. I have my reservations with Church Growth models because it has done more damage than good in the Body of Christ. Over the years, western churches are more focused on results, formulas and processes with little or no emphasis on membership and church discipline. Pastors and vocational leaders are burnt out because they're overworked. I do believe that the Church Growth model is a catalyst to two destructive groups: The New Apostolic Reformation and the Emerging Church. Both groups overlap and have a very loose definition. They're both focus on contemporary worship, expansion of church brand (franchising), and mobilizing volunteering members as 'leaders' to grow their ministry. Little focus on biblical study, apologetics and genuine missional work with no agenda besides preaching of the gospel.
 
— Dave
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for sharing such a good article. It is a great lesson I learned from this article. I am one of the leaders in Emmanuel united church of Ethiopia (A denomination with more-than 780 local churches through out the country). I am preparing a presentation on succession planning for local church leaders. It will help me for preparation If you send me more resources and recommend me books to read on the topic. I hope we may collaborate in advancing leadership capacity of our church. God Bless You and Your Ministry.
 
— Argaw Alemu
 

Clarity Process

Three effective ways to start moving toward clarity right now.

What Storytelling Means for Your Brand

 What does Cinderella have in common with Fight Club?

Lots, according to Jon King, Story Worldwide’s Chief Storyteller. During the ‘Storytelling for Brands’ session at our London office last   week, part of Social Media Week London, we shared Story’s brand-centred approach to narrative content.

 

We draw our inspiration from the most important study of storytelling ever done, The Hero with a Thousand Faces, by Joseph Campbell.   Campbell’s insights have influenced and guided the approach, which he called the hero’s journey and which is used in all forms of narrative, including classic films from Cinderella to Fight Club.

The Hero’s Journey is a model story format—honed by the knowledge contained in myriad cultures and history—which follows remarkably consistent rules that reflect profound human needs. It explains the narrative structure found in the great myths, timeless fairy tales and modern action films. Here’s how Cinderella’s story maps directly onto the Hero’s Journey:

And, surprisingly, Fight Club can be mapped to exactly the same pattern (spoiler alert!!):

SO WHAT DOES THIS MEAN FOR BRANDS?

Brands are stories, effectively. At their most successful, these stories powerfully narrate the relationship between the brands and their audience(s). The most powerful brand stories, like the most engaging fairy tales, speak to fulfilling deep, unmet emotional desires.

Humans are psychologically hardwired to respond to meta-narratives that have been informed by human culture and history: the long journey home, marrying outside your tribe, the quest…It’s a search for meaning that defines what we are and want to be.

Through digital and social media, using maturing social-listening and search techniques, we can uncover and understand meta-conversations across cultures in a way that was not possible even five years ago. Tapping into these conversations reveals the current mind-sets of different audience segments and reveals their deeper unsatisfied emotional needs, providing a rich seam of consumer insight that brands can use to learn the best way to position and promote their stories to create value for themselves as well as their consumers.

Once marketers understand which aspect of the brand consumers really identify and engage with, the next step is to plan and shape the conversation between brand and audience over time. This content plan’s sole purpose is to bring the brand’s story to life across every touchpoint between consumer and brand, in the real and digital worlds.

In the Social Media Week session, we shared some of our latest thinking on the social multiplier effect (Kirk Cheyfitz will be publishing more on this topic soon)—which is the process of using digital to leverage a brand’s fans so they make the brand story genuinely contagious, delivering exponential return for the brand and lowering media spend dramatically.

According to Nielsen, recommendations are roughly twice as trusted as advertising. Add to this Forrester Research’s recent studies of how social fans share brand stories through their networks, and you’ll see the beginnings of the compound multiplier effect. But greater trust and greater reach are totally dependent on how interesting, credible, useful and, most of all, contagious the content is as well as where it’s shared and promoted.

THE ROLE OF TRADITIONAL ADVERTISING

This is not to say that we should dismiss years of established traditional advertising knowledge and practice. Traditional advertising still has a role to play, as has been proven by one or two stunningly effective long-term brand campaigns—Sainsbury’s ‘Try Something New Today’ being a perfect case in point. A few years ago, Sainsbury’s deployed a simple but rich ‘big idea’ to impressive effect across its brand ecosystem, extending it across everything from integrated comms to internal staff engagement. The campaign makes an eloquent case for the age-old marketing practice of delving deep into a brand to uncover an idea so broad and powerful that people, consumers and staff, can’t help but listen and act.

But brand work like this, despite London’s prominent place in the global advertising industry, is the exception rather than the rule. It is noteworthy precisely because it is rare and because it depends heavily on constant support by large amounts of paid media.

So think how valuable, for both brand and consumers, a rich and satisfying brand story can be, and how powerful its impact can be as it is spread across the media ecosystem by brand advocates who share with their far-flung social networks using the latest developments in social and mobile. Such contagious brand stories spread on their own as a matter of routine, gaining currency by tapping into ongoing conversations and multiplying across social networks at extremely low cost. That is the present and, increasingly, the future of the new advertising. And that is a story every brand will find well worth telling.

So what’s your story?

Download PDF

Tags: , ,

| What is MyVisionRoom? > | Back to Communication >

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Jon Thomas

See more articles by >

COMMENTS

What say you? Leave a comment!

Recent Comments
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for this information. I'm going to use this article to improve my work with the Lord.
 
— Abel Singbeh
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you Ed for sharing your insights into the Church Growth Movement. I have my reservations with Church Growth models because it has done more damage than good in the Body of Christ. Over the years, western churches are more focused on results, formulas and processes with little or no emphasis on membership and church discipline. Pastors and vocational leaders are burnt out because they're overworked. I do believe that the Church Growth model is a catalyst to two destructive groups: The New Apostolic Reformation and the Emerging Church. Both groups overlap and have a very loose definition. They're both focus on contemporary worship, expansion of church brand (franchising), and mobilizing volunteering members as 'leaders' to grow their ministry. Little focus on biblical study, apologetics and genuine missional work with no agenda besides preaching of the gospel.
 
— Dave
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for sharing such a good article. It is a great lesson I learned from this article. I am one of the leaders in Emmanuel united church of Ethiopia (A denomination with more-than 780 local churches through out the country). I am preparing a presentation on succession planning for local church leaders. It will help me for preparation If you send me more resources and recommend me books to read on the topic. I hope we may collaborate in advancing leadership capacity of our church. God Bless You and Your Ministry.
 
— Argaw Alemu
 

Clarity Process

Three effective ways to start moving toward clarity right now.

The Top 3 Approaches to a Multisite Church Website

The multisite revolution is underway as more churches nationwide are choosing to launch new campuses. According to Outreach Magazine, 75 of the 100 Largest Churches in America are multisite. There are myriad reasons to explain this transition, the biggest one being the cost efficiency to broaden the church’s reach. Regardless of why, the trend continues.

The idea of “one church, multiple locations” isn’t new to the local church. In fact, it’s as old as the New Testament itself. Perhaps that’s why multisite churches baptize more people, have more volunteers, and produce more diverse communities than single-site churches.

With all the positives, having multiple sites creates unique and specific challenges for churches seeking to organize content, provide value, and accomplish missional goals with their website.

At MonkDev we help thousands of churches use technology to further the gospel. Lately, more of our clients are coming from a multisite community. We partner with these churches to help build out a web strategy that appropriately translates their organization’s mission online. (If that interests you, click here to learn about our Web Strategy Services for Churches.)

We want to spend the next few weeks exploring multisite web presence trends. We’ll unpack one example each week. This week, I’ll provide a brief outline of the specific examples we’re seeing in multisite communities.

Here they are from least common to most:

Trend #1: Universal Website – Multicampus Information

The least common method is to have a universal website representing the entire church while listing information for different campuses in the navigation. This approach works well in a densely-populated area where events throughout the week are available to all and are less “campus” dependent.

The challenge here is usability. This approach requires users to determine what context the content or events apply to. If they aren’t familiar with your community, they may choose not to participate at all.

Trend #2: Standalone Campus Websites

This method works well when one church has multiple locations with separate preaching pastors and/or leadership teams. A church can convey that, while they are bound together in mission, each location has a unique identity. Locations have greater autonomy in developing their web presence.

The challenge presented with this approach is website management. Many church teams struggle with keeping content fresh on one site. Managing multiple websites can add significant content challenges. Be sure to keep cost in mind!

Trend #3: Universal Website – Campus Select Option

This approach is the most common of the three we’ve listed. The biggest benefit here is clearly identifying your site locations and asking you user to self-identify with one of them. Teams managing the website also benefit from keeping church branding uniform. Content is managed easier with this approach, as one person can push content to multiple sites.

Conversely, if you’re not working with a CMS (a content management system like Ekklesia360) with this strategy, you run the risk of duplicating content, pages, etc.

 

Conclusion on Multisite Web Presence Strategies

Churches who choose multisite have much to think about. According to our own research, 51% of members and visitors stated the church’s website was somewhat to very important in their decision to attend the church. That number, by the way, keeps increasing.

If you’re a member of a multisite community, or even considering it, this blog series will be important for you to follow in the weeks ahead.

To begin this series, go here.

Read more from Justin here.

 

Download PDF

Tags: , , , ,

| What is MyVisionRoom? > | Back to Communication >

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Justin Wise

See more articles by >

COMMENTS

What say you? Leave a comment!

Recent Comments
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for this information. I'm going to use this article to improve my work with the Lord.
 
— Abel Singbeh
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you Ed for sharing your insights into the Church Growth Movement. I have my reservations with Church Growth models because it has done more damage than good in the Body of Christ. Over the years, western churches are more focused on results, formulas and processes with little or no emphasis on membership and church discipline. Pastors and vocational leaders are burnt out because they're overworked. I do believe that the Church Growth model is a catalyst to two destructive groups: The New Apostolic Reformation and the Emerging Church. Both groups overlap and have a very loose definition. They're both focus on contemporary worship, expansion of church brand (franchising), and mobilizing volunteering members as 'leaders' to grow their ministry. Little focus on biblical study, apologetics and genuine missional work with no agenda besides preaching of the gospel.
 
— Dave
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for sharing such a good article. It is a great lesson I learned from this article. I am one of the leaders in Emmanuel united church of Ethiopia (A denomination with more-than 780 local churches through out the country). I am preparing a presentation on succession planning for local church leaders. It will help me for preparation If you send me more resources and recommend me books to read on the topic. I hope we may collaborate in advancing leadership capacity of our church. God Bless You and Your Ministry.
 
— Argaw Alemu
 

Clarity Process

Three effective ways to start moving toward clarity right now.

Multisite Church Website Approach 1: Keep It Under One Roof

Multisite church planting has gone mainstream. As goes the church, so goes the website. We’re going to go in-depth with the Universal Website with Multicampus Information approach.

As we stated in the introduction to this series, the advantage to this type of site is having all the information under one digital content roof. It works extremely well in densely-populated areas where events throughout the week are available to all and are less campus dependent.

In most cases, the reasons for going multisite revolve around cost efficiency to broaden reach. Why have people drive 30 minutes to a campus when they can drive five and bring more of their neighbors with them?

If, however, a church is in a densely populated area, and mass transit is readily available, the geographical area to work within is much smaller.

Mutlisite communities like this can “blend together” without the need for developing separate identities for each campus. A member might participate in the men’s ministry at one campus and worship at another. Why? The campus for men’s ministry is closer to their work and the worship community campus is closer to their house. Convenience plays a larger factor in church attendance than most would care to admit.

Here are a few examples to consider as you map out your multisite website. While these churches are located in larger population centers, this approach can also be adapted for smaller communities. (For instance, The Leadership Network released a survey that said the median size today for a multisite church is 1,300 attendees.)

Park Community Church – Chicago, IL

When you click the campus links at the top of the page, Park Community Church shows you a “snapshot” for each location.

Each site displays the latest message, a featured event, contact information, and physical address. Great for gauging which location is most relevant for the user.

 

Redeemer Presbyterian Church – New York City, NY

Redeemer Presbyterian gathers all of their campus information onto one main site. The upper left corner allows users to sift through content for each campus using tabs. The benefit of this approach having all church-related content under one “roof.” The URL is fantastic as well!

 

Woodlands Church – Woodlands, TX

Woodlands Church lists all of their campuses on one page, giving the addresses, phone numbers, and service times for each location.

Once you’ve located a campus that works, you can view the events for that location. Best feature? The ability to filter events by ministry areas. This approach keeps users in one location, cutting down on distraction and location confusion.

Conclusion

If you’re looking for an easy to way to start with a multisite church website, this approach may be best for you. Leave the microsite and stand-alone site planning for later.

Read the Introduction to this series here; read Part 2 here.

Read more from Justin here.

Download PDF

Tags: , , , , ,

| What is MyVisionRoom? > | Back to Communication >

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Justin Wise

See more articles by >

COMMENTS

What say you? Leave a comment!

Recent Comments
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for this information. I'm going to use this article to improve my work with the Lord.
 
— Abel Singbeh
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you Ed for sharing your insights into the Church Growth Movement. I have my reservations with Church Growth models because it has done more damage than good in the Body of Christ. Over the years, western churches are more focused on results, formulas and processes with little or no emphasis on membership and church discipline. Pastors and vocational leaders are burnt out because they're overworked. I do believe that the Church Growth model is a catalyst to two destructive groups: The New Apostolic Reformation and the Emerging Church. Both groups overlap and have a very loose definition. They're both focus on contemporary worship, expansion of church brand (franchising), and mobilizing volunteering members as 'leaders' to grow their ministry. Little focus on biblical study, apologetics and genuine missional work with no agenda besides preaching of the gospel.
 
— Dave
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for sharing such a good article. It is a great lesson I learned from this article. I am one of the leaders in Emmanuel united church of Ethiopia (A denomination with more-than 780 local churches through out the country). I am preparing a presentation on succession planning for local church leaders. It will help me for preparation If you send me more resources and recommend me books to read on the topic. I hope we may collaborate in advancing leadership capacity of our church. God Bless You and Your Ministry.
 
— Argaw Alemu
 

Clarity Process

Three effective ways to start moving toward clarity right now.

Multisite Church Website Approach 2: Standalone Sites

We continue our Multisite Church Website series this week by looking at “Standalone Sites.” This is when churches choose to create separate sites for each one of their campuses. (By contrast, you might want to revisit last week’s post on churches who keep all campuses under one digital “roof.”)

This method works well when one church has multiple locations with separate preaching pastors and/or leadership teams. A church can convey that, while they are bound together in mission, each location has a unique identity. Locations have greater autonomy in developing their web presence.

We are working with Harbor Presbyterian here in San Diego to implement this strategy. Harbor chose this method because while it’s one church community, each campus has its own preaching pastor and leadership team.

At Harbor, each campus serves as a local area church with shared central services. Additionally, each campus has its own visual brand, contextualizing each campus for the communities they seek to reach. The church has seven locations and is launching new ones each year, with some being as far as an hour apart.

Here’s what their main site looks like. Note the different locations:

 

 

The Chula Vista site:

 

It should be noted that this approach requires a healthy amount of resources. With separate sites, each online outpost must be managed individually. Content creation, design, and updates must be accounted for on each site.

Aside from Harbor, here are a few more examples of churches who use the “Standalone Site” approach for their multisite website strategy.

 

Multisite Church Website Example – Highland Park

While Highland doesn’t have a true standalone solution, I chose to include it because each campus site is designed differently. Visually, they’re telling the user these faith communities are different. Some of campuses have their own microsite while others exist as a page on the main site. The giveaway is the URL structure.

Here’s the main site:

 

Here’s the page for one of their more modern worship communities.

 

Multisite Church Website Example – Woodlands United Methodist

The Woodlands has a structure similar to Highland Park. The separate campus has it’s own website, URL, and theme. Visually speaking there are similarities between the main site and the Loft campus. They are distinct enough to communicate a difference.

The main site.

 

The Loft Campus site.

 

Conclusion

The Standalone Solution would work well for churches who have more of a distributed ministry model. Each campus would be responsible for updating its own content, sermons, events, and ministry info. The downside? It can take more internal resources to manage and execute effectively.

To read the previous posts in this series: Introduction; Part 1. To read Part 3, go here.
To read more from Justin, go here.
Download PDF

Tags: , , , , ,

| What is MyVisionRoom? > | Back to Communication >

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Justin Wise

See more articles by >

COMMENTS

What say you? Leave a comment!

Recent Comments
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for this information. I'm going to use this article to improve my work with the Lord.
 
— Abel Singbeh
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you Ed for sharing your insights into the Church Growth Movement. I have my reservations with Church Growth models because it has done more damage than good in the Body of Christ. Over the years, western churches are more focused on results, formulas and processes with little or no emphasis on membership and church discipline. Pastors and vocational leaders are burnt out because they're overworked. I do believe that the Church Growth model is a catalyst to two destructive groups: The New Apostolic Reformation and the Emerging Church. Both groups overlap and have a very loose definition. They're both focus on contemporary worship, expansion of church brand (franchising), and mobilizing volunteering members as 'leaders' to grow their ministry. Little focus on biblical study, apologetics and genuine missional work with no agenda besides preaching of the gospel.
 
— Dave
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for sharing such a good article. It is a great lesson I learned from this article. I am one of the leaders in Emmanuel united church of Ethiopia (A denomination with more-than 780 local churches through out the country). I am preparing a presentation on succession planning for local church leaders. It will help me for preparation If you send me more resources and recommend me books to read on the topic. I hope we may collaborate in advancing leadership capacity of our church. God Bless You and Your Ministry.
 
— Argaw Alemu
 

Clarity Process

Three effective ways to start moving toward clarity right now.

Multisite Church Website Approach 3: Campus Select Option

We conclude our series on Multisite Church Websites with the most common approach of the three, the Universal Website with a campus select option.

One of the most well-known examples of this approach comes from The Village Church in Flower Mound, TX. Let’s jump right in, shall we?

Here’s how you’re greeted the first time you visit the church’s website:

Before you go any further into the site, you’re asked to pick a default campus. This approach works best if you identify clearly where the various campuses are located, as The Village Church has done.

f someone is visiting the site for the first time, they may know nothing about your church and simply want to find the location that’s closest to them. This approach helps them do that immediately and then tailors the web experience for them moving forward.

After you pick a location for The Village Church, your browser automatically remembers your choice each time you come back. If you need to change campuses, you can. Just use the campus selector at the top.

The biggest benefit to this approach is clearly identifying your site locations and asking you user to self-identify with one of them. Teams managing the website also benefit from keeping church branding uniform. Content is managed easier with this approach, as one person can push content to multiple sites.

Here are some other examples of churches using the Universal Website with campus select option:

Biltmore Baptist Church

As you hover over each location, it displays when services are held, what the physical location is, and a link to Google maps. In the case of the online campus, it displays a countdown timer that shows when the next service will go live. Very helpful.

Calvary Chapel Fort Lauderdale

Calvary Chapel Fort Lauderdale helps you to immediately identify what location is nearest/most relevant for you. The “Times & Campuses” tab is prominently displayed in the navigation.

Click on it and you get this beautiful mega nav drop down:

Once you’ve found the church nearest you, you can quickly get to know who is behind each location without having to leave the page.

Conclusion

Building an online presence for multisite churches takes considerable planning, resources, and attention. Coordinating communication efforts across locations, whether two or 20, means forming an organizational-wide strategy and sticking to it. Ministry can, and does, happen online. Help your multisite church accomplish goals by having the right online strategy in place.

This concludes the series. To read prior posts: Introduction; Part 1; Part 2.

Read more from Justin here.

Download PDF

Tags: , , , , ,

| What is MyVisionRoom? > | Back to Communication >

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Justin Wise

See more articles by >

COMMENTS

What say you? Leave a comment!

Recent Comments
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for this information. I'm going to use this article to improve my work with the Lord.
 
— Abel Singbeh
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you Ed for sharing your insights into the Church Growth Movement. I have my reservations with Church Growth models because it has done more damage than good in the Body of Christ. Over the years, western churches are more focused on results, formulas and processes with little or no emphasis on membership and church discipline. Pastors and vocational leaders are burnt out because they're overworked. I do believe that the Church Growth model is a catalyst to two destructive groups: The New Apostolic Reformation and the Emerging Church. Both groups overlap and have a very loose definition. They're both focus on contemporary worship, expansion of church brand (franchising), and mobilizing volunteering members as 'leaders' to grow their ministry. Little focus on biblical study, apologetics and genuine missional work with no agenda besides preaching of the gospel.
 
— Dave
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for sharing such a good article. It is a great lesson I learned from this article. I am one of the leaders in Emmanuel united church of Ethiopia (A denomination with more-than 780 local churches through out the country). I am preparing a presentation on succession planning for local church leaders. It will help me for preparation If you send me more resources and recommend me books to read on the topic. I hope we may collaborate in advancing leadership capacity of our church. God Bless You and Your Ministry.
 
— Argaw Alemu
 

Clarity Process

Three effective ways to start moving toward clarity right now.

Isn’t About Time Your Brand Adopted a Mobile Strategy?

I received a sobering yet enlightening Facebook message from my aunt two weeks ago. After getting over my shock that she even knew how to use Facebook Messenger (she is not a technophile), I read her message:

Aunt: Guess what I got today?
Me: What?
Aunt: The iPhone 5
[cue jaw dropping]

I was reading this on my iPhone 3Gs, yet I’m the one who works at a global post-advertising agency. That’s when I knew it: Mobile has reached significant penetration and can’t be ignored by brands.

There’s more proof than just the fact that my aunt owns her first smartphone (three generations newer than my own). This past Monday, during a panel discussion of mobile marketing at OMMA Global (where Story happened to take home an OMMA award), moderator Matthew Snyder, founder-CEO of ADObjects, Inc., said, “We’ve been hearing since 1995 that next year would be the year of mobile adoption and exponential growth. I think 2010 was finally that year, and now we’re moving toward the next stage of mobile innovation.”

The stats back Snyder up. According to the Flurry Blog, 78 percent of U.S. adults between 15 and 64 years old own a smart device of some kind. The adoption rate of iOS and Android devices has surpassed that of any consumer technology in history; it’s 10 times faster than the one that marked the ’80s’ PC revolution.

A July 2012 survey by Google found that 67 percent of users surveyed are more likely to buy from a mobile-friendly site than they are from one that’s unfriendly, and 61 percent of users surveyed said they’d leave a website if they couldn’t quickly find what they were looking for. So if your site isn’t optimized for a mobile device, then you may as well just redirect your customers to your competition.

A FLAT TIRE

What Zappos.com is to your feet, TireRack.com is to your car. When I blew out the rear right tire on my car last week (pictured at left), I was instantly in the market for new tires. As I sat on the train yesterday, I thought I’d price tires on TireRack.com and possibly purchase them right there. But its website completely ignores the mobile visitor. Instead of a seamless mobile version, I got the full site, which took ages to load and had me zooming and swiping all over the page. I made it only halfway through the search process before I boiled over with frustration and gave up.

I could just have waited until I got to my laptop, but by then it was too late: My installer had already gotten back to me with prices, and I ordered through him. Data from Viacom indicates that 96 percent of tablet owners in the United States use their devices in their living rooms. Even when laptops or desktops are near, users still turn to their smart devices.

I’d been there on TireRack.com, on my phone, with time to kill and a need to fill, and the sale was lost because of a bad mobile experience. The value of e-commerce is in its 24/7/365 nature. Without mobile optimization, TireRack is leaving money on the table.

Speaking of Zappos, its mobile site is fantastic, and it also offers an iPhone application. The search function (for the mobile site) is right on the front page (see image at top of post) and has big buttons and simple criteria. No extra fluff, just a smooth user experience that creates the shortest path between customer interest and product sale.

WHAT IT MEANS FOR YOUR BRAND

Given that there are businesses that still don’t believe they need websites at all, it may seem premature to try to move the masses toward mobile development. But for most brands, having a website, even one that’s continually updated with fresh content (for inbound marketing and SEO purposes), isn’t enough anymore.

If your brand values consistent and recurring engagement, you’re doing it a disservice by creating a torturous (read: non–mobile optimized) mobile experience for your audience. Mobile optimization is not just for e-commerce sites, either. It’s for all sites. The fact that smart devices can access full websites doesn’t mean that the experience translates well. On the contrary, it rarely does. In fact, PostAdvertising.com is very bad as a full-site web experience, which is why it’s optimized for mobile and available as an iPhone and iPad application.

IT’S ABOUT TIME

Whether they concern moving a print magazine to the iPad, creating a mobile-friendly e-commerce site or constructing a stand-alone mobile application, these statistics and stories are, as Google put it, “a sobering reminder of just how quickly and deeply users’ attitudes about companies can be shaped by mobile site experiences.”

How has your brand embraced the mobile world?

Read more from Jon here.


Download PDF

Tags: , , , ,

| What is MyVisionRoom? > | Back to Communication >

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Jon Thomas

See more articles by >

COMMENTS

What say you? Leave a comment!

Recent Comments
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for this information. I'm going to use this article to improve my work with the Lord.
 
— Abel Singbeh
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you Ed for sharing your insights into the Church Growth Movement. I have my reservations with Church Growth models because it has done more damage than good in the Body of Christ. Over the years, western churches are more focused on results, formulas and processes with little or no emphasis on membership and church discipline. Pastors and vocational leaders are burnt out because they're overworked. I do believe that the Church Growth model is a catalyst to two destructive groups: The New Apostolic Reformation and the Emerging Church. Both groups overlap and have a very loose definition. They're both focus on contemporary worship, expansion of church brand (franchising), and mobilizing volunteering members as 'leaders' to grow their ministry. Little focus on biblical study, apologetics and genuine missional work with no agenda besides preaching of the gospel.
 
— Dave
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for sharing such a good article. It is a great lesson I learned from this article. I am one of the leaders in Emmanuel united church of Ethiopia (A denomination with more-than 780 local churches through out the country). I am preparing a presentation on succession planning for local church leaders. It will help me for preparation If you send me more resources and recommend me books to read on the topic. I hope we may collaborate in advancing leadership capacity of our church. God Bless You and Your Ministry.
 
— Argaw Alemu
 

Clarity Process

Three effective ways to start moving toward clarity right now.

Renegades Write the Rules

Amy Jo Martin (@AmyJoMartin) has written a book about connecting. About being human. Renegades Write the Rules is about how to connect with other people using the medium of social media. But you’ll find you can apply the principles in many other ways too.

She stresses the importance of just being you. Especially when it comes to exposing yourself using social media, that can be an uncomfortable place. “We all have the tendency toward the creation of a veneered version of our brands that we think is more acceptable, more compelling, more marketable to our audience. … Ultimately it makes you less human.”

You begin by using social media to listen; to find out what matters to your audience. And then consistently deliver it.

Importantly she notes, “Being excellent still earns an audience these days, but to keep them and attract more requires giving them something more personal….Without the ability to nurture loyalty through human connection, your brand’s value relies solely on performance.” Let that sink in. People don’t buy your what, they buy your why. 

Martin takes you through 8 essential renegade rules using good examples from her own experience and the organizations and people she has worked with like Dwayne Johnson (@TheRock), Shaq (@shaq), and Tony Hsieh (@TonyHsieh). Her philosophy is that “Renegades experiment and fail early so when everyone else jumps on the bandwagon, their best practices are being polished while others’ are just starting to fail. Sometimes it’s not about being the best or smartest; it’s about being the first to try and the first to learn from failure.”

I found all of the chapters helpful, but one of my favorite sections came in the appendix. Martin shares fifteen lessons she wishes she had known from the beginning. Here are eight of them:

  1. Where passion, skill, and purpose collide, bliss resides.
  2. Beware of the shiny object syndrome (SOS). It’s important to know the difference between an opportunity and a distraction.
  3. You can color outside the lines without crossing the line. Disruption and destruction have two different outcomes.
  4. Learn how to push your own buttons. It’s important to motivate and inspire yourself. Everyone else is busy.
  5. A five-degree shift changes your entire trajectory.
  6. Your hustle factor is often your differentiating factor. Work hard.
  7. Learn to control your thoughts and you will be free.
  8. Don’t forget the importance of your personal brand. Your personality, confidence, and the way you conduct yourself define your brand. You can always improve it.
Download PDF

Tags: , , , ,

| What is MyVisionRoom? > | Back to Communication >

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Michael McKinney

See more articles by >

COMMENTS

What say you? Leave a comment!

Recent Comments
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for this information. I'm going to use this article to improve my work with the Lord.
 
— Abel Singbeh
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you Ed for sharing your insights into the Church Growth Movement. I have my reservations with Church Growth models because it has done more damage than good in the Body of Christ. Over the years, western churches are more focused on results, formulas and processes with little or no emphasis on membership and church discipline. Pastors and vocational leaders are burnt out because they're overworked. I do believe that the Church Growth model is a catalyst to two destructive groups: The New Apostolic Reformation and the Emerging Church. Both groups overlap and have a very loose definition. They're both focus on contemporary worship, expansion of church brand (franchising), and mobilizing volunteering members as 'leaders' to grow their ministry. Little focus on biblical study, apologetics and genuine missional work with no agenda besides preaching of the gospel.
 
— Dave
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for sharing such a good article. It is a great lesson I learned from this article. I am one of the leaders in Emmanuel united church of Ethiopia (A denomination with more-than 780 local churches through out the country). I am preparing a presentation on succession planning for local church leaders. It will help me for preparation If you send me more resources and recommend me books to read on the topic. I hope we may collaborate in advancing leadership capacity of our church. God Bless You and Your Ministry.
 
— Argaw Alemu
 

Clarity Process

Three effective ways to start moving toward clarity right now.

3 Communication Lessons from iPhone Launches

It seems like every 6 months Apple does it again.  Somehow they are able to capture the imagination of literally millions of people to get them to line up at their stores to purchase the latest version of their devices.  It’s breath taking.  It’s beyond just a successful business and is moving into a cultural defining experience.  ”Have you stood in line for an iPhone?”  Just this past Sunday I heard of a kid who is going as a “Mac Genius” for Halloween this year!

What lessons can we pull out from the way that Apple rolls out it’s new iPhones for the way we roll out launches at our churches?

  • Earn the Right to be Heard Again. // When the first iPhone came out the world celebrated that Apple sold 1 million units in 74 days. The iPhone 3g took just 3 days to get to 1 million units.  The iPhone 5 sold a staggering 5 million units in the first 3 days. Apple has successfully released multiple generations of a “wow experience” to it’s users.  This has earned them momentum and creditability for every subsequent release.  Apple does more than just hype it’s release … it delivers on an excellent experience.  They are known for that delivery and therefore people believe the hype the next time around.  Are we delivering an experience that matches our hype? Is that event really “an amazing spiritual growth opportunity?” Will the kids day camp really “make memories that will last a lifetime?” When our execution matches our communication it creates a virtuous loop where people are more willing to listen to our communication in the future.

 

  • Their Solution Matches Our Problems // Apple has always had a keen ability to see through the typically “technobabble” and actually communicate to the public that their solution solves our problems.  The features of their products line up with real world needs (or wants) of real people. They are masters are connecting the dots between what they have made and how that will help us in our lives. Are being clear “what’s in it for our them” or are we simply describing our solution to our people?  Do people really want a 10 week study on Biblical financial stewardship or do they really just want to know how to get out of debt? Our small groups are great places to meet people, grow spiritually and serve the community … but do folks in our church perceive that they want to meet people, grow spiritually and serve the community? Do we spend enough time explaining the benefits of our ministry to people and not just the features that it includes? Our communication needs to framed primarily from the place of those people listening to it and not from our position as the communicator.

 

  • Hype Works. // Apple focuses the release of products to generate hype.  They understand that the picture of people standing in lines to buy their product is a powerful image for creating purchasing momentum and craft their launches around that hype.  During a previous iPhone launch they even set up a temporary store within walking distance from a massive tech/culture conference to make sure that those clients could stand in line and wait for a phone. When Hollywood releases a movie they gear their marketing efforts to focus a response from the public on opening weekend. Even authors have picked up on the fact that generating a lot of initial sales for their books is a way to earn credibility and sales. Do our launches create this sense of urgency? When we announce the upcoming massive community service opportunity do have laptops waiting the lobby after the service to sign people up right away? Or what if when students signed up for that retreat they received a killer t-shirt they’d actually want to wear to build interest and identification? If it matters to the future of your church … generating and focusing anticipation needs to be a tool in your communications belt.

 

Our “product” is so much more important than a 0.5 inch bigger screen on a smart phone. Our job is to help people connect with Jesus in a way that sees life transformation that ripples beyond them to their family, community and the world!

I look forward to the day when people are lined up around the block to get into your next ministry initiative! 

Read more from Rich here.

Download PDF

Tags: , , ,

| What is MyVisionRoom? > | Back to Communication >

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Rich Birch

Rich Birch

Thanks so much for dropping by unseminary … I hope that your able to find some resources that help you lead your church better in the coming days! I’ve been involved in church leadership for over 15 years. Early on I had the privilege of leading in one of the very first multisite churches in North Amerca. I led the charge in helping The Meeting House in Toronto to become the leading multi-site church in Canada with over 4,000 people in 6 locations. (Today they are 13 locations with somewhere over 5,000 people attending.) In addition, I served on the leadership team of Connexus Community Church in Ontario, a North Point Community Church Strategic Partner. I currently serves as Operations Pastor at Liquid Church in the Manhattan facing suburbs of New Jersey. I have a dual vocational background that uniquely positions me for serving churches to multiply impact. While in the marketplace, I founded a dot-com with two partners in the late 90’s that worked to increase value for media firms and internet service providers. I’m married to Christine and we live in Scotch Plains, NJ with their two children and one dog.

See more articles by >

COMMENTS

What say you? Leave a comment!

Kevin Persinger — 03/30/13 7:27 am

Brother just came across your stuff on vision room. Wow good stuff ..get tired of hearing same old thing all the time ..you are putting some good stuff Out there ...I am working on outreach in my comm. this summer ..we are working hard on this ...but u have fire me up to make sure my Execution matches my communication that I communicate to the church and the comm...but what I communicate only what I can Execute ...wow ..I need to make sure my talk matchs my waLk ...but also DreaM big ...and Execute big ....thanks...Pastor Kevin ?.let me know u got this ...thanks

Mr. Steven Finkill — 11/05/12 8:23 am

Great article about Apple, the masters of buzz-generation. Especially the first point is critical, though. Creating buzz about something that isn't buzz-worthy will only hurt you in the long run. You've got to start by DOING something that is buzz-worthy. For some of the churches I've been a part of, that has been the main challenge.

Recent Comments
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for this information. I'm going to use this article to improve my work with the Lord.
 
— Abel Singbeh
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you Ed for sharing your insights into the Church Growth Movement. I have my reservations with Church Growth models because it has done more damage than good in the Body of Christ. Over the years, western churches are more focused on results, formulas and processes with little or no emphasis on membership and church discipline. Pastors and vocational leaders are burnt out because they're overworked. I do believe that the Church Growth model is a catalyst to two destructive groups: The New Apostolic Reformation and the Emerging Church. Both groups overlap and have a very loose definition. They're both focus on contemporary worship, expansion of church brand (franchising), and mobilizing volunteering members as 'leaders' to grow their ministry. Little focus on biblical study, apologetics and genuine missional work with no agenda besides preaching of the gospel.
 
— Dave
 
comment_post_ID); ?> Thank you for sharing such a good article. It is a great lesson I learned from this article. I am one of the leaders in Emmanuel united church of Ethiopia (A denomination with more-than 780 local churches through out the country). I am preparing a presentation on succession planning for local church leaders. It will help me for preparation If you send me more resources and recommend me books to read on the topic. I hope we may collaborate in advancing leadership capacity of our church. God Bless You and Your Ministry.
 
— Argaw Alemu
 

Clarity Process

Three effective ways to start moving toward clarity right now.