Church Web Strategies Podcast

How does your church website engage the youngest members of your church? It does not. It engages the parents of those members. So how do you reach them? With regular contact and reminders about the lesson that was started during Sunday School and how it should continue the rest of the week. Below are a few ways your church can incorporate Sunday school into everyday life. Topics covered include Daily Notes Weekly Reminders Monthly Digests Action item What tempo of Email newsletter would benefit your church? What tempo can your team sustain? Will your members embrace Email updates? Can you switch from printed material to Email content, and remind your audience that they have a responsibility in raising their children in the faith as much as the Sunday School teachers do? If so, ask your audience to subscribe to a pace they feel comfortable with; whether that be daily, weekly, or monthly. Then sit back and watch your audience grow and flourish. Referenced Articles My article “Taking the Sunday out of Sunday School“

One problem most churches face is consistent content production. Regular updates tell users you are an active congregation, regardless of your size. It also gives search engines new pages to index. Plus, active pages rank higher in search results. But who has the time to create regular updates? You do. In this podcast I will tell you where you can easily repurpose content for multiple channels of communication. Topics covered include Using content from sermons Teasing out content from bulletins Action item You are already creating sermons and bulletins. So why not use these two sources of content to breathe new life into your stagnant website or social media campaign. Many of these steps can be automated and scheduled ahead of time. Your website staff can set these up on Monday, and have the rest of the week to focus on larger strategic endeavors. So get moving, get that content out there, and grow your church online! Referenced Articles My article “Repurposing Your Content for Maximum Impact“

There are two ways to have more money in a business; increase your intake, and decrease your costs. Churches often look at how they can bring in more money through donations and fundraisers. Cutting costs is more difficult to swallow, as many churches are already running on tight budgets. By utilizing tools to increase productivity of the existing staff, you can avoid job and salary cuts while still advancing your ministries. Topics covered include Centralized Information Personal Information Templates and Logos Data and Reports Tools and Collaboration Software Repository Document Collaboration Action item Instead of cutting staff, or trying to raise more money to cover costs; try to allow your existing staff to be more productive. As I explained, one such way is setting up an intranet or at least utilizing a centralized collection of tools. The one word of caution here is security. Many of these documents contain sensitive information. Make sure you access to these documents is restricted to those that truly need the information. After that is squared away, see where these improvements can be made and help streamline processes before you cut jobs. Referenced Articles My article “Does Your Church Need an Intranet?“

Are you updating your church website? Most likely unless you just completed a major release, you are probably in the middle of some sort of update. The more important question is has your release date slowly crept backward as you find more things to change? Scope creep is dangerous as hard work you already accomplished is sitting idle. In this episode I will explore when it is acceptable to launch website updates. Topics covered include Missing content Missing graphics Missing functionality Action item What is holding your website update from launching? Is it a major setback or something that only seems like a big problem. Take a step back and see if it is better than what currently exists. If so, publish it. Having something that truthfully answers some of your visitor’s questions is better than having something that tells none of the story. Referenced Articles My article “When To Launch Your Church Website Update“

Ready to add online donations to your website and social media campaigns? You may have wanted to start on this step of picking a credit card processor. Yet this article is to be more of a reminder that you need to do some work in parallel. While your technical and financial teams sort out what makes sense, your writers and communications team has some work. Dig into the first three episodes of the series. If you are a one person team? Well I have no consolation prize or special advice. Get listening and get to work! Topics Covered Gather your information. You will need financial and contact information to be right in front of you. Many services cater to churches. This will require you submit proof that you are a non-profit organization. Gather all that paperwork, and scan documents ahead of time if necessary. Then research and pick a service. The ones I found are as follows: E-Giving Givelify MoGiv PayItSquare PayPal SimpleGive Tithe.ly WePay Action Item Check out each of the listed services and see who has the best rates and conditions for your church. You may also want to research their integration methods. If you are using a platform such as WordPress, an official plugin may be available. Then before you take the plunge, get your contact and financial information together.

Last week I re-launched the podcast with a special episode on my professional journey. This week I delve into how my faith journey is so intricately woven into that same story. How a spiraling career led me back to God. Then, with perfect timing, I took my life in a completely new direction. Finally, I explain that my revival in faith led to this blog and podcast. I hope everyone enjoyed hearing about how I wandered into the world of UX. But that journey is incomplete if I do not mention my faith. I did not want to share this story to make me seem like a good guy. I am not. I wanted to let you know that like my career, my faith has had many twists and turns It is full of successes and failures. But by God’s grace, one that continues to get better overall. So please indulge me one more time and listen to this second half of my story. Next week I promise we will get back into website stuff!

In this episode I restart my podcast with a special message. I summarize my professional journey. This isn’t to just talk about me. I want to add some credibility to this blog and podcast. Plus I hope to inspire you to share your journey and experience with others. This focuses on just my professional career. Next episode will delve into my spiritual journey. They are deeply connected, and were difficult to separate. I tried to highlight my first interests in computers, to my job today as a user experience architect. Thank you for listening and I hope you enjoy it!

When you ask for donations on your church website, it matters as to how much you ask for. By pairing a suggested donation amount with a type of donation, you not only influence how many people give, but how much they finally give. I will explore methods and explain how they can be best utilized. Topics covered include Blank Donation Values Locked Donation Values Guided Donations Action Item Consider the types of donations you wish to ask for, then see how different conventions can nudge your members to give a particular donation size. Choose methods that best suit your situations before you select a service provider. You want to make sure the service you finally settle on can process the transaction you wish to initiate. Referenced Articles My article “Donations on your Church Website: Influencing the Outcome“ Paul Boag’s article: “Charity web design: How charities nudge users into action“

Churches need financial resources to operate. One way to solicit those resources is via your church website. To craft an enjoyable giving experience, you need to account for all of the types of giving, as well as what motivated people to give. In this episode I will delve into what kind of donations you need to consider. Each has unique aspects; including motivation and expected outcomes. Topics covered include One Time Donation Church Initiated Self-initiated Recurring Donations Make it easy to start Make it easy to stop Action item Before you jump head first into accepting online donations, you need to consider what content should support each of these types of giving. You should check with the processing service you are considering to see if they support all of the donation types you wish to accept. Depending on the agreement you are setting up, you might require different pages, form formats, and multiple terms & conditions. Go slow, do your homework, and pray for guidance as you proceed! Referenced Articles My article “Donations on your Church Website: Types of Donations“

Your church website can serve many purposes, from recruiting new members to serving your local community. One purpose that is met with some apprehension is soliciting donations. In this episode I will discuss some approaches to creating compelling content that will alleviate concerns and encourage joyful giving. Topics covered include Why should I bother? What will my money enable? How will it be spent? Action item Before you start designing your site or begin the technical implementation of a donation service; consider what will actually drive people to give. Start developing that content in advance or at least in parallel to those other parts. Getting an online donation tool in place with these consideration greatly increases the odds of people actually using it… and I have yet to meet a church that would turn down an opportunity to increase their financial resources! Referenced Articles My article “Donations on your Church Website: Approach and Content“