I am hoping to present a multi-part series this week about balance. One consistent trend we are finding when meeting with pastors is that most, if not all, are responsible for wearing many hats at their church. The days of the pastor only being the spiritual leader of the church have passed. Modern pastors are now responsible for much more.
With a large, growing number of clients, we have had many experiences both good and bad. I’d like to start today with your church’s web presence. Our society now communicates online. The average age of Facebook users is 38 and Google receives billions of search queries per day. It doesn’t take long to see that your presence on the web can be a crucial component to communicating your message.
1. Keep your site updated.
If you do nothing more, keep your site up to date. When we visit a new client, one of the first things we’ll check out is their website. Some are good, but most are out of date. Keeping a consistent listing of your upcoming events, and removing your old events is CRUCIAL. Perception is everything, and most users visiting your site will get an impression of your church. What impression do you want the user to get?
2. Your site must look good.
Sure it’s cheap and inexpensive to have a basic site online for your church. Most people can figure out how to put a site together relatively easily. There are even a number of template services online that you can use as well. The question we always ask…How much did you spend on your building’s appearance? How much time do you spend making sure your building looks good from the outside, the grass mowed, trash removed, inside the carpets are vacuumed, papers are picked up from last week’s service, etc.? Most will answer and say they take great pride in the appearance of their building. They further to say, we want to make the best impression we can. We then ask:
If appearance is important to you, and you understand the need to present a clean appearance, why do you not use the same theory with the appearance of your website. It is the first impression many people will have of your church.
If you want a complimentary review of your website or current web practices, don’t hesitate to contact us. We have years of experience helping churches create web destinations and putting the best foot forward to present their church online.
