Marketing your chuch on the web

Marketing Your Church on the Internet

Joe LuedtkeLiturgical Publications Inc

[email protected]@cathtechtalk

• What do you mean by marketing your church?

• Why you need to market your church

• The Don’t’s and Do’s of Marketing your Church

• The non-technical infrastructure you need

• Your website as a marketing tool• Email Marketing• Social media marketing• The Wrap-up

Why is a Church Bulletin Company

talking about technology?

Every Church Needs an Online Ministry

Marketing Engagement

Why do you need to market your church?

First, you were told to

Pope Benedict XVI described the Internet as a “digital continent” and use this technology to “proclaim the Gospel”.

“As the Church sends missionaries to every continent, we now need to send missionaries to proclaim the Gospel in this new digital continent also.” – Archbishop Jose H Gomez

The next generation of parishioners is growing up online

Adapting and embracing this change is the challenge the church is facing.

The church must adapt to the new communication styles or be left behind.

You were once told to “let your fingers do the walking”. Now, they really need to. It is how fast can you text that counts.

Second, times are changing

Google vs Yellow Pages

2010 Australian Survey indicated that:

• 54% of respondents hadn’t used the Yellow Pages in over a year.

• 100% of the respondents used Google ‘almost every day’.

The Internet is Now Leading the Way

Having a website is not enough

Expectations Are Changing Too

Number of Mobile Phones in 2011

Microsoft Tag

And Mobile is Still Growing

Microsoft Tag

Microsoft Tag

Microsoft Tag

Remember when a phone was used to call someone?

Lastly, if you don’t, others will do it for you

• Mormons are the Fastest Growing Religion in America– Added 2 million new members from 2002 – 2012– Present in 295 counties in the US where no Mormons existed a

decade ago.– Let’s take a look at just one of their marketing strategies…

From 2012 Religious Congregations and Membership Survey

They use Google Ad Words!

Search for…

Yields…

At a cost of

$3.00 - $4.00 per click

The Don’ts & Dos of Marketing Your Church

1. Don’t start a website, Facebook page, or Twitter feed without a goal.

2. Don’t create any of the above unless someone is going to be be responsible for managing it.

3. Don’t get too excited if someone offers to do it for free.

4. Don’t create any of this by committee. There’s never been a good website designed by more than 3 people.

5. Don’t bite off more than you can chew.

The Don’ts

1. Do start with a set of goals and a plan.

2. Do measure what you create. You can’t manage what you can’t measure.

3. Do make it someone’s job to maintain what ever you’re creating.

4. For your website, 1. Do focus on your home page. It’s the front-door to your church and

your community.

2. Design the site for guests. Think like an outsider when working on the site.

3. Do spend more than the cost of week’s worth of coffee on creating your website.

4. Keep it simple; keep it fresh.

5. Do take ownership of your website’s domain, i.e. www.mychurch.com.

Now the Dos

The Infrastructure You Need

Don’t worry I’m not talking about Computer Infrastructure like this

But rather someone like this

The Infrastructure You Need• Always remember, technology is just a tool. It’s the

people and processes that bring it to life.• Technology - The only two technology requirements

that really matter are:• Can we maintain it?• Is it accessible everywhere (i.e. Desktop, iPad,

Smart Phone, etc.)?

The Infrastructure You Need• People – This is what its really all about:

• Write it in to someone’s job description to maintain the website, monitor the Facebook page, etc.

• Set expectation that the church website should be as updated as the church bulletin.

• Start small, but think big. The person who may manage your website’s content today may one day be your church’s Internet Outreach Director

• Process• Put some money in the budget to maintain the website.• Your Communication in print and online.• Setup quarterly or annual reviews.• Set objectives for your website• Follow up with visitor requests with email. Develop an email-based

informational packet.

Setting Goals• Set a goal. Yes, you do need a church website, but

define why.• Use Google Analytics to track activity on your website.• Is your real objective here, website ‘hits’ or visitor

conversions?• Track the results:

– “How did you hear about our parish?” is a really important question to ask.

– Ask new parishioners how they found out about your church?– Ensure ‘website’ is an option on your visitor card.

Focus on Your Church’s Home Page

http://catholictechtalk.com/2011/11/08/-page-things-on-a-churchs-home

SEO – Start with Googling Your ChurchOf course your ranked #1 in Google, aren’t you?

Or Are You?

Seaching for my hometown and with the word ‘church’ doesn’t put St. Bernard parish anywhere near the top.

Searching for “Catholic Parish 53213”Yields similar and disappointing results.

Why is this? The answer is much simpler than you think.

You can see a few problems right away on this church’s Home Page.

• The word ‘Church’ is only used once and its embedded in a graphic.

• ‘Catholic’ also only appears once and its next to the word ‘School’.

• The word ‘School’ is used 4 times.

• Bible school content is months old.

Looking for Help On Your Website?• Here’s some good ones to review,

http://catholictechtalk.com/2012/06/22/annoucing-our-parish-website-winners/

• If you’re feeling pretty good about your website, take this simple 5 minute rating test, http://catholictechtalk.com/2012/01/23/rate-your-church-website/

• If you’re looking for help, please check out www.weconnect.com or other church-oriented website resources here, http://catholictechtalk.com/website-builders/?orderby=title

Social Media Marketing

Social Media Marketing• Don’t think of Social Media as ‘sites’ but rather ‘streams’. • In the Web 1.0 world, Content was King, but in Web 2.0

it’s the conversation.• No your church doesn’t need a Facebook ‘page’, but,

yes, you need to have ‘conversations’ on Facebook. • Find someone willing to post your current events and

monitor your Facebook page for at least 30 minutes per week and then create one.

• Please, don’t be afraid of the conversations. The conversations are what Social Media is all about.

Social Media Engagement• Post once per

week.• Again allow

commenting, please!

• Check engagement statistics once per month.

Email Marketing

Why does my grocery store want my email address?

• Email Marketing Programs make an email like this and email list management simple

• Mailchimp is my favorite as its free for lists under 2000

• VerticleResponse and Constant Contact are good cost effective alternatives

Email Newsletters Work

Social Media & Parishioner Engagement

• Social Media and Email Marketing really start to shift from marketing to parishioner engagement.

• If Facebook pages and Twitter Feeds aren’t for you and Email Marketing Tools seem a little too daunting, please take a look at:

http://www.4lpi.com/wegather http://www.flocknote.com

http://www.4lpi.com/weshare

The Wrap Up• Marketing is the business term for evangelization. Look

to Corporate America for trends. • Small businesses have found the Internet to be a great

help in leveling the playing field, and now the church can too.

• The Internet used to be informational, now is becoming relational.

• Content used to be king, but its really becoming all about the conversation.

• The next generation of parishioners is growing up online, but on their phones.

Thank You

Joe Luedtke

President, Liturgical Publications

[email protected]

@cathtechtalk