July 2, 2009

Scalejacking and Performance Metrics

Jeff Goins recently posted at Wrecked for the Ordinary entitled Marketers, Quit Hijacking Our Communities.

In it, he makes some great points regarding marketers' obsession with numbers and metrics. I'll give you a couple snippets to whet your appetite, but you don't want to miss the entire article.

I'll quote Jeff who quotes Seth Godin who is quoting Dave Balter (welcome to the Internet.):

"Because marketers were raised on the scale of mass-TV, radio, newspapers, they have a churn and burn mentality. The Internet turns this upside down. The Internet is about who, not how many. The Internet lets you take really good care of 100 people instead of harassing 2,000."

Continue reading "Scalejacking and Performance Metrics"

Posted by Joshua Cody at 7:03 AM
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June 24, 2009

Megachurches Are Hip, Young and Selfish

It's not marketing news per se, but the Associated Press reported last week on a study looking at the differences in contemporary megachurches and their smaller Protestant counterparts (minichurches?). Anyone interested in churches and marketing will likely be eager to dive into the statistics behind the article. The overarching finding of the study is that megachurches tend to be composed of younger, single adults, while other churches tend to be home for older families.

Among the other interesting findings of the study are that only three in four described the megachurch they attend as their "home church." This could be indicative of some level of Christian tourism, where people visit to see what a given church is like, or it could just be that people are shifting towards visiting more than one church regularly. Megachurches are also the place of worship for more well-educated and wealthy individuals.

The survey seems to present some overwhelming evidence in favor of megachurches, except for one key aspect:

Nearly 45 percent of megachurch attenders never volunteer at the church and 32 percent give little or no money to the congregation.

Continue reading "Megachurches Are Hip, Young and Selfish"

Posted by Joshua Cody at 12:56 PM
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March 5, 2009

Christianity Not a Default

Christianity is no longer the default faith for Americans, according to half the population. And apparently Christians are leading the charge in that belief.

A Barna survey released back in January revealed that 50% of Americans agreed that "Christianity is no longer the faith that Americans automatically accept as their personal faith." While that doesn't really surprise me, what is surprising is that 64% of evangelical Christians agreed with that statement, more than any other group.

So Christianity is no longer a default. I don't think that has to be a bad thing. What's encouraging about this survey is the 74% of people who say their faith is becoming a more important source of moral guidance. Fewer people are defaulting to Christianity, but people are taking their faith more seriously. That's a good thing.

This should serve as another reminder to the church that we can't assume a cultural advantage and relax our efforts to spread the gospel.

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 7:53 AM
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November 8, 2008

Internet Ministry Best Practices

by David Bourgeois, Guest Blogger

For the past two years, I have been conducting research on Internet ministry. This has included one-on-one interviews with leaders in the field, case studies, the development of my own church's web site and the implementation of a survey taken by over 300 different ministry organizations. This culminated last month in a presentation on Internet ministry "best practices" at the Internet Ministry Conference in Grand Rapids, Mich.

The Internet Ministry Framework
The Internet Ministry Framework embodies the three different aspects of implementing an Internet ministry: technology, people and process. This is an important definition because many, many organizations looking to start an online ministry immediately focus on the technology and completely ignore the more difficult decisions surrounding the people involved and the processes undertaken to implement and maintain the ministry. None of the three components are any important than the other: all three play an equal role in supporting a successful Internet ministry.

Best Practices
The “best practices” for Internet ministry were developed by looking at what the successful online ministries had in common based on their responses to the survey. This data was combined with follow-up case studies to reinforce these findings.

Continue reading "Internet Ministry Best Practices"

Posted by Guest Blogger at 12:20 PM
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October 10, 2008

Communicating To/With Next Generation

Adweek, one of the trade pubs for the advertising industry, had an opinion piece by Deborah Morrison in their September 29 issue. Morrison is a professor of advertising at the University of Oregon and wrote a great article about the next generation and how they're thinking, behaving and living. Although it was written about the changes the ad industry is likely to experience as a result of the next generation's differences, Morrison's well researched perspective can certainly help the church.

How they live has everything to do with how they work. They time shift. Favorite shows happen online on-demand. News is 24/7. There's not much use for e-mail. Instead, they're YouTubing, Stumbling, Digging, Twittering, blogging, updating. They're Loopted and LinkedIn. Caffeine drives the day and night. In this world, wristwatches and alarm clocks are as necessary as rabbit ears. They grew up IMing, and the cell phone rules. Area-code identity is mobile but long lasting--a virtual network.

Continue reading "Communicating To/With Next Generation"

Posted by Brad Abare at 5:53 PM
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September 1, 2008

Factors That Improve Online Experience

Looking for a church web site overhaul? Or do you know a pastor who needs to be looking for a site overhaul? IDEA has released a study titled Factors That Improve Online Experience. If your church web site sucks, this is a great place to begin brainstorming something new. They interview three different groups--nonprofit organizations and cities, web designers and firms, and the general public. And you wind up with some of these gems:

• Designers are overly optimistic about visitors' ability to maintain orientation.
• Good visual design and up-to-date information are critical.
• Visitors want information fast.
• Visitors point to the lack of breadth and depth of site content as causing an “Information Gap.”
• Visitors still need handholding.

Some of these seem like "Duh" statements, but you can get a deeper explanation with their executive summary, or the truly adventurous can download the full report.

Posted by Joshua Cody at 8:29 AM
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May 14, 2008

Jesus Did Polls Too

Last year at MinistryCOM, it was a delight to hear Shawn Wood's keynote titled "Brand Schizophrenia". Shawn is the experiences and creative communications pastor at Seacoast and a new author. And if that doesn't win most links in an opening blog entry here on Church Marketing Sucks, I don't know what does.

It was certainly not his main point of the day at MinistryCOM, but Shawn made a great observation about how Jesus was the first one to do a Zoomerang poll. In Matthew 16:13-16, Jesus asks his disciples what people are saying about him. He wanted to get a pulse for what everyone was thinking. "What are people saying about who the Son of Man is?" The disciples replied with some of the things they had been hearing. "Some think he is John the Baptizer, some say Elijah ... "

Thankfully, Jesus didn't let the polls or the pollsters have the final word. Although he cared about what people were thinking, he cared more that they were thinking rightly. The right answer, as we hear from Simon Peter, is that "You're the Christ, the Messiah, the Son of the living God." Simon obviously checked the right box on his survey.

Surveys are a great way to get feedback on things that matter to you. They're also a great way for you to measure if the things that matter to you actually matter to the people you're polling.

Posted by Brad Abare at 6:52 AM
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March 31, 2008

Best Practices for Internet Ministry: Part 3

by David Bourgeois, Guest Blogger

This is the last of my three guest posts here at Church Marketing Sucks on the best practices for Internet ministry. In my first post, I explained how my research had shown that the churches and other ministries with successful web sites were the ones who had a deliberate planning process. My second post discussed the issue of using volunteers to develop and maintain your web site and how the most successful web ministries did not use volunteers to do this. In this post, I will discuss the last of my preliminary findings, which relates to keeping the site updated.

Internet Ministry Best Practice #3: a successful Internet ministry carefully decentralizes the responsibility for updating content.

Continue reading "Best Practices for Internet Ministry: Part 3"

Posted by Guest Blogger at 7:11 AM
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March 24, 2008

Best Practices for Internet Ministry: Part 2

by David Bourgeois, Guest Blogger

In this series I am previewing some preliminary results of my research into the best practices for Internet ministry. In my first post in this series, I suggested that churches and other ministries that have a deliberate planning process that includes the development of a mission statement for the web site, data collection and the development of a target user profile are the most successful. In continuing this research, I present my findings as they relate to the use of volunteers to develop a web ministry:

Internet Ministry Best Practice #2: a successful Internet ministry does not rely exclusively on volunteers to create or maintain their web site.

Continue reading "Best Practices for Internet Ministry: Part 2"

Posted by Guest Blogger at 5:03 PM
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March 17, 2008

Best Practices for Internet Ministry: Part 1

by David Bourgeois, Guest Blogger

For the past year I have been conducting a research project on what makes a successful Internet ministry (see the specifics here). The goal of the research is to understand how churches and other ministries are implementing their web presence and then to use the results to develop a framework for successful Internet ministry.

I have spent many hours interviewing church web ministry leaders to better understand the various decisions they have made and processes they have used. Over the past couple of months, as many of you may know, I have surveyed over 240 ministries (which includes 88 churches) to try to get some deeper insights into their web implementations. The folks here at Church Marketing Sucks have graciously allowed me to use this platform as a way to share some of my preliminary findings (in the form of "best practices") and to get feedback from you all. I will be presenting the full set of results at the Internet Ministry Conference later this year.

Continue reading "Best Practices for Internet Ministry: Part 1"

Posted by Guest Blogger at 2:28 PM
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March 3, 2008

No Time Like the Present

Church marketing. It's a term that sends chills down the spines of some and puts warm fuzzies in the heart of this blog. Love it or hate it, it's something that is, and it's something that is going to be.

The New York Times reports on the U.S. Religion Landscape Survey that more than 25% of adults have left their childhood faith for either a different religion or no religion. People are switching congregations, denominations and faiths at an unprecedented rate in a culture of short attention spans and mass boredom.

Both the NYT article and the original survey provide too many insights to cover here--from a decline in Catholicism to guesses at why megachurches succeed and everything in between. It's incredibly insightful, and it could spur some great conversation about how to market your church. Maybe even a great staff read.

Either way, folks are moving around out there, and unless they know your church exists and what you believe, they won't be able to get on board. So go out there and market your church for the sake of the Church.

Posted by Joshua Cody at 7:27 AM
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November 15, 2007

Lessons In Not Sucking: Know Your Audience

This is part six in a series on Lessons In Not Sucking. Today we discuss the idea of knowing your audience. It's basic Communication 101, and I'm embarrassed to admit how many times I forget this stuff and just proceed as if I know how to communicate to everyone. Do you have additional wisdom to share? Speak up.

1. Create people playing cards.
Ad agencies do this all the time. Profile your audience (with real data/research) and then create posters or cards for a few of the people that represent the overall audience you've profiled. Hang these images of the people in front of your writers, designers, creators, etc., so that you always have those people in mind when you communicate.

2. Surveys and polls.
Conducting surveys and polls is as easy as SurveyMonkey.com or PollMonkey.com (which powers our poll in the right column). I also just heard about My Church Survey. These are handy examples of how easy it is to get feedback from groups of people. The more you know about who you are communicating with the better you get at communicating.

3. They audience is always right.
Often when I speak at events, I tell the story of Robert E. Lee, the famous Civil War General. He never sent a communiqué to his generals before first asking a private to read it. The private had to read the letter and then re-state in his own words what the call to action was. If the private didn’t get it right, Lee assumed it was his fault, not the private’s. Lee would re-write it as many times as necessary to be perfectly clear and start the cycle over again.

Continue reading "Lessons In Not Sucking: Know Your Audience"

Posted by Brad Abare at 7:36 AM
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June 5, 2007

Trust vs. Statistics

The last chapter of 2 Samuel reads somewhat like a page out of the book of Revelation. It's got everything a good chapter in Revelation has: judgment, death and an "angel hovering between earth and sky, sword drawn and about to strike Jerusalem."

The reason for all the death and hovering is because of a test God put to King David. "Once again God's anger blazed out against Israel. He tested David by telling him, 'Go and take a census of Israel and Judah.' So David gave orders to Joab and the army officers under him, 'Canvass all the tribes of Israel, from Dan to Beersheba, and get a count of the population. I want to know the number (24:1-2).'"

"But when it was all done, David was overwhelmed with guilt because he had counted the people, replacing trust with statistics. And David prayed to God, 'I have sinned badly in what I have just done. But now God forgive my guilt--I've been really stupid (24:10).'"

Continue reading "Trust vs. Statistics"

Posted by Brad Abare at 6:43 AM
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March 15, 2007

Yahoo! Real Estate and The Church

Yahoo! Real Estate's new tool, Neighborhood Profile, provides an interesting tool for an often overlooked necessity in the church--cross-cultural ministry. The tool lists factors such as average income, average family size, cost of living and more. Keep in mind it isn't a tool designed for ministry, but rather for real estate, so there are deficiencies. For example, unfortunately, it would be helpful to know a little more about race, age or job fields. I think from the strengths and weaknesses of this tool, we can make a few observations and draw a few principles:

• America is too big a place for real estate or churches--break it down, and begin ministering there.
• Being sensitive to your surroundings should not be an option but a necessity.
• This tool is incomplete, and nothing will ever be as effective as living as a community member before a church member.

Posted by Joshua Cody at 10:51 AM
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February 28, 2007

Megachurches are Desegregating Sunday Mornings

You can deride megachurches all you want, but new research shows that they're more racially diverse, finally beginning to overturn the assertion that Sunday morning is the most segregated hour of the week. In one-third of megachurches minorities make up 20% or more of the congregation. It's a small start, but a welcome one.

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 6:34 AM
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February 2, 2007

Christians Lie with Data

"You can make up statistics for anything. 14% of all people know that."

Those are some of my favorite words from the philosopher Homer J. Simpson, and they're painfully true. Christianity Today posted the story "Evangelicals Behaving Badly with Statistics" that explores the shock-enducing stat that only 4% of today's youth will be evangelicals as adults. Compared to 34% of evangelical adults today this number would mean the American church virtually collapsing in a generation.

Continue reading "Christians Lie with Data"

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 9:19 AM
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December 12, 2006

Dear Pastor College Student Essay Contest

Hey college students, Outreach magazine and Kyros Entertainment are teaming up to offer a essay contest. It's a chance to tell pastors why churches are missing the boat when it comes to your age group. Prizes include publication in Outreach magazine and "cash prizes". Check out the details and submit your essay (deadline January 15, 2007).

College students who can write should also know that you can be a guest blogger for us. We don't offer "cash prizes," but we do have the word 'sucks' in our title. That counts for something, right?

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 10:33 AM
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September 28, 2006

Do It Yourself Market Research for Churches

by David Zimmerman, Guest Blogger

Sometimes the best things in life don't cost any money. This is a fact that is very easily overlooked in the realm of church marketing. From fliers and mailers to complete demographic surveys--there is a lot of money you can spend in marketing your church.

Let's face it, to market your church effectively you are going to have to spend some money--but I think I'm preaching to the choir on this blog. There is a potential hazard down this road, however, and it is overlooking the simple, inexpensive ways to find out about our market. One of the most effective and least expensive things I've ever done to learn about my church's market is simply going around the neighborhood and asking people questions.

Continue reading "Do It Yourself Market Research for Churches"

Posted by Guest Blogger at 6:06 PM
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August 8, 2006

Church Attrition

Earlier this year we did a series on church growth which hinted (or at least the comments did) at an idea Bob Franquiz of Calvary Fellowship in Florida elaborates on: attrition.

Every church experiences attrition to one degree or another. People die, people backslide, people get upset, and people move. It's the natural reality of ministry. ...

The national average for attrition runs at about 15%. In a big city, that number could be as high as 25% to 30%.

I'm not sure where Franquiz gets the numbers, but if you're losing 15% per year, that means you need to gain 15% per year just to stay where you're at. It adds a tricky little dynamic to the church growth question.

Franquiz chooses to look on the bright side: "We are probably reaching a lot more people than any of us realize!"

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 7:27 AM
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August 4, 2006

Fastest Growing U.S. Churches in 2006

We know how much you love lists ranking churches, so how about the top 100 Fastest Growing U.S. Churches in 2006? Outreach magazine offers the list, compiled from a Church Growth Today study.

Some interesting facts about this list:

• 52 of the 100 churches are new to the list (they didn't appear on the 2005 list).
  
• Texas is the state with the most growing churches at 19. California, Florida and Georgia are tie for second with eight. (Apparently church growth only happens in warm climates. Wimps.)
  
• The oldest church on the list is 165 years old; the youngest church is 3 years old.
  
• You can also check out the top 25 churches plotted out on a Google map.

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 6:50 AM
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August 2, 2006

Man Law for Churches

Bob Franquiz of Calvary Fellowship in Florida is proposing Man Law for Christians, including the inaugural law that men shouldn't have to hold hands with other men while praying. It's reminiscent of (and more entertaining than) the Why Do Men Hate Church discussion.

He follows up that manly post with an announcement that his wife is pregnant. [In your best Duffman voice:] Oh yeah!

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 6:47 AM
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Greg Boyd, Megachurch Anomaly

Woodland Hills Church in Maplewood, Minn. and its pastor, Greg Boyd, are getting loads of attention from the New York Times article, "Disowning Conservative Politics, Evangelical Pastor Rattles Flock" (registration required). The article covers Boyd's controversial sermon series, "The Cross and the Sword," which argued that Christians should have little to do with politics and typical Republican alliances on issues like abortion, homosexuality and war.

"I am sorry to tell you that America is not the light of the world and the hope of the world," said Boyd. "The light of the world and the hope of the world is Jesus Christ."

Continue reading "Greg Boyd, Megachurch Anomaly"

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 6:20 AM
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May 17, 2006

Wall Street Journal on Church Tech

We'll go from west coast to east coast today as the Wall Street Journal covers technology in churches. The piece focuses on churches trying new methods, like MySpace and Flickr (sounds like our web 2.0 series). A few of the good quotes include:

"It's a way for us to say, 'Hey, come and see,'" said Father Gray [of Boston's Church of the Advent, who created a MySpace profile for his parish]. "It gets our name out there. It puts us on the mental map, the emotional map." ...

"We're called to get the word out," said Bobby Gruenewald, new campus development leader at LifeChurch.tv, a group of evangelical churches in Oklahoma, Texas and Arizona. "We want to engage people where they're at. If MySpace is where they are, that's where we want to be." ...

Technology is a tool that Christians should "redeem" for religious use, said Mark Batterson, lead pastor of National Community Church, which holds its services in movie theaters in Washington, D.C. "In the 15th century, Guttenberg used the printing press to make copies of the Bible," he said. "The church needs to find creative ways to help get some great content into these iPods."

Oh, and some guy named Brad Abare is quoted, too.

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 8:29 AM
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May 16, 2006

L.A. Times on Church Marketing

The L.A. Times covered church marketing and technology today in an article called "God's Call Comes by Cellphone". A few interesting quotes include:

"We dare not change the Gospel. But the method of delivery? We better change it for each new generation." -Mark Beeson of Granger Community Church

"You can sit in an ivory tower and whine all you want about 'This isn't the way it was done in 1500.' We're here to help people. If there's a tool out there that can help us reach them, why wouldn't we use it?" -George Barna of The Barna Group

Of course not everyone is thrilled with churches blindly embracing technology. Andrew Careaga, a youth pastor, blogger and author of e-Ministry: Connecting with the Net Generation, worries about spirituality becoming just another item to check off the to-do list: "a five-second spiritual fix, you've seen the verse of the day and you're done."

"Technology always seems to be a Faustian bargain. It encroaches on our ability to unconnect with the world and connect with God."

Continue reading "L.A. Times on Church Marketing"

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 3:47 PM
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February 10, 2006

Revamping Seniors Ministry

Changes in ministries to seniors are coming fast, especially as senior citizens aren't thinking of themselves as seniors. Last week we heard about teaching seniors how to play Xbox, but there's always more. An article in the Shreveport Times talks about the new ways seniors are being involved in congregations, often depending on whether they're healthy and active, active but having health problems, or ailing.

Continue reading "Revamping Seniors Ministry"

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 7:29 AM
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February 6, 2006

Mega-Churches Double

Speaking of mega-churches, they've doubled in the last five years. There are now 1,210 churches with weekly attendance over 2,000. More info than you wanted to know about mega-churches is now available: get the overview or go for the hardcore data.

Some interesting facts include:

• 52% of mega-churches have between 2,000-3,000 people. Only 16% have over 5,000.
  
• Only 5% of mega-churches have seating for more than 3,000, which results in 52% of mega-churches offering four or more services over two or three days.
  
• One-third of mega-churches were founded before 1940; 15% have been founded in the last 15 years.
  
• 56% of mega-churches are intentionally trying to be multi-ethnic. On average, 19% of the attenders were not of the majority racial group, so their efforts seem to be working.
  
• 96% have a web site (what are the other 4% thinking?); 77% have mailed newsletters or fliers; 75% have done radio/TV/newspaper advertising; 41% have contacted people who recently moved to the area.

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 1:17 PM
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December 22, 2005

Jesus, CEO

The Economist is talking about Jesus, CEO. I'm a bit too busy to read the article myself, but you can check it out and let us know what you think. Jordon Cooper thought the piece portrayed Willow Creek as "soul-less." Cuz that's what we need--more soul-less church marketing.

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 6:03 AM
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December 3, 2005

CFCC Church Marketing Report

You can score a free 8-page Church Marketing Report over at the Center for Church Communication. And yes, we are a part of the Center for Church Communication, so yes, we are tooting our own horn. But you get a free report out of the deal, so what's the problem?

The report was compiled from an online survey of over 500 churches taken this past summer and has some juicy details, including:

• 76% of churches aren't documenting or tracking the results of their marketing.
• 63% of churches said marketing and promoting their church was important or extremely important.
• 80% of churches spend less than $10,000 on marketing and promotions each year.
• 59% of churches were dissatisfied or ambivalent about their web sites.

It's not Barna material by any means, but it is some interesting stuff.

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 1:40 PM
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November 4, 2005

More on Mega-Churches

Ah, yet another article on mega-churches, this time from Minneapolis-St. Paul Magazine (that's where I live!). The Twin Cities are actually a breeding ground for mega-churches. According to the article we have 26 mega-churches, and Minnesota has six of the nation's seven ELCA mega-churches, and Minneapolis is home to the largest Lutheran congregation in the world (though I don't know why that surprises anyone—this is Minnesota).

So we've got a lot of mega-churches. Anyway, the article covers the usual mega-church ground, but it also has a few interesting comments on church marketing, including the idea that brand loyalty among denominations is dead.

But even more interesting is the sidebar piece stuck at the bottom about Greg Boyd, author and pastor of yet another mega-church in the Twin Cities. But Boyd isn't interested in business or marketing tactics. He focuses not on attracting people, but challenging them:

"The danger of any church, but especially megachurches, is that by giving people what they need and want, you reinforce the consumer mindset and Christianity becomes like a McDonald's or Burger King. Where can I go to get the most for the least? The kingdom has to confront that. That's the antithesis of living in a Christ-like mode."

That's definitely a challenge and an interesting debate. But what's also interesting is how Boyd practices what he preaches: Last year Boyd preached a series of sermons challenging the militarism and triumphalism that swept this country after 9/11 and the invasion of Iraq. The series resulted in about 1,000 people leaving the church and a 20% drop in offerings.

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 9:37 AM
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November 1, 2005

Hey Look, a Mega-Church!

You've got to love how the press continually rediscovers this odd concept of mega-churches. And they've been doing it for 30 years.

A couple interesting articles from last week on mega-churches, including an overview on Willow Creek's 30th anniversary and an interview with pastor Bill Hybels.

Another article looks at Crossroads Community Church in Cincinnati, Ohio. Finally we have an overview of mega-churches in Metro Detroit, which includes details on Catholic churches super-sizing to deal with a shortage of priests, and Mormon churches that split when they reach 600 members.

All cool stories of different things churches are doing, though I wish journalists would stop looking at mega-churches with wide-eyed wonder. This isn't a new concept.

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 10:15 AM
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October 26, 2005

Denominational Church Marketing

Two recent newspaper articles in the Des Moines Register and the Washington Times (though the Times doesn't seem to be loading) talk about the marketing efforts of church denominations. The United Church of Christ and their Still Speaking campaign gets most of the attention, but the United Methodist Church is also attracting attention with their "Open hearts, Open Minds, Open Doors" campaign.

Both campaigns are seeing success:

• The UCC spent $1.7 million on the Still Speaking campaign and have seen visits to their web site soar from 35,000 per month to 500,000 per month last December when their controversial ad aired. So far they've had 5 million visits to their web site since the campaign started, and 521,000 have searched for a church in their area. This year they plan to spend $3 million on their Advent campaign.
• The United Methodist Church has seen first-time attendance rise 14% since 2001. They launched a new $2 million national cable TV campaign in September and plan to spend $28 million on advertising by 2008.

It's cool to see denominations stepping in and doing advertising where local churches can't always afford to.

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 7:30 AM
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October 20, 2005

Church Marketing Quotes

Check out the Austin American-Statesman for yours truly. Brad and I were quoted in an article about church marketing, though we definitely didn't have the best quotes.

Mac Richard of Lake Hills Church in Austin, Texas had a nice one:

"The world calls it marketing. The Bible calls it evangelism."

The Rev. Larry Hollon, CEO of communications for the Nashville, Tenn.-based United Methodist Church:

"This is not a matter of choosing to do communications or to do ministry. It is including communications in the ministry of the church as it is right to do."

And Scott Evans, the founder and president of Outreach:

"Ten to 15 years ago, churches were asking, 'Should we be doing it?' Now they're realizing that they have to do it."

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 8:45 AM
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October 18, 2005

Jakob Nielsen Familiar with Church Marketing?

I thought it was rather interesting in Jakob Nielsen's Top 10 Blog Design Mistakes (check out our take) that he gave an example from the world of church marketing.

Under his section on Nondescript Posting Titles he offers examples of good and bad headlines. Under the good headlines he includes "Ice cream trucks as church marketing," which sounds awfully familiar. The story was in the USA Today, so I suppose we shouldn't be surprised. But it is cool to see more people aware of church marketing.

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 8:59 AM
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August 30, 2005

Why People Leave Church

People leave church for the stupidest reasons. Nearly three-quarters of people left U.K. churches because of a "disagreement on a range of issues, from the way the organ is played to the content of the sermon." It's the little things like the choir robes or the building design or the flowers that cause silly arguments and people end up leaving.

I'm sure it's a cumulative effect and it has more to do with our inability to solve conflict than anything, but it's still sad.

And if silly things like that cause our own people to leave, what's going to make visitors want to stay?

Update: I knew this story sounded familiar, and today I placed it: The Baptist Press recently covered the book Why Churches Die: Diagnosing Lethal Poisons in the Body of Christ. The book basically comes to the same sad conclusion: people leave church for stupid reasons. Only in this book it's not just people leaving, it's churches dying.

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 7:34 AM
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August 24, 2005

Business Savvy Pastors in High Demand

A recent article reports that pastors and church leaders with business and marketing backgrounds are in high demand. And more church leaders have those skills since 2 in 3 seminarians are over 30, giving them time to have business experience. Plus of men in seminary, the most common educational background was technical science, including business, communications, and computer science.

Churches are seeing the need and value for marketing, and seeking it out, whether it's on-staff expertise or outside experts.

Too bad not everybody gets it.

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 9:37 PM
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August 22, 2005

Hey Look, Church Marketing!

USA Today covered church marketing yesterday with the headline, "God is cool." The story covers the growing trend of churches doing marketing, including the following techniques:

• An ice cream truck passing out free treats in the neighborhood (New Life Christian Church in Centreville, Va.)
• Mass-produced TV ads with localized tag lines (Mountain Christian Church in Joppa, Md.)
• 3,000 water bottles and 5,000 Frisbees with a church logo and contact info—and it works: "Ten percent of regular attendees say they learned about the church from a Frisbee." (LifePointe Christian Church in Charlotte, N.C.)
• Free coffee and laptops available for use (Granger Community Church near South Bend, Ind.)
• The United Methodist Church's 4-week $4 million TV campaign.

Continue reading "Hey Look, Church Marketing!"

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 6:27 AM
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August 4, 2005

No Return

Yesterday I met with the president and his management team from a Bible college here in Southern California. They had initiated the meeting a month ago to discuss "marketing." Even though this is what I do for a living, I am always encouraged when organizations (especially those of the Christian persuasion), come to realize that often the biggest thing stopping themselves from doing things right is themselves.

I won't bore you with all the details of the meeting, but one thing did stand out as I contextualize this for church marketing. We spent a significant amount of time discussing their campaign tracking systems, and the data they track. One of the discoveries was that they do not track why people say no. In other words, if a potential student requests information, comes to a preview day, or expresses any amount of interest in attending the college, they are only tracked for how they heard about the school. They are never followed up with to track why they decided not to pursue their original interest.

Continue reading "No Return"

Posted by Brad Abare at 6:15 AM
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August 3, 2005

The Growth of Black Churches in the U.K.

A BBC article on black worshippers in the U.K. says that people of African or Caribbean origin make up 2% of the U.K. population, but account for 7% of church goers. In London, they account for a whopping two-thirds of church goers (the BBC neglects to tell us what percentage of the London population they make up, though an Encarta article gives 1996 data that blacks make up about 6% of the London population—that's probably outdated, but at least it's something).

Did you catch that? London's black population comprises 6% of the total population and 67% of the church going population. While most churches in England are declining, black churches are growing, mainly thanks to immigrants with a vibrant faith.

"Christianity in Africa is big in terms of lots of people going to church," says pastor Jonathan Oloyede, founder of Glory House that's grown from 45 members in 1992 to 3,000 today. "Another factor is we have a strong, very vibrant ministry that is an outreach to the family and young families, so church is not just something you attend, it's part of your life."

Lessons to learn from churches that are obviously working.

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 4:51 AM
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July 26, 2005

The Case of the Missing Church Members

Remember Encyclopedia Brown? He was cool. Solving all those complicated cases with quick thinking. Maybe the Southern Baptist Convention should call Encyclopedia. You see, they're missing 10 million members.

Of the SBC's 16,287,494 members, only 6,024,289 show up on the average Sunday for their church's primary service. That means only 37% of church members actually go to church. So if your church has 200 people on Sunday morning, you likely have 500 to 600 people on the membership roll. Yikes.

So where'd everybody go? Some are probably sick or out of town. Or perhaps they're in the military or are elderly shut-ins. But that hardly accounts for 63% of a church's membership not showing up. Where'd all the churchgoers go?

Continue reading "The Case of the Missing Church Members"

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 10:52 AM
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June 16, 2005

Youth Ministry for Big People

Recently we had an entry about Rob Bell and his church that's attracting mostly twentysomethings. Many of the comments focused on demographic strategies, and whether or not churches should target specific demographics to the exclusion of others.

It's a good debate, but personally I've always felt that the church should be packed with diversity. That diversity should include race, gender, age, economic position, social status, political leaning, denominational bent, theological position, etc.

Mike Breaux of Willow Creek shares his multi-generational strategy that involves applying a youth group mindset to the entire church (he calls it "youth ministry for big people"). I'm not suggesting youth ministry is king, but the idea of doing something radical to get radical results is cool:

Fannie Hamilton sat among teenagers during the Sunday service. She used her left hand to hold up her stroke-affected right hand in praise, belting out the words to "My Glorious" by Delirious. A few minutes later, she stood next to a 16-year-old, who joined her in belting out the words to "Great Is Thy Faithfulness." She was a small group leader in our youth ministry—at the age of 82.

I've always thought that in the ideal church youth ministry as we know it today wouldn't be necessary.

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 6:59 PM
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June 10, 2005

The Comeback of Mainline Churches

A three-year study on mainline congregations that's scheduled to end in 2006 is showing a surprising resurgence in certain mainline congregations.

"Most people think mainline Protestant churches are dead," says Diana Butler Bass, a senior researcher at Virginia Theological Seminary and director of the Project on Congregations of Intentional Practice. "[There's] a new kind of mainline congregation developing in the United States that's moderate to liberal theologically, taking traditional Christian practices seriously, and is experiencing an unnoticed vitality."

These are midsize congregations, usually with 200 to 500 members, they usually don't have famous pastors, and they're attracting younger adults in their 20s and 30s as well as older people in their 70s and 80s. These congregations might make up 6-7% of the mainline churches nationwide.

Bass describes these as intentional churches, often incorporating practices from Christian tradition, including hospitality and testimonies. Many of the churches are turning to more spiritual discernment practices as they seek to figure out what they should do, as opposed to the business mentality that has driven many mainline congregations in the past.

The bottom line is that there is hope for declining mainline churches: "I think it's very suggestive of what you can do when you use your imagination and you allow a congregation to be creative," says Bass. "It offers a potential pattern that mainline congregations can embark on that could spark new life." (link via CT's weblog)

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 7:01 AM
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May 14, 2005

BusinessWeek Goes to Church

Evangelicals landed on the cover of BusinessWeek as they explore the booming business of church. But before you get too excited it's more an overview of megachurches and Christianity in pop culture, with hardly anything new to report. They cover the usual suspects, including Bill Hybels, Rick Warren and Joel Osteen.

The piece had a few interesting details, including the fact that Willow Creek supposedly ranks in the top 5% of 250 major brands, sharing space with companies like Nike and John Deere. Also the Willow Creek Association, the consulting arm that hopes to spread the Willow Creek charm, raked in $17 million last year from its 10,500 member churches and the 110,000 leaders who attended their conferences.

Aside from that it's your typical megachurch philosophy: no pews, no crosses, positive preaching and in the case of Osteen and Creflo A. Dollar, the prosperity gospel.

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 8:51 AM
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May 12, 2005

Church Marketing Plans & Costs from Major Denominations

Tim Bednar tips us off to a post at Harbinger quoting the Washington Post (follow all that?) about church marketing plans and costs from the major denominations:

Denomination: United Methodist Church Slogan or name of ad campaign: "Open Hearts. Open Minds, Open Doors." Expenditures: $43 million from 2000 to 2008

United Church of Christ
"God is Still Speaking"
$30 million from 2004 to 2007

Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
"Living in God's Amazing Grace"
$7 milllion in 1999-2000, smaller sums since

Presbyterian Church (USA)
"Here and Now"
$1.5 million by the national church in 2005-2006

Episcopal Church USA
"We're Here for You"
$750,000 by the national church in 2004-2005

Roman Catholic Church
"It Starts With Faith"
$350,000 for public service announcements in 2004

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 5:38 PM
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April 22, 2005

How Churches Attract People

A Florida newspaper explores the strategies churches use to bring in people, and it's all marketing. Everything from how the message is delivered to paying attention to the people to offering something for the community.

I especially like the example of First Alliance Church in Port Charlotte, Fla. Their pastor, Scott Borden, noticed that most of the people in the community were not originally from there and had few connections. Thus a small group ministry became an excellent way to give people the connection they were lacking. That's smart marketing.

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 1:34 PM
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April 12, 2005

Accessible Church

The Washington Post covers the plight of the disabled as they try to find their place in church. And it only starts with wheelchair ramps, wide doorways, elevators and other physical accomodations. It also involves letting the disabled participate fully in the life of the church.

For as much time as Jesus spent healing people of physical disabilities, it's sad that this is even an issue for the church.

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 3:38 PM
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Why Do Men Hate Church?

48 million women attend church every week while only 35 million men do. That's a gender imbalance of 13 million people, and a reason why churches need to become man-friendly--according to David Murrow, author of Why Men Hate Going To Church.

"[Murrow] concluded that today's church culture favors, even expects, participation in intimate, nurturing behavior such as singing, hand-holding, sitting in circles and sharing feelings. Many men feel uncomfortable in such an environment and choose not to go." (Washington Post)

Murrow offers seven principles to becoming a man-friendly church, or you can dive into his Church for Men web site.

(Quite frankly, all I can think of when I hear the term "man-friendly" is Kelso from That 70s Show saying, "I'm what you call 'man-pretty.'" I never watch the show but the local station carrying the reruns always plays that line in their promo commercials.)

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 8:14 AM
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April 11, 2005

Church Attendance Down, Bible Reading Up

Barna's latest study of American religious beliefs and practices shows little change over the past 15 years. A few things that have changed:

• Bible reading is up.
• Church attendance is down.
• Unchurched adults attending small groups are up.
• Sunday school is down.
• Christians sharing their faith is up.
• Having a biblical view of God's character is down.

But these few changes pale in comparison to the nearly four dozen categories that haven't changed. The glacial pace of religious change over the long term shows the need for a change in direction, according to George Barna.

"You cannot make good strategic decisions without reliable information about the people or situations you hope to change," says Barna. "Bringing about genuine and lasting religious transformation requires leadership that is more aggressive than simply constructing bigger buildings, replacing the overhead projector with a big-screen projection system, and introducing a few new programs. Our era is noted for distractions, stress, technology, choice, busyness, information overload and mistrust. Effective leaders must spearhead a thoroughly conceived and highly targeted plan that runs a significant level of risk and promises attractive returns on people’s investment of themselves. Merely tinkering with the existing system is a recipe for irrelevance and abandonment."

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 6:00 AM
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April 6, 2005

Quitting Church

Charisma magazine has a lengthy report on Christians who opt to stay home on Sundays. The article presents the issue as a growing trend, and not limited to twenty-somethings. The biggest motivation for skipping out on church seems to be disaffection with the church, though several experts agree that if church isn't working, we need people to stick around and fix it, not leave it for dead.

The article also cites research that the more churches expect of people, the more they get involved. People may be opting out of church because they don't have a role, because they aren't being challenged to get involved.

Finally, the article points to the importance of a standard marketing technique: the exit interview. "In the commercial world companies learn a lot from past customers who leave them," says New Zealand pastor Alan Jamieson. "Surely we in the church can do the same thing." (link via DJ Chuang)

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 6:42 AM
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March 22, 2005

Chicago Churches Lure Latinos with Marketing

Newsweek has an article this week covering churches in the Chicago area and how they're catering to Latinos.

On the upside, several churches are finding success using marketing methods like direct mail and gearing programs for niche audiences.

On the downside, the infighting is pretty blatant:

From her perch at the tiny Iglesia de Dios Peniel, Pastor America Garcia eyes Rebano [Companerismo Cristiano—a Pentecostal church in the Humboldt Park area of Chicago—] down the street—where female congregants might sport tight pants and belly rings—with suspicion. The place is rife with "libertinism," she says. "When people leave, they go to orgies, to movies, to dances!"

Rebano's Lynette Santiago has heard all this before. Back when her parents led the congregation and replaced old-school coritos, or spiritual songs, with a salsa band, a disapproving pastor labeled her mother "the Devil."

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 11:01 AM
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March 16, 2005

Go to Church, Live Longer

A 12-year study tracking people 65 and over found that those who attend church at least once a week lived longer. They were also healthier. Over the course of the study, those who didn't attend church had a 52% risk of death, while those who did go to church had a 17% risk of death.

"There's something involved in the act of religious attendance, whether it's the group interaction, the worldview or just the exercise to get out of the house. There's something that seems to be beneficial," said University of Iowa psychology professor Susan Lutgendorf, who carried out the study.

It worked for Flanders, why not you?

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 7:34 AM
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March 8, 2005

Washington Post Covers Church Marketers

Church marketing received a boost from the Washington Post on Sunday with the story "The Business of Filling Pews." The story covers the church consulting company The Alban Institute, which started in 1974, and the Willow Creek Association, started in 1992 by Willow Creek Community Church. The story is packed with success stories and gives some credibility to marketing for churches.

Bravo. Do you think maybe they were inspired by our press release? (Okay, wishful thinking)

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 1:14 PM
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March 3, 2005

N.C. Church Marketing Seminar

Apparently we're not the only ones pushing church marketing. Brunswick Community College in North Carolina held a marketing seminar for area churches last week.

"It has to be a little different than any other organization's marketing. ... You're looking for people who you hope will accept Christ. You have to market your services so they know they can turn to the church. The ideal is to make sure everyone who comes in contact with the church feels something and gets what he or she is looking for." -Ray Gilbert of Pleasant Grove Missionary Baptist Church

The conversation continues...

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 5:49 PM
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January 24, 2005

The Church & Technology

A recent study shows a deep gap between large and small churches when it comes using technology. Only 52% of Protestant churches have a web site, but the numbers vary greatly based on church size: 88% of large churches (those with 200+ members) have a web site compared with only 28% of small churches (those with less than 100 members).

Small churches may be missing out on a relatively cheap and efficient method of communication.

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 7:50 AM
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January 13, 2005

Church of England Grows--Sort of

The Church of England released new numbers showing a 1% increase in church service attendance in 2003 over the previous year, a small but significant change to the recent declines.

The bad news, however, is that very few young people are showing up. The church saw a small rise in marriages and funerals, but big drops in baptisms and confirmations.

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 7:42 AM
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November 19, 2004

Confusion Costs

by Andy Havens, Guest Blogger

Siegel & Gale, a major research, branding and communications firm, recently published a "Perplexity Poll" (PDF) for its clients in the wireless telecommunications industry. In brief, what they found is that there is a measurable cost related to the confusion and complexity surrounding issues like rate plans, additional charges, roaming, phone features and invoices.

What kind of measurable cost? Try $3 billion. That's how much the industry loses every year when people get fed up and quit because they are confused. Fully 25% of the people interviewed said they'd left a previous wireless company because they'd been perplexed and frustrated.

What does this have to do with church marketing? Well, it shows -- in big, stark numbers -- that people like clear, easy-to-understand information. They don't like to be confused. And they vote with their feet.

Continue reading "Confusion Costs"

Posted by Guest Blogger at 1:37 PM
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November 17, 2004

Rev Magazine: A Little Misleading

I found in my stack of clippings a one page ditty in Rev magazine. The column-esque heading at the top left read "culture" and floating in the middle of the page was a large colorful graphic that read: "brAnd." (See photo inset for full view.)

Naturally, I thought this was going to be a quick take on branding and how it relates to the church or some other useful nugget a pastor (the primary audience of Rev) could apply to the subject.

I should have known better than to think Christiandom would get it right. There are some useful takeaways, but it is all about direct mail. Yep, direct mail works. I wrote an entry last month, citing a study by Pitney Bowes. Rev cites what appears to be a more legitimate study by the Cable & Telecommunications Association for Marketing. Their results?

Continue reading "Rev Magazine: A Little Misleading"

Posted by Brad Abare at 6:42 AM
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November 10, 2004

Church Membership Cards

I love hanging out with pastors. A week ago today I spent several hours with a local pastor here in southern California who planted a church four years ago in Orange County. Our time together had no big agenda other than to connect and learn more about each other's lives, passions, families, ministries and everything else those subjects bring out. Although our acquaintance was made familiar through mutual friends and circles, I was honored to spend time with this guy. His heart is huge. His mind is brilliant. And his love for people is deep.

Among the many topics we covered, of which I'll work into more entries later, one of particular interest was the idea of having church membership cards. I should stop now and say if you think this brings us one step closer to the "mark of the beast," you might as well stop reading and take your apocalypse phobia somewhere else.

Continue reading "Church Membership Cards"

Posted by Brad Abare at 6:35 AM
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October 22, 2004

Direct Mail Works, Really

A new report (PDF download) out from Pitney Bowes says that direct mail performs ahead of print ads, television, radio, and the Internet. Kevin Weiss, President of Customer Marketing for Pitney Bowes Global Mailing Systems says, "This research shows that direct mail does the best job of providing consumers with the information they want, when they want it, and how they want to receive it." The report also shows that:

• "The majority surveyed (34%) said direct mail contributes most to establishing a relationship with them and keeping them informed and involved with a business, followed by print ads (30%), TV (25%), radio (5%), e-mail (4%), Internet (2%), and telemarketing (0%).

• "Direct Mail is effective at building customer relationships because it is familiar (95%), convenient (94%), interactive (93%), universal (93%), private (87%), and personalized (84%).

• "Now more than ever, consumers value organizations that make an effort to communicate and build a relationship with them through the mail (57%), up 10% since a 1998 study."

Although the study was only done with 350 U.S. households, the results are more a confirmation of assumptions than a big shocker. It should also be mentioned that Pitney Bowes does have a bias as they are world leaders in mailing services and a huge partner with the USPS.

I'm encouraged to see that print ads came in a close second (30%) in terms of establishing a relationship.

Posted by Brad Abare at 6:10 AM
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September 23, 2004

It's the End of the Church As We Know It

A couple interesting tidbits from Will Samson, who just spent two days hanging out with George Barna and Leonard Sweet talking about the future of the church:

• "Currently only 65% of self-professed Christian in America experience their faith through the local church, and that is diminishing every year. He [Barna] predicts that by 2025 only about one-third of Americans will experience their faith through what we would define today as a local church."

• "According to Barna, the people who sit in our pews on Sunday morning are statistically unrecognizable from everyone else in the culture in terms of their actions and attitudes."

He goes on to talk about spiritual mini-movements and the importance of children's ministry. (link via Knightopia)

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 2:44 PM
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August 11, 2004

Sunday Morning Segregation

"Eleven o'clock Sunday morning is the most segregated hour in America," civil-rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. declared many times, quoting evangelist Billy Graham. While that statement is more than 50 years old, it remains solidly true today, despite the continual claims of the Bible that we are all one (1 Cor. 12:13, Gal. 3:28, Col. 3:11).

But there is reason for hope.

Continue reading "Sunday Morning Segregation"

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 9:03 AM
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August 5, 2004

More People Sleeping in on Sunday

The number of adults who skip church has nearly doubled since 1991, rising from 39 million to 75 million. These unchurched adults, defined as adults who haven't attended church in the past six months other than holidays or special events like weddings or funerals, account for 34% of the population.

In a bizarre twist, while about half of the churched population has accepted Jesus Christ as their Savior (only half!?), one in six unchurched adults (about 17%) have done so as well.

Continue reading "More People Sleeping in on Sunday"

Posted by Kevin D. Hendricks at 8:17 AM
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