When people search for churches in your city does your church website appear at the top of Google, Yahoo, MSN, and Ask? No? Our Top Church Search Rankings service can put it there. It includes local search engine optimization & local directory registration, and should be a part of your church evangelism, church outreach, and church growth strategy.
About Church Marketing Online
Church Marketing Online is dedicated helping churches reach the people in their communities through the Internet. We're using a 2-pronged strategy. The Top Church Search Rankings service provides search engine optimization to church websites so they appear at the top of the search results when people in that community search for a church. The CMO blog is here to educate and discuss Internet evangelism and church outreach.
Church Marketing Online Blog
Do you want to know how to use the full potential of the Internet for evangelism, outreach, and to grow your church? Read articles on church marketing, web evangelism, Internet ministry, search engine optimization, and more. Discuss ideas, tools, strategies to reach your community online. Check out CMO University.
Chris Walker at EvangelismCoach.org posted a good article about a church that issued a press release that was practically useless because it included so much flowery language and Christian lingo (aka Christianese).
Local newspapers will often run church press releases (or exerpts from them) in their religion section (both print and online), so it’s great to see a church using a press release to communicate with people in their community, but you’ve got to write them in a way that unchurched people can understand. Read the critique: Flowery Church “Insider” Language confuses Press Release.
Some people believe the church can be more effective by utilizing processes most commonly and effectively used in business today, including marketing. In fact there are companies that specifically help churches develop a logo, a slogan, a website, brochures, and a multi-faceted marketing campaign much the same way other companies develop these elements to launch a new business.
On the other hand, some people abhor these practices and think the church should stay as far away from them as possible. They believe marketing is deceptive, manipulative, superficial, worldly, and yes – evil.
And then there’s the middle ground where I think most of us find ourselves. We want our churches to reach more people in our communities. We want to express the passion and love we have for God and people. If people would just come to a Sunday service, we know God would show up and touch their hearts and show them the amazing life they could have with Him in it. We want to let people know about the opportunities God has for them, but it’s so hard to get people’s attention in this media-saturated culture. We want to reach out, but we don’t want resort to hype, gimmicks, or starkly corporate tactics.
Is marketing the way to do that, or is marketing evil?
James Dalman at Church Communications Pro posted an interesting blog article asking Is church marketing dead? He concludes that it is:
Church marketing is dying. Throwing a slick advertising piece or website at the public isn’t going to cut it much longer. The church of tomorrow will require more than a campaign. It will require investing personally and hanging out in people’s jacked up lives.
Church Marketing Sucks posted an interesting story about Kinetic Church in Charlotte, NC. Kinetic church holds its Sunday service in a movie theater and so they keep all their gear in a trailer. About a month ago theives stole the trailer. In response, Kinetic Church launched an outreach effort with donated billboard space and a coordinated online outreach effort. They even put this video on YouTube reaching out to the person or people who stole the trailer offering them forgiveness and asking for the opportunity to take them out to dinner.
In the past when a family was looking for a church they would talk to their friends or maybe check the yellow pages for churches in their area. Then they might visit several of those churches until they find one they like.
The Revolution of Local Search Over the last several years Internet search engines have made tremendous improvements in what is called local search, that is the search for businesses or organizations in a specific geographical area. Now if you search for something and include a city in the search phrase you’re likely to see results that include a map with some virtual push-pins in it. With one click you can get a phone number, driving directions, and even read reviews of the place of your choice. As a result, people have been ditching their yellow pages in droves and searching online for restaurants, retailers, and even churches.
Today someone who is looking for a church – let’s call him Bill - will most likely start his search online. Bill uses a search engine like Google, Yahoo, MSN, or Ask to find the websites of churches close to his home. Then he visits many of those websites. Based on what he reads, hears, and watches on those website’s Bill quickly rules out most of the churches without ever stepping foot in them. Then he picks 2 or 3 that seem to be most like the kind of church he’s looking for. He attends a Sunday service at those churches. Hopefully he likes at least one of them and gets involved in that fellowship.
Church Marketing Online is a new website being launched today by OurChurch.Com. The purpose of Church Marketing Online is to help churches make better use of the Internet in their marketing, evangelism, and outreach efforts. We’re doing that in two ways.
First, we’ve developed the Top Church Search Rankings service which puts a church website at the top of the search results on Google, Yahoo, MSN, and Ask for the phrases people search when looking for a church. This is key because most people looking for a church these days start their search online. And while most churches today have a website, very few have been optimized for search engines and very few churches are monitoring their search rankings and making adjustments on a regular basis to ensure people can find the church website.
Second, we’re launching this blog where we’ll be posting articles about church marketing, Internet evangelism, and search engine optimization in an effort to help pastors and church webmasters better understand how to reach the people in their communities online. Not only will we discuss purely online church marketing strategies, but also how to maximize a church’s offline outreach efforts (personal evangelism, random acts of kindness, billboards, postcards, etc) by coordinating and complimenting them with an online efforts. The cornerstone of the CMO blog is what we’re calling CMO University. This is a series of in-depth articles we’ll be publishing over the coming weeks for the purpose of giving busy church leaders an understanding of Internet technologies and their application to church marketing and outreach.
Thanks for stopping by. Please a comment and let us know what you think about the new site and let us know about any comments, questions, or issues you want to discuss regarding online marketing and outreach.
In His Service,
Paul Steinbrueck, CEO
OurChurch.Com
Some people believe the church can be more effective by utilizing processes most commonly and effectively used in business today, including marketing. In fact there are companies that specifically help churches develop a logo, a slogan, a website, brochures, and a multi-faceted marketing campaign much the same way other companies develop these elements to launch a new business.
Over the last several years Internet search engines have made tremendous improvements in what is called local search, that is the search for businesses or organizations in a specific geographical area. Now if you search for something and include a city in the search phrase you’re likely to see results that include a map with some virtual push-pins in it. With one click you can get a phone number, driving directions, and even read reviews of the place of your choice. As a result, people have been ditching their yellow pages in droves and searching online for restaurants, retailers, and even churches.