Church marketing

[stephenpatrick]

I would love to know your thoughts on this and how far the church should go to market itself.
My pastor just sent me an email,

I would like to invite/ask you to meet with me to discuss how we can better “market” our church to our community . We don’t have denominational identity, a big-church name, or programming that give us name-recognition. What are things we can do with class & respectability so that Shoreview is aware of who we are, what we do & why we do it?

Our church is small (around 50 member families, maybe) and the building is small too.

Even though I am in an industry in which certain marketing techniques are used, I just have never felt comfortable using those same for the church. Am I just an old fuddy-dud or what? I've always believed that if you preach the Word faithfully and correctly they will come. Then again, if you do that they not only won't come, but will leave.

I would appreciate any feedback you can give me.
Thanks

[Allyn]

Jan 22, 2010 15:42:46 GMT -5 stephenpatrick said:

I would love to know your thoughts on this and how far the church should go to market itself.
My pastor just sent me an email,

I would like to invite/ask you to meet with me to discuss how we can better “market” our church to our community . We don’t have denominational identity, a big-church name, or programming that give us name-recognition. What are things we can do with class & respectability so that Shoreview is aware of who we are, what we do & why we do it?

Our church is small (around 50 member families, maybe) and the building is small too.

Even though I am in an industry in which certain marketing techniques are used, I just have never felt comfortable using those same for the church. Am I just an old fuddy-dud or what? I've always believed that if you preach the Word faithfully and correctly they will come. Then again, if you do that they not only won't come, but will leave.

I would appreciate any feedback you can give me.
Thanks

Come to the church which really knows Jesus. Don't settle for second best when you can have the best and at a lower price. Are your whites still dingy from repeated attendance at your present church. Well now those dingy whites can be whiter then ever thought possible. Attend our church for 30 days and we guarantee you will come out more sin free then before. If you are not completely satisfied simply walk away knowing that you can never loose the white robe you received from the best church in town. Hurry, this offer last only through 2012 so get here and claim that seat and call it yours before it gets taken by another.

(maybe too strong?)
I'm not much for marketing religion.

[Sower]

Hi Stephen,

My personal thought, it's commendable to "invite" people to your church to hear and share what you do in a place that teaches truth. If they enjoy it they will comeback!

The Sower~

[Once4all]

Allyn, you crack me up.

Steve, your church sounds similar to the one I left recently, except ours didn't average 50 families, but about 50 people for Sunday morning service. I could very easily imagine receiving an identical email from our pastor.

Our church had no outreach. The leadership was good about sitting around and talking about needing to grow, but putting ideas into action often didn't happen. The usual excuse was how small we are, and even smaller than that when you consider the core group of people willing to at least meet and talk about it.

One of the most promising outreach programs they ever did, they only did one time (even though it was billed as the first ANNUAL event of its kind.) Unfortunately, one of the elders who helped bring it off that first year ended up moving to another state, so the second annual event never occurred. Basically, it was an outdoor BBQ right on the church property. Our church praise band, boosted by visiting and talented family members, entertained by playing country gospel music. There were games for the kids. About 120 people turned out for it. Unfortunately, no new church members resulted from it, which is the reason given for not continuing the practice the following year. I think they should have tried more than once.

The other thing we did (more than once) was to hold our Sunday evening church services at one of the local parks during the summer months. We'd all take our lawn chairs and sit in an open circle (more inviting than a closed circle) and sing songs, the preacher or someone else would have a short message or lesson, someone else might ask some Bible questions (in quiz fashion). And we'd have a couple of empty chairs in case any curious passers-by wanted to join us. No one ever did, and we did it off and on for two summers. But I still think it had potential.

So those were our country church's attempts at "marketing" (though we didn't call it that).

Bev

[Allyn]

I shouldn't have come of so cynical sounding because I really do think an outreach program is very important and the main reason the church is a church. I just couldn't resist a little humor.

The best program I have ever seen is that from individuals or from a family group who simply befriend a neighbor or a stranger in need and simply love them to Christ. The local church should be a place for encouragement and worship while the mission field may be right next door to our own house.

[Once4all]

The two most successful ways that we gained new members (or regular attendees, since we didn't have any kind of membership declaration or anything like that) was through walk-ins who simply decided this was where they wanted to be and kept coming, and invited friends, as Allyn mentioned. We (my husband and I) were walk-ins while "church shopping."

Of course if you compare what we've been talking about with the book of Acts, our ideas of getting people to "come to church" would seem very alien to first century believers.

"Attending church" is given way more emphasis than it was ever meant to have, I think. But I'd better stop here before I get off on one of my tangents. :-)

[stephenpatrick]

Allyn.

Those little quips of yours would make great posters.
Even though you were kidding, I liked them.

Bev.

I'm probably being generous on the number of families that are members. A crowded Sunday service has around 75 people, with kids downstairs for Sunday school.

I have enjoyed the outreach programs we've had. While we have a small church building, the yard is about 4-5 acres. Every summer we would have a huge festival with music, tents all over with arts and crafts, games for kids, very inexpensive food, etc. It was always a big hit for the neighborhood. But the returns, as far as adding more to the church list was nil. You said as through walk-ins who simply decided this was where they wanted to be and kept coming, and invited friends, as Allyn mentioned. Our neighbors invited us to visit and finally after a year we made it up there. We loved it, and it was time to leave the church we had been attending.
And thats how we ended up at our church

Sower said to "invite" people to your church to hear and share what you do in a place that teaches truth. If they enjoy it they will comeback! Absolutely, I agree.

Thanks for your advice. Some of the main reasons we left our previous church was the constant preaching on tithing, and the non-stop plea for raising more money to add on to the building (again) even though the numbers weren't there. The head pastor finally left, upset that the vote to build another addition didn't pass. He wanted a mega-church, and he finally got it, only to see it dwindle to nothing when the economy in the area he went to tanked.

[mellontes]

Find out your communities specific needs and meet them as a church body. The only way you can determine their needs is to go out and speak to them.

Who are the elderly?
Who are the widows?
Who are the unemployed?
Who are the single mothers?
Who is unable to shovel their driveway?
Who is unable to rake leaves?
Who is unable to cut grass?
Who needs rides to see their doctor?
Visit local nursing homes to talk individually with the residents - not to set up church and preach to them. Churches are for believers to be enabled so that they may go forth into the community.

I once suggested to our pastor that the choir (25 people) sing Christmas carols in a large park in downtown Oshawa. The church folk who were not singing could go into the gathered crowd with tracts, materials and see who they could talk with. He said no.

Meet people's needs and let God do the marketing. He is the one who promised to build the church. Let's not interfere with His work.

Imagine the scene:

Saturday morning at 10:00 AM. Several cars and a church van pull up to a house. People jump out carrying shovels, brooms and salt. Soon there is a flurry of activity and the driveway, front sidewalk, and porch are cleared of snow. Then it is swept. A few people go over the area and lightly dust some salt on the concrete/pavement to prevent slippery sections from forming. As quickly as they came, they left. They didn't stop for payment and they asked no one to advertise what they had done. Of course, permission from the owner would have to be received in order to proceed. Total expenditure = people's time, the amount of gas to drive there and back, and the cost of one bag of salt.

In my entire lifetime I have never seen anything like this. I can well imagine the impact it would have.

I remember when a previous pastor of mine in Winnipeg "accidentally" leaked to the newspaper of his intentions one week-end. We ended up being on the eleven o'clock news that night. I think God was disgusted with the whole idea...

[MoGrace2U]

Why not just encourage the members to grab a few church bulletins and pass them out to their neighbors and friends each week along with an invite to go with. If the bulletin is informative enough including some encouraging words about things going on with its members, it might just find its appeal to those looking for a church. The scheduled sermon topic and biblical reference would be good to include too - with perhaps a short intro of the topic.