Dealing with your church website is annoying. Keeping it up to date with current information, let alone with technology and design trends feels like a real drain on time and resources. Wouldn’t it be better to just not have one?
However, we also know that almost every visitor to your church is going to take a look at your website before stepping foot in your front door. It’s your first impression and you only have a few seconds to make it. What impression are you sending to your community?
Put yourself in their shoes for a minute.
Though reports claim a majority of people first visit a church because of a personal invite, website analytics also indicate that nearly all of those visit the church’s website before showing up. And what about those who are curious about church but have no personal invitation?
Imagine you are on vacation with your family in a new city. It’s Saturday and you are trying to make a decision about where to worship on Sunday. Or you’ve just moved to a new city to start a new job, and are looking for a church to join. Or you have just moved back to your hometown after twenty years to take care of your parents.
How are you going to look for a church?
The same way 76% of all people do: you google for churches in the area, and look at their website. What do you do then? You look at their statement of faith, maybe play their latest sermon, and then if you like what you see, you’ll show up.
Probably.
Show them you care about your ministry
There’s another element at play that also matters: your subconscious reaction to the site’s design. A poorly executed design will lead to a feeling of mistrust and unease, and a well designed website will remove those barriers.
Another way of saying it is that your site’s design will communicate something about how much you care about people and details. Your subconscious is alerting you “if these people don’t care about the simple things, how much care are they taking with the big things?” (Luke 16:10)
Help them find you
Apart from the bad first impression of a poorly executed site, a nonexistent site means that when they search for you (which they will) they will find no information about you, leading them to believe you are either closed, or not worth their trouble.
Help them know you
A church needs a well-executed website as a matter of hospitality. Can potential visitors find you when they search for you? What do they find when they get to you?
Is your content up to date? We recently worked with a church who insisted they were far too busy to worry about their website: and yet, their homepage showed a pastor who had not been with the church for two years.
We’ve all run into the church website (or perhaps had one ourselves) that advertises the past May’s potluck… in October.
Honor the effort of those who are taking the time to seek you out by giving them accurate information.
Put your message and your community on display to the watching world!
Your church has a beautiful community, a family of families that is a wonderful (though imperfect) display of Christ’s love. You proclaim The Message, The Truth, the Gospel that is the power of God for salvation to all who believe!
Don’t hide this message behind a website that makes you look like anything less than what you are.
How we can help.
94% of churches in the United States are under 500 people, and lack the skills and resources necessary to build and maintain a professional website on their own. We’re here to help. Our unique designs are tailored to the needs of churches, and our custom technology makes it easy for a volunteer or administrator to post sermons, events, announcements, and keep other information like staff and meetings times current. All this is at a price point that is easily accessible to your church.