ChurchTrac Livestream - 2/28/2024: Church Communication
Summary
TLDRThe video discusses improving church communication to prevent people saying 'I didn't know about that'. It covers reasons people say this using the 'FAST' acronym - not providing Frequent updates, Audience-relevant content, Simplified communication channels, or Timely notifications. It then shares the 'LEAPS' formula for good church communication - Leadership initiation, Event listing, Active website updating, Pointed targeting, and Strategic alerting. Finally, it offers pro tips like leveraging small groups, text messaging, helping people use new technology, and using Canva for announcements.
Takeaways
- 😣 Church people say "I didn't know" when leaders don't communicate frequently or effectively enough (FAST - Frequent, Audience-relevant, Simplified channels, Timely)
- 📱 Leverage all communication channels (email, text, social media, etc) and target relevant audiences
- 🗓 Create event listings that are easy to find and keep them continuously updated
- 🏠 Small groups have big impact for sharing announcements and information
- ✅ Texting ensures messages are read quickly - useChurch Track messaging tools
- 💻 Actively update website with events, resources and needs consistently
- 🙋♂️ Make leaders available to help members use or access communication tools
- 🔁 Establish processes where members can efficiently communicate needs back
- 🖼 Use visual content creators like Canva to make announcements stand out
- 📋 Forms allow members to directly submit info and requests to leadership
Q & A
What is the main reason church people say 'I didn't know about that'?
-The main reason is that church leaders are not communicating frequently enough or effectively enough with their congregation. Concepts like the 'marketing rule of 7' show that messages need to be communicated frequently across multiple channels for people to retain the information.
What are some best practices for church communication according to the presenters?
-Some best practices include using small groups to relay important messages, leveraging text messaging, making leadership available to help members use church software/apps, using every available communication channel, keeping all leaders informed, using visual content creation tools like Canva, and enabling members to communicate back to leadership through forms.
What does the FAST acronym stand for regarding frequent church communication?
-FAST stands for Frequent updates, Audience-relevant content, Simplified communication channel, and Timely notifications. Following these principles can help improve church communication.
What are some components of the 'LEAPS' church communication formula?
-The LEAPS formula includes Leadership initiation, Event listing, Active website updates, Pointed targeting, and Strategic alerts. This provides a model for effective overall church communication.
Why are small groups important for church communication?
-Small groups meet more regularly than the church at large. Leveraging small group leaders to relay announcements ensures messages reach church members frequently and effectively.
What is an easy way to equip small group leaders with announcements?
-A Church Connect page card with a simple list of 3-5 important announcements is an easy way to keep small group leaders informed. They can then share announcements with their group members.
How can we make it easy for church visitors to get information?
-Have well-trained volunteers available to help visitors use church apps, signups, etc. Also ensure your Welcome Team is fully knowledgeable about all church events, groups, and resources.
Should we use print bulletins or digital communication?
-Use every channel available based on your congregation's needs and preferences, whether print, digital, or both. There is no one-size-fits-all solution.
How can Church Connect help with our outdated website?
-Transition website content to Church Connect. Then forward the website domain to Connect. This maintains links while directing people to updated information.
How can members communicate needs back to church leadership?
-Digital form cards facilitate easy member communication about prayer requests, spiritual decisions, event registrations, and more. Members can communicate directly with leadership this way.
Outlines
😊 Introducing the hosts and topic of effective church communication
The hosts Wes and Matt introduce themselves and the live video topic of discussing strategies for effective church communication to prevent members from saying "I didn't know about that". They mention this is an interactive session with a chat for viewers to contribute ideas.
😖 Explaining why church members say "I didn't know"
Wes and Matt explain common reasons why church members say "I didn't know" - lack of frequent updates, irrelevant content, too many communication channels, and untimely notifications. They introduce an acronym FAST to summarize these issues - Frequent updates, Audience-relevant content, Simplified communication channel, and Timely notifications.
😃 Presenting the ultimate church communication formula
Wes and Matt jokingly introduce an acronym "LEAPS" to represent the key elements of effective church communication - Leadership initiation, Event listing, Active website updating, Pointed targeting, and Strategic alerting. They emphasize the website as the hub to direct people to.
📝 Sharing pro tips for evaluating church communication
Wes and Matt provide 7 pro tips for assessing and improving church communication - leverage small groups, maximize texting, offer personal help, use all channels, inform all leaders, create visuals with Canva, and offer feedback forms.
💬 Interactive feedback session on communication wins and fails
Wes and Matt encourage viewers to share in the chat their biggest wins and fails related to church communication. They provide some examples from their own experience and emphasize learning from mistakes.
❓ Answering audience questions on various communication topics
Wes and Matt interactively respond to various audience questions on topics like - using Church Connect, embedding calendars, importing Google calendars, creating explainers on complex features, and finding the Church Connect mobile app.
👋 Wrapping up with final thoughts and reminders
As they wrap up, Wes and Matt note this was a different interactive format from their usual webinars. They remind viewers to reach out for any further help needed and to stay updated on upcoming live streams.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡communication
💡leadership
💡event
💡website
💡target
💡text
💡small group
💡channel
💡fail
💡automation
Highlights
People say 'I didn't know' because churches don't communicate frequently enough or target relevant audiences.
Messages should be seen or heard at least 7 times before people will act on them.
Leverage small groups to share announcements and information.
99% of text messages are read within 5 minutes, making it the fastest way to reach people.
Be available to help people use new communication tools to increase adoption.
Use every communication channel available including social media, email, bulletins, etc.
Ensure all leaders are informed on announcements so they can share with others.
Use Canva to create visually engaging announcements and communication.
Online forms allow people to communicate needs and requests back to the church.
Failing to phase out a donation platform caused a temporary loss of giving.
Not giving enough details with announcements causes confusion.
Having outdated information between the church website and app is problematic.
Announcing an event just days before causes low attendance.
Embedded calendars work on websites but break on mobile devices.
Let the support team know if you need help or have feature requests.
Transcripts
[Music]
[Music]
[Music]
[Music]
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
[Music]
[Music]
[Music]
[Music]
[Applause]
[Music]
the
man Jes
[Music]
man
[Music]
and we are officially live hey everybody
my name is Wes my name is Matt and today
Matt we are talking about church
communication churchs but more
specifically we're here to help us all
keep people from saying those five
terrible words we've all heard them too
yes and and in the chat let us know what
are those terrible words that you've
heard from your people those five
terrible words I already know half of
you are like frantically typing in your
keyboard what that is um but those five
terrible words what are they M I didn't
know about that now we had a smart alec
here earlier that said well it's
actually technically six because it's
did cont and I was like no no no it's
five words um if I had a dollar every
time someone in my church said that I
would be a millionaire I could
retire oh man um and so that's the whole
point of this live stream today is for
us to take a lot of the things we've
learned personally the hard way from our
own experience by doing it the wrong way
and the hard way um and also taking a
lot of that we have gained from church
leaders over the years um that have done
a really good job of communicating with
their Church um and so we're going to
talk about all that today but before we
dive into all the things just a couple
things I want to remind everybody about
um first and foremost Matt our YouTube
channel yes we have a YouTube channel
with I think over 160 videos now yeah uh
with instructions for how to use
everything in church track but also lots
of other hour-long webinars like this
one and some equip videos and just other
fun things that we've been putting out
over the past few years so go ahead and
subscribe and join that community and
speaking of communities one of the best
communities I've ever seen personally is
our Facebook group here at church track
um you can go ahead ask to join that
community and it's so great because that
is a place where church leaders just
like yourself are getting involved
talking to each other working through
like different things they're trying to
accomplish with the software um but it's
more than just talking about church
track it's just talking about Ministry
and how to do ministry better uh so I
encourage you to take a look at that
Facebook you users group and then last
but not least when it comes to getting
help in the software uh the best way to
get help and the quickest way to get
help actually is to click that help
button on the top right corner of your
screen when you're logged into church
track and so when you click that help
button it'll give you the ability to go
and straight ask us a question or you
can look at our entire online user guide
uh where we have so much content yes uh
it is a lot um everything from how to
navigate the people screen to accounting
you name it um so that is how to get
help okay well today's live stream we're
kind of we're going to break it into I I
say three parts but it's technically
four because we're doing a very
different thing today see typically in
our live streams uh we are obviously
we're doing them live but we have like a
Q&A that we'll do at the end and answer
questions and stuff whereas this
particular live stream we felt like it
would be better to just have
conversation with you all and so we want
to talk about different Pro tips and
things that you all have found that work
well for your church communication and
share them with everybody here and
everything uh but before we get to that
point uh first we just want to talk
about okay why is it that church people
say I didn't know yeah I didn't know I
didn't know um about that or whatever it
else variant of that may be uh and then
we're going to look at the ultimate
Church communication formula done we've
dialed it in um and also we'll share
after that we'll share some Pro tips for
evaluating your overall Church
communication strategy and that's when
we'll also want to hear from you all to
share what you've done that has worked
really well at your church to make sure
that everybody is in the know all right
one two three let's go all right so why
church people say I didn't know um there
are a lot of reasons but after working
with a lot of churches and also just
being a part of some pretty amazing
Ministries that have kind of figured out
why they they say they didn't know yeah
um it came down to we're just not being
fast Matt just not fast enough we're not
fast so we actually created an acronym
for this because I don't know about you
I love acronyms it helps me remember
things um maybe some of you out there
maybe Jeff John Kim you like acronyms
and it helps you remember things um and
so we actually have a pretty funny
acronym for this that I thought was so
fitting um we're not being fast so the
first one is we're not giving frequent
updates and so Matt when it comes to
like frequent updates what do we mean
well just regularly informing people but
also not just regularly informing people
but repeating and talking about what
you're trying to communicate with
everyone at least seven times uh what's
you were telling me about the rule of
seven that you were reading about yes in
fact I I even have it on the big screen
Matt because it's that big of a deal the
marketing rule of seven uh this is
actually uh something I learned in
business in school but basically to sum
up the marketing rule of seven I've got
it here a message needs to be seen or
heard at least seven times by a
potential customer for it to be
effectively absorbed and acted upon um
and I I highlighted those things because
I thought they were so important for it
to be seen and heard because people us
people we we see things and hear things
and sometimes people need to both see
and hear things to be able to retain
those things but we also need to and
hear them seven times repetitively
before it finally sinks in but but it's
beyond just like it absorbing into us we
actually need to act on it and so this
is such a great thing and in terms of
getting people and and I like how Mike
says are you sure it's not 70 times
seven oh goodness come on Mike yes that
Mike sometimes it feels like it doesn't
it um and so when it comes to getting
that message out and getting it out to
people 7 time 7 S as Matt Mike said 490
times I mean there's so many different
ways we communicate with our people at
our church I mean just giving this silly
illustration here but I mean we've got
the person sitting there on the email
getting that out uh we've got you know
sending people text messages uh we've
got preaching we've got you know on our
website having announcements on our
website you got the guy in the corner
right there every social media you can
imagine whether it's you're trying to
put something out on Instagram you're
trying to put it out on Facebook very
online um you're trying to put it out on
uh Tik Tok you're trying to put it out
on oh goodness what are some other
things YouTube YouTube come what we're
currently streaming in right now is
YouTube as well um by the way if you're
watching on YouTube or Facebook right
now you can't be a part of the chat you
have to be a part of this Vimeo so make
sure you click the Vimeo link if you
want to join the chat but also small
groups Matt when people are hanging out
at small groups that's a great way to
communicate things too yeah we'll get
into that in a little bit but that's a
that's a great opportunity to share
announcements yes so all right so
frequent updates that's number one and
then it also comes comes down to
audience relevant content audience
relevant content the other part of being
fast is we're not giving people stuff
that's relevant to the audience
specifically yeah like we'll we'll send
text messages to the entire church that
should have been to like a specific
group or a particular Ministry like like
reaching out to the entire church for
something children's ministry related
instead of just sending it to the
parents at the church or one of my
favorites so I was talking to a church
leader um and he was explaining to me
kind of how he was communicating with
people with text and he was super pumped
about using mass texting because it was
just really changing the game for his
church and how to communicate with
people but um I made this meme I thought
it was so fitting um so churches be like
hey don't forget about the women's
breakfast coming up next Saturday uh and
all my husbands are like uh why am I
getting this text I'm a guy yeah I'm a
guy so and if some of you recognize this
picture it's a meme from that all state
commercial um where you know he was like
like well she she's a guy well she
sounds hideous um I thought that was so
funny because like that's so perfect and
I know like if you got a text message
about some lims event are you going to
tell your wife I would if anything I'd
be like hey did you get this text cuz I
don't know why I'm getting this
text which that also comes down to
wasting money too when we're sending the
wrong things to the wrong people
especially if you're doing mass texting
um well that cost money to do that on
any platform no matter what you're
paying to send that text so for everyone
you send text that shouldn't receive it
you're spending money that didn't need
to be spent yeah all right so another
part of the fast acronym I Love This
Acronym because it just helps me
remember it all right so we talked about
the frequent updates we talked about
audience relevant content but then the
other part of this is having a
simplified Communication channel and so
one of the things that I was actually
part of a church that struggled with
this is we had so many different places
we posted everything but we didn't have
one single place where you knew that all
that information ultimately would be and
so when it comes to us in a church
environment uh the best place for that
is our website yeah because our website
you can take all these different mediums
of communication and just point them to
one place yes and and that's the best
way to do it and so when you're sending
out emails to people whenever you're
teaching people um in Sunday school or
small groups whenever you are preaching
on a Sunday when you're putting stuff on
social media when you're sending out
those mass texts all of it pointing
right back to a certain area on your
Church website it helps out tremendously
so that's the simplified Communication
channel and that's it also streamlines
things that way everyone's getting the
exact same message rather than the game
of telephone playing the game of
telephone throughout your church yes um
and not to be confused with the
targeting obviously because you still
want to use these different mediums to
Target people in different ways but you
ultimately want to have one place where
all that information is living in terms
of like what the events are going on at
your church and the resources you're
trying to get your people to know about
and the needs you have for volunteers
stuff like that um and then the last
part of fast time T the timely
notifications yes um uh you need to give
people enough heads up so that they can
react properly and make plans uh rather
than last minute I'm very last minute
I'm not good about staying on top of
things weeks ahead of time um I have to
have everything scheduled out in order
to stay on top of that you you have to
have timely notifications for your
members as well um like talking about an
event several weeks ahead of time just
to make sure that they can plan that Wes
has another meme that he created I'm
just full of memes today um scheduling
at some Churches hey can you serve at
VBS tomorrow am I a joke to
you I got work
man but it's so true though I mean I've
been a part of a lot of Ministries and
I've also sat in on churches that will
do stuff like this um and sometimes it's
just kind of a because we become
reactionary and we kind of don't get as
intentional as we want to be or maybe
we're just not as organized as we need
to be to plan things out now most
churches are not falling into this
drastic situation where you're asking
people to serve at VBS the day before um
but it's still kind of the joke that
there's still a lot of situations where
we kind of fall into those situations
where we are um and so that's a big part
is just being timely and and doing all
that but all right so we've talked
talked about the reason why church
people are saying I didn't know about
that cuz we're not being fast we're not
fast enough we're not fast enough um I
I'm really I'm probably going to use
that acronym for like other stuff in the
future I'm just going to like repurpose
it um but we have another acronym uh
because ultimately acronyms make me
remember things and it also makes it a
lot easier to present this stuff um and
by the way I just want to really
reinforce this isn't like us coming at
you like we're no ad alls or anything
yeah um this is us just bringing the
culmination of really amazing feedback
that we've received from churches
working one-on-one with churches all
around the world and how they do
ministry and being able to take you know
all this great stuff we found from
church leaders also the bad stuff and
learning hey what doesn't work well and
stuff to really help us make these
resources to be able to streamline our
church communication yeah and we would
love to hear your ideas on what works
and what doesn't work in the chat in
this video a little later yeah when we
get to that okay so we've got the
reasons let's talk about the ultimate
Church communication formula shall we um
now this formula uh it it's not as cool
as the fast one but I think it still
works pretty well um and we have called
this one in fact let me just go to this
formula um in fact I'm just going to
leave it here and I think we're done so
there it is there is the formula for the
ultimate formula in fact for church
communication leaps so leaps at L plus e
plus a Time p over s and that's that's
it so now you know how to communicate
with your people I think we're done here
so we'll send you all have a good week
no kidding so leaps all right so what
does this mean all right team bring us
the acronym so it comes down to having a
few things set in place and it all
starts with our leadership is really
what it comes down to and but what I
mean by that is initiating what it is we
need to know in our leadership of what's
going on at our church the needs we have
at our church um the things that we're
trying to provide to our people us as
leadership we have to get together at
our staff meeting or whatever that
meeting is that we set for this and
really hammer out all that stuff yeah
and then the E is event listing which is
making sure that it's easy for your
members to know where like what all the
upcoming events are at your church so
it's not just you all having like a team
calendar and you all collaborating and
planning things but you have to publish
that and make it easy for everyone to
find it all in one place so they can
stay up to date and you know make notate
their own calendars and make their own
plans yeah and I was actually talking to
um David who is the gentleman that's
behind the the scenes here running all
this stuff and we were talking a little
bit about how the church that he used to
be at did a lot of their event listing
and it was almost like a like excuse me
if I like a Battle Royale in a way David
where like church leaders are basically
saying hey this is what I have going on
in Min my Ministry and this is why I
think it's important and they would kind
of determine okay like these are the top
things that we need to like announce to
the entire church but then these are
like the secondary things that we want
to announce in these situations and then
these are like the third things that we
want to announce here and they had like
kind of a a method to when they would
announce things and and where they would
announce things and everything which is
very strategic very very very smart yes
and speaking of being smart so then so
we got leadership initiation we got
event listing the next one is active
website updates um this one hits very
near and dear to me Matt uh because we
work with a lot of churches uh where
we'll go on their website because it's
just part of like what happens when you
know we're helping churches get set up
with church track and everything we'll
look at their website and we see a lot
of churches that have a website where it
either like doesn't have any information
about the events going on or the needs
of the church or resources the Church
offers or it has stuff but it's like
incredibly outdated and kind of cryptic
in some cases yeah and so being able to
like all right as leadership we figured
out what we want to do we've listed
everything out now we start updating our
website accordingly and I use the word
active just because a website isn't
something that's just static where we
just let it hang out there's even been a
couple questions in chat um like Shirley
just asked website versus Church conect
connect which is better for simplified
Communication channel we use the app
more than the website Chad said we love
having our website but I feel like the
app seems like a better tool yeah
honestly when it comes to websites
whether you're using the church Connect
app or U you know a public website on
some other platform um we recommend
picking one of those channels and just
focusing a lot of your effort on that so
if you're finding that the Connect app
is easier to manage because it's already
right there in church track then yeah
just use that and direct people D to the
app and basically treat it like what
we're recommending for the website
that's because it is a website it is a
website yeah um yeah and so Bey once we
get everything in the website and then
we get to that pointed targeting which
we kind of talked a little bit earlier
you know about not sending the women's
event text message to all the dudes in
the church but you know being targeted
with that um and you know not only
targeting the right people but also
targeting the right situations yes
because if you're constantly messaging
people for things that aren't relevant
to them they're eventually going to
either tune it out or actually block it
out and unsubscribe altogether from
communication yeah and unsubscribe both
figuratively you know and literally in a
way yeah they might actually hit the
unsubscribe button but they'll also just
click check out and be done well and a
lot of times in church service when you
see people their eyes kind of start
glazing over during the time of
announcements they just like mentally
unsubscribe during the church service um
so pointed targeting and then last but
not least strategic alert
uh we we're being strategic about
alerting people at the right time um and
like not waiting till that day before
VBS but doing a few months in advance
but also not sending a text out at like
6:30 in the evening yes cuz no one's
going to read that they're eating dinner
send it like at lunch or at maybe 7 in
the morning or 8: in the morning or
something like that before their commute
uh whatever you do don't send it at 6:
a.m. on a Saturday please don't ever
don't ever send anything at 6: a.m.
happen um okay so that is the formula um
now granted there are so many churches
that do communication so well um they
may not do like this exact formula but
the variant of what they do kind of
encompasses what we've just gone over
here in the leaps formula U but it it
just I I love it just because you set
that foundation with getting leadership
on board and then you have that time of
listing everything out and then you
actively put everything in your website
you target everything you strategically
alert people and people hopefully stop
saying I didn't know about that I didn't
know about that but to help uh to help
you all uh with your quest of hopefully
getting people to not say I didn't know
about that uh we've got some Pro tips to
help you out um some of these include
are hard one pro tips yeah yeah the
these are really good Pro tips um in
fact I think probably one of my
favorites is the one you've got here but
uh let's start with all right we got
seven Pro tips number one small groups
have big impact yes um so small groups I
mean you we were both a part of the same
church that we used to go to the small
groups was like probably I think the
best way the church communicated the
important things that needed to be
communicated yes um I'm to be honest
that's you're interfacing with your
small group more than the church because
you're texting them throughout the week
you're hanging out with them you know
once a week or however often you meet
with them but you may also have other
times where you're meeting with that guy
from the small group or your wife is
hanging out with one of the ladies from
the small group or something like that
yeah so you're interacting with these
people even more often throughout the
week than you are with the church itself
the institution so leverage your small
groups have the small group leaders make
announcements to let people know about
upcoming events or what the church is
trying to accomplish yeah and one really
good way in church connect to kind of
get your small group leaders or just
your entire small groups up to speed on
like important announcements I would
recommend creating like a page card in
church connect so I'm just I've got my
church app here already loaded up but I
just created a quick page card it is not
pretty it is not fancy I would encourage
you to get crazier than I did but I just
named this one weekly announcements it's
just a page card and it's just giving
hey announcements this week and then
there's like the top three announcements
potluck on Saturday tell your friends
early service is now 9:00 a.m. and there
are two spots left for a Uganda mission
trip I mean obviously you can take this
to another level and stuff but this is a
really good example of like how you can
just have all your small group leaders
in the know that hey all the
announcements they need to say they're
going to be on Church connect when they
get on Church connect they're going to
be right there and they can tell them to
their small group and even encourage
their small group hey get on Church
connect yes yes so that's a really good
way to utilize small groups to have big
impact so Dwayne that answers your
question how would you use Church
connect for event listings also as you
add events to church track in the event
screen if someone logs into their
account in church connect they can see
that in the upcoming events tab on their
profile so it's also there twice
essentially for those people all right
you got a good one Matt yes uh texting
is best in the US just remember text is
best uh uh
99% of all text messages are read within
the first five minutes after they're
sent that means this is texting is the
best opportunity and the best medium for
getting the word out to your people at
least very quickly yeah um way better
than email it takes like it takes days I
think it takes two days for 99% of
emails to be open and read so definitely
use texting as a way to communicate with
your members as often as possible uh in
church track you can go to the people
and family screen and at the top there's
a messaging tab this is where you can
send emails as well it's I we still
recommend doing emails but you can also
send text messages and what's really
cool is we actually have a built-in way
to send targeted messaging by in that
choose who to include section on the
bottom left you can select a smart list
or even just a tag that you've applied
to some of your members and reach out to
just those people yeah and disregard the
estimated recipients this is just a test
database um but you may have you know
100 people you're sending a text to or a
couple hundred people however many um so
texting is best um Now Matt another one
that you did at your previous church I
thought was so incredible tell me about
that one well what I did and this the
the recommendation by the way Pro tip
three is just be available to help um
what I did at my church when we launched
our church app is for a few weeks ahead
of time I would get up behind the pulpit
and announce that we're working on an
app and it's coming and here's the date
that it'll be available um and then the
day of I we had the QR code we announced
it woohoo don't everyone download it but
I said hey if you have any questions if
you need help downloading it if you want
to help creating an account or setting
up this or that or the other come to me
I will be in the welcome area out front
bring me your phone and I will help you
out and people would literally hand me
their phone and I would download the app
and then together we would set up online
giving and create their account and just
make sure that they were set up for
success with the app that way more
people got to download it I like the
adoption rate of the of the app went
through the roof be like 95% I mean yeah
I mean we basically doubled the
potential number of people cuz we we had
a mix of older and younger people the
younger people jumped right on it but
the older people just wanted to make
sure that they were doing it right or
this or that so by me making self
available and helping them they all
jumped on that platform that's how we
help all of our members do virtually
anything whether it be sign up for an
event or be in the know about something
or just do something that we want them
to do is to like make ourselves
available so what we recommend is that
either you or some volunteers at your
church get really well trained on
whatever it is you're wanting to help
the members do so that as they leave
they can be in that welcome area and
interact with them and help them do that
I would say that probably whoever is
running your welcome Booth um or your
welcome center whatever you may call it
they may need to be the person that's in
the know the most in your entire church
just because they're the person who
everyone's going to come to about hey
what events are going on here hey what
small groups are available hey you know
what resource how how do I download the
sermon stuff like that and they can
point them to all that yep um all right
so that's a good one Matt I think that's
probably one of the most powerful to be
brutally honest but um Pro tip number
four leverage all all available channels
of communication um and what I I mean by
this I mean preaching i' I've list out
here announcements in service pre- and
post- service slides the bulletin
bulletin is still strong and does a
really good job uh small group text
email Instagram Facebook Twitter snail
mail Church track mail by the way Church
track mail you can send emails in church
track um let me show you something
really cool just because leveraging all
your available channels of communication
that's a lot and thankfully you can
schedule some of these things in church
track because the reality is you're not
going to have time to just like when you
need to get the message out a specific
time just quick do that so what I
recommend is back on the people screen
in that messaging tab like let's say you
have an email you want to send to your
people and so I'm just sending out an
email but we have this option down here
when I go to send a schedule or an email
which I actually need to type something
in my email for it to actually send so
I'll just say Hi and then email blah
blah blah and so when I go to send an
email I can send it as soon as possible
or I can schedule the message to send
later and then I can say I actually want
this email to send out maybe on the 7th
of March and pick a certain time and go
from there uh this is just such a great
tool because I see a lot of church
leaders um I feel like they they've just
like figured out a not not just like a
life hack but like a Ministry hack of
just scheduling so many things ahead of
time um and that email tool will help
you out with that I haven't even talked
about automations which is for another
day but automations could blow your mind
too if you check out our video on that
um so that's a good one so being able to
leverage all of your channels of
communication yeah in fact Donnie you
mentioned bulletins were still great
Donnie even said like your church is a
primarily senior adult so you're still
printing a weekly bulletin yeah uh and
somebody else said same with us so yeah
uh definitely leverage everything
whether it be a bulletin that you're
handing out some some Churches probably
have a bulletin board even still yeah
definitely use all of those points of
contact to reach out to your people well
and just like I don't want to get on too
much of a soapbox of this but when you
hear people that are like Professionals
in Ministry they they deem themselves
Ministry professionals which we do not
we just deem ourselves people that like
to learn from churches and give you the
information and help you uh but when
people say like oh the bulletin is dead
and bl no no no every church is unique
every church is different and what works
at some churches may not work at other
churches what works phenomenal at one
Church may not work the best at another
and so that's why it's good to to know
all the different ways we can
communicate um all right now Matt uh
this is a good one this next one all
leaders must be in the no yeah don't
ever leave any of your leadership team
whether it be staff or Volunteers in the
dark on what's coming up at your church
so yeah like even we we we joked about
sending a text to all the men in the
church about a women's event but have
all your men volunteers and leaders know
about the women's event so that as
they're shaking hands and hugging people
and interacting and laughing and joking
and having a good time at church they
can still share that information with
anybody um do that across your
leadership team make sure that all of
your leadership team knows about all of
the upcoming events and important
announcements um in church track you can
make this really easy on yourself by
like we we showed you in church connect
having that card for all the upcoming
events the big things that they need to
know about but also using using your
smart lists and your tags to segment
your members for all like your leaders
and your volunteers so that you have an
easy way to just send a text to
everybody in that group or an email so
that you can send them a quick
announcement let them know what they
need to be sharing with the rest of the
members at your church yeah and and
that's so key like if you don't already
have a tag or a smart list you use to
designate who all the key leadership of
the church is so you can quickly send
emails and texts to them go ahead and do
that today because it's just going to
make your life so much
group text because there's always that
one in group Tex that just like responds
every time and then your ph's blown up
all day so I like that um okay so that's
a good one Matt um my favorite though
this is yeah my favorite I love canva we
we like are canva evangelists and canva
doesn't even know we exist and they're
not even a Christian company it's just
explain canva to those who are don't
know what canva is well the simplest way
to put it is it's Photoshop for dummies
and I say that lovingly because I'm one
of the dummies I don't know how to use
Photoshop it's a platform where you can
create really great graphic images or um
uh just visual content that allows you
to and like they even give uh their Pro
subscription like their paid
subscription for free to nonprofits yeah
so you can have the full power of that
tool without having to pay anything for
your church I use canva every day just
here at church track uh and also for
like the the church that my wife and I
were going to uh Church plant that we
were serving at a couple years ago um it
was a great way to have really
professional images and graphic content
and visual content for the church yeah
um definitely use canva to just make
your image make your images but make
your announcements really stand out
check out some of our we we've done a
few videos on canva that was one of I
think it was our most watched video was
the one we did on canva for churches
we've done we've done two actually we've
done one canva for churches and then
canva templates for churches both of
them are really really great for
understanding how to use canva and how
to get it for free but also like how to
use the templates and instructing you on
on just the way it works so definitely
check those out yeah that's a good one
all right Matt so we've talked about so
many pro tips I think we have one more
oh yes forms how can I forget the most
underrated thing in church track um all
right so forms the underrated and most
powerful Church communication uh because
the whole time we've been talking about
us communicating to our people and us
talking to them uh but forms are one of
the most powerful ways for them to talk
back to us yes and creating forms in
church track is much more than just like
having a like I'll just show it real
quick on my phone here but it it goes
beyond having just a standard like
connection card I mean obviously if you
don't have a digital connection card I'd
highly recommend making one today uh you
can check out our user guide and it
shows you how to do that and walks you
through the process but this goes beyond
just getting people's information
because they want to maybe learn more
about our church or make a spiritual
decision no this is giving them the
ability to do things like submit prayer
requests uh this is a really really
important thing being able to provide a
way for our people to let us know how we
can pray for them so I'd recommend
creating a form card for that I'd
recommend creating another form card for
maybe volunteers uh where your
volunteers can sign up to be a part of
the worship team or maybe they want to
serve in the children's ministry or the
connections team at your church whatever
it may be uh the form card The Humble
form card is probably lowkey the most
powerful tool in terms of church
communication because it ultimately
brings it back to providing our people a
way to communicate with us which we
don't want a one-sided communication it
needs to be that's not because that's
it's a conversation I mean you're you're
in a relationship with these people and
you can't have a one a relationship if
it's a one-way Street uh so yes
absolutely leverage all opportunities
for them to communicate back to you and
forms are a great opportunity for that
whether it be a physical form or a
digital form we recommend the digital
form though simply because you can
change that and update it anytime yes
physical forms you have to like send
that to the printers and that could cost
money well especially when you're like
coming up to Easter we we've got a blog
post on like making your church connect
ready for Easter and everything but
that's a great opportunity to have like
specific question that's geared towards
your typical Easter crowd um to really
just make that experience better for
people um I this chat is I think it's
going to be insane we've never done this
before like typically we do like a Q&A
where we just start answering questions
but we're going to shift into this
different time where right we've talked
about the pro tips I want to hear from
you all and I want to see like what are
some of the things that have worked well
for your church and your ministry in
terms of communicating with your people
um what are some things you've done
terribly bad let me know I mean so so
how about this um help us learn from
your mistakes so preface whatever it is
you tell us by either a win or a fail so
say like when and then what it is that
was a big win for your church and if it
was a fail say fail and then what was it
that made you fail epically in your
church communication and this isn't to
laugh laugh at your failures it's more
so to help the whole class here learn
from your failures so we don't make that
same failure um so this is going to be
interesting so y'all bring us all of
your wins in church communication as
well as your church communication fails
in the chat uh now if you're watching
this at a later time hello future U you
can't actually join in on the chat
uh and do this because you're watching
you know after this is done but uh is as
always if you ever need me help with the
software uh just click that help button
uh and you can reach out to our team to
get help we have a very great team um
and also if you're like me you like to
learn how to do things like by watching
a video actually learn how to do spark
plugs the other day in my car by
watching a YouTube video yeah nice so
very handy you can learn how to to put
spark plugs in your car or you can learn
how to craft your church connect uh for
Easter Service whatever it is in between
um on our YouTube channel uh so a lot of
great stuff okay so let's take a look I
want to see some wins I want to see some
fails um y'all let me know or if you
just have some random questions as well
so you can just preface that with
question and let us know what your
question is too um well I to be honest
I'll go ahead and share a fail uh we a
while back um at my the church that my
wife and I were serving at for a couple
years a couple years ago uh we were we
had multiple platforms to give online
okay one of them included zel and we saw
some things about zel that made us kind
of suspicious about how secure they were
and we we were worried that our our
church account would get compromised so
my pastor like pulled the rug out from
zel and said no we're we pulled the plug
on zel and said no we're not we're not
offering zel anymore and cut that
opportunity of online donations off
but it turns out that like most of our
online donors were using zel and so all
of a sudden we lost all of those
donations and some of them we never got
back oh wow like you know they they
didn't they didn't start giving online
on another platform so we didn't have
the
timely yes we just it was all of a
sudden my pastor kind of panicked and
said oh we we can't we can't take this
risk anymore we have to cut this off uh
rather than giving people time to
transition from zel to another platform
and and obviously there are situ where
we can't be as timely as we want to be
um but that's when we have to really
leverage all those communication
channels and be able to have that place
where all that communication lives and
again give time for people to react to
what we're trying to tell them and and
and to do uh so Phyllis let's read some
of these answers Phyllis you said reals
on your website that's pretty cool so
like not only on social media but you're
sharing them on your website thems
that's actually a pretty good way to
drive traffic to the website yes it is
but also get people to engage in the
content elsewhere from your website
that's awesome I love that well and
especially too because we live in such a
visual age where video trumps everything
now at this point when it comes to just
engagement um I mean that's why we're
doing video right now but full
disclosure yeah but but doing reals
that's a really great idea and having it
on your main website I like that idea
good idea um what are some other ones we
got here Matt Jean said my biggest
frustration is people in the no assume
that everyone else knows yes and so they
don't give enough info to draw others in
yeah um yeah you have to like bring
people along with you and catch people
up on your knowledge that's a big
challenge is knowing how much to
communicate so thank you very much for
sharing that that's a good reminder uh
Shannon at the moment our church Connect
app is the most up to- date but our
website doesn't reflect the same
information and it's up to date and it's
up to date at all is there a way for
church connect or church track to
overtake our website so that when
community community members go on there
they can also see what what the church
is up to well sort of what you can do is
you can take all the content that's on
your website that isn't yet on Church
connect and just go ahead and add that
to church connect and then go ahead and
phase out the website but you can keep
your domain so that when people use that
domain or type in that URL or click a a
link somewhere else online that has that
URL in the button it'll still take them
to your church connect site so you can
domain forward to church connect that
way you still maintain the usefulness of
the the main website but direct people
to where things are actually up to date
and one thing too I'd point out um so I
don't know if you know this but you can
actually take your calendar and you can
embed your calendar on an existing
website yes um and so that way you can
just keep everything updated in your
church track calendar make life easy by
by the way Church TR Church track
calendar um not only is it a standard
calendar but it gives you the ability to
create registrations and stuff um but
then you can embed that calendar on your
main website so that way anytime people
will go to your website and they go to
the calendar page where you put that uh
it's always up to date because it's
embedded in there and it's pulling
directly from church track yes so that's
a really great way to do it as well um
all right read read both of Chad's this
is actually a really cool win and fail a
really good example so Chad your win as
Chad sits at Chick-fil-A eating his
lunch um ring on the Lord's internet
when having events in the events
calendar on Church track so people can
see them when they tap coming events and
see all the events with one tap yeah
it's such a great thing Chad to have
that um fail not keeping those events up
to date on the calendar in church track
so people couldn't see them when they
tap upcoming events and can't see all
the events with one tap face
palm so I I take it your fail caused you
to learn from your hard mistake and then
became a win
eventually um so Jack you're asking what
is reals um so reals I tell you what re
uh ask ask in the chat and they'll tell
you we we'll let the chat help you out
with that um so office Lisa I'm trying
to pull up the other chat here um
because we've got more questions I'm
just not seeing them
yet all right uh let's see grace glor
and Lutheran you said um we have a link
from our website to church connect Plus
have embedded the calendar on our
website yeah so Jeff you said fails new
Bible study not sending email until 3
days before first class yes so you
probably had very low attendance um I've
seen some Churches do something like
that just forget to announce it until
like right before and the attendance was
of course zero yeah um it happens it
happens stuff slip stuff is it's pretty
easy for things to slip through the
cracks so we understand that yeah I I
appreciate your honesty Jeff just
because um you know it's sometimes it's
tough to admit when we mess up um in
church leadership and when we didn't get
things things out on time and when we
didn't tell people you know the right
information and stuff like that um so I
appreciate your honesty and I know there
there's so many I if I could count on
you know how many times I've failed in
church communication just like in a
particular week I mean it's crazy I mean
there's so much going on when we're
trying to communicate with our people um
that it is easy for things to slip
through the cracks um that's why it's so
important for us to have that place
where we we write everything down we get
with leadership we have it all written
down so we know exactly what's going on
and we also know okay what is the
importance of these different
announcements we want to get out there
um yeah any any other Pro tips from you
all things that you have found worked
really well in your overall Church
communication um do you do you have an
example like is there is there a fail
that you've seen at your church or any
churches you've been to um mine was
actually um it's funny Jeff said that
because I actually did the exact same
thing when I had a small group at my
house a while back um and so that's a
big fail for me um the other fail I did
so when I was leading worship at my
previous Church um I was having a like a
a party kind of get together for for
like basically whoever wanted to come
for Super Bowl uh the problem was I like
didn't tell
anybody um like I I I basically thought
I had told everybody but like I didn't
actually talked to anybody about it in
the leadership meeting and stuff so none
of them knew but I talked to like people
on the worship team and stuff so then it
ended up just being like a worship team
thing it was kind of a blessing in
disguise but like it still was one of
those situations where like I wanted
other people to be a part of it but
because I didn't do a good job of
communicating that and letting our
leadership know that hey I'm having this
big party where everyone can come over
and watch the game and just have a
cookout and stuff yeah it just kind of
ended up being a fail um so question I
think we got a question here um is there
a video on YouTube and how to embed the
calendar I think she's asking about how
to embed our calendar on a website I
don't think we have a video on that
that's a good idea Shannon thank you
yeah we may need to make a video on that
job
security um all right so we currently
use Google Calendar for staff and then
our web and visitor Church newsletter
can we easily Import in into the
calendar in church track I noticed it is
asking for a Google Calendar yeah so you
can link a Google Calendar and have
those events added into your church
track calendar we have a user guide
article on the steps to to do that it's
it's a little more involved than what we
can get into in this video definitely go
ahead and check that out and have those
events brought into your church track
calendar that's that's a good question
yeah I see so Shannon yes please do a
video on that R Ray said please do so um
Can can you write in your notepad for me
just because I'm incapable of
multitasking we're going to do that
we'll we'll get a video going for that
just to make it easier um in fact just
to kind of throw this out there um
because we're really big on support at
church track I mean it's kind of like
it's a part of our core values um on top
of you know making a software that's
really easy to use but if you ever find
you know a situation where you're like
man I I I can't quite figure out how to
do this and there's no like guide that
shows me how to do this in church track
or it would be really cool if Church
track had this they offered this
whatever it may be we love to get
feedback from people uh because
ultimately we don't build the software
for us we build it for you we build it
so that way your church has the tools
that you need to build the body of
Christ and so if you ever have any
feedback for us please let us know um
Chad you're amazing stop it you're great
Chad come on Chad um Chad I actually
need to give you a shout um probably
maybe in the next week or so I'm going
to give you a shout about some things uh
but I love the fact that like we've been
able to just develop this relationship
with all of our church leaders and and
really just we're all doing this
together you know we're all trying to
figure out how we can best communicate
with our people how we can better manage
our churches um to ultimately be able to
push the name of Jesus in our
communities absolutely um so this is
great um all right so Jeff you have a
win uh Google Calendar can be embedded
in onor Squarespace site yes it can fail
it falls apart when it is on a phone yes
it does um you know Jeff that's it's
funny you say that um there there is
this weird thing right now in a lot of
platforms when it comes to putting a
calendar on a mobile device um we're
actually kind of working on this to make
this better um just because sometimes it
doesn't always look the best on a mobile
device because of how the ineds work um
that's part of the reason like when you
go on Church connect just to quickly
show this on my phone um this is so key
like if if your people when they sign in
to church connect so I'm going to sign
in as a church member real fast to show
this and so now I'm logged into church
connect as a church member so when
whenever they click that menu on the top
left and they go to upcoming events they
can see all these events that are coming
up and then if I have any other events
like I've only got one on my test church
here but like I If I had all these
different events where people can
register and stuff like that um they
would see those and then they can click
on those events and take a look at them
and register for them if they haven't
registered or cancel their registration
if they've already registered um which
is a great thing um speaking of church
communication mant um this is still I'm
going to this is kind of like a weird
gray area of church communication but
I'm going to allow it for myself okay so
so we talked about how like form cards
are a way for church people to
communicate with us and you know Church
leadership um another way that people
can communicate with us is by
communicating when they can and cannot
serve so when your people go to those
upcoming events in church connect yet
another reason why Church connect is so
powerful and an important tool for
having all of your people use so when
they go on upcoming events they have the
ability to update their availability I'm
sorry I clicked that so fast let me go
back so update my availability and so
from here I can put in dates that I'm
not available to serve at my church and
so that way I don't get scheduled and so
right now I've got a ski trip where it
automatically put in all those dates
I've blocked off but then I can add
other dates in which I'm unavailable to
serve so I can say hey I'm actually
going to be out of town April 3rd 4th
and 5ifth and I'm going to say I'm at a
conference because I will be at a church
planning conference I'm just going to
put that there and there we go save
those dates and so now I've got those
dates saved so really great church Comm
it's you know obviously it leans on the
side of scheduling but it's still a way
for church people to communicate with us
um so yeah um any other good stuff we've
got in here no that's I think we've got
enough I think we've heard from
everybody about their their wins and
everything that they've done um so we'll
go ahead I think we need to um if you
have any final questions definitely drop
that into the chat we'll we'll answer
them um I know we've had a few questions
like Jeff you said we're new to church
track where can we find the church
Connect app like I mentioned in the chat
though it's it's fully included in your
it's fully included in your account and
also if you're looking for it to like
download it right there within the app
itself like church go to the church
connect feature in church track that
link at the very top or if you go to
connect menu and then choose view your
QR code and URL that'll take you to
where you'll find the url and the QR
code it'll take you and your member
directly to your Church's app so that's
how you get it downloaded on your phone
but thank you for asking that Jeff yeah
yeah and church connect I mean that
really it's the Hub of communication at
churches when you're using Church
connected it's fulls capacity um and I
think what I love about it most of the
fact it's a website it's an app it's
both of those things fused together it's
kind of crazy don't know how the
developers figured it out but they did
um and so it just makes it simple where
you're just updating everything in one
place and it's just showing all the
things for your people to see um great
well this was a different format um a
little different than what we usually do
and I like this because it kind of has
the heart of our getting started live
streams which by the way if you haven't
joined a getting started live stream we
do these every single week um where it's
focus more so people who are getting
started obviously with church track and
we just kind of walk through a lot of
the core features of the software and
everything um and it we purposely keep
those much smaller so like this one I
think we had like 120 people at one
point give or take with those ones we
purposely keep them around a dozen to a
dozen and a half people just because we
want it to be more and more
conversational uh and so if you haven't
joined one of those and you're new to
church track you definitely should join
one of those um but yeah this this kind
of had that feel Matt where even though
we had a lot of people in here today
basically the size of like you know good
size Church in here today watching this
live stream we're having some good
conversation back and forth here I love
it um well I would say speaking now for
forever hold your peace but they can
reach out to our support team and get a
answer in like literally like 30 minutes
or so even less in most cases yeah so
reach out to our sport team if you need
any help with anything else um stay on
the lookout because we're going to be
announcing future live streams yes we
dive into other cool stuff of how to
utilize the software and ultimately just
continue to build the body of Christ and
your local community so Matt this was
fun we'll see y'all
later
Посмотреть больше похожих видео
5.0 / 5 (0 votes)