When many people start to think about building a website, the first question they ask is “Who will build it, and what will it cost?”

These are very important questions but they are not the first ones you should think about. A website can be your most valuable marketing tool if done correctly, but if done incorrectly, it will be nothing but a worthless money pit.

With today’s technology, the potential of a website is infinite. Unfortunately your time and resources, along with the attention span of your potential website visitors, are very much limited. This means that you need to find the answers to a few important questions before you even lift a finger or pay a dime to start the construction of your project.

1. What will be the overall purpose of your website?

If this website is the only website your organization will have, chances are, the overall purpose of your website is the same as the overall purpose of your organization.

If you are a Christian Church, the ultimate purpose of your website may be “To  bring people to Christianity”. If you are a grass seed salesman, the overall purpose of your website may be “To sell grass seed”.

It’s important that you and everyone who will be working with you on your website has a clear idea in their heads as to what your web site’s ultimate purpose is. If you stray from your purpose, your website will become too general and will eventually fail to serve any purpose at all.

2. What kinds of People will visit your site and why?

If you make your website public to the world, all sorts of different people will stumble across your pages. Who are they? What is it that they want from you? Below is a short list of people who might be visiting a church website and what they may be looking for:

1. Members of the church wanting to find something inspirational to hear, read, or see
2. Members of the church trying to remember the date of the next church potluck dinner
3. New folks in town who are looking for a local church
4. Non members looking to visit for the first time but don’t yet know what to expect
5. Non Christians who are interested in learning about general Christian beliefs
6. Other Christians, Preachers, or theologists wanting to know the specifics of your church’s doctrine and maybe listen to a sermon or two
7. Lost or ex-members of your church looking for a private place online to rekindle their faith until they gain the courage to fully re-enter the congregation.
8. Enemies of your church looking for a way to disturb your organization or steal away members of your congregation

3. How can your site serve its visitors

Now that you have a list of visitors and their needs, it’s time to ask how you will meet their needs while keeping in mind the overall purpose of your website.

If you are a grass seed salesmen, you will need to convince your visitors to buy your grass seed and then you will need to give them a way to do so.

Below is a list of how a church website could meet the needs of the list above while keeping in mind the main purpose of a Christian website which in this case is “To bring people to Christianity”. Each number in the list below matches the numbers in the list above.

1. Your site could have articles, sermons, and videos about spiritual things for members to view and share.
2. Your site could have an events calendar that’s easy for the church to update and simple for visitors to use.
3. You could provide meeting schedules, church location, and contact info for potential visitors.
4. You can explanation exactly what goes on during meetings, and how people typically dress (formal or informal) so your first time visitors won’t be caught off guard by awkward surprises.
5. You can give a basic overview of your beliefs for people who are new to the idea if being Christian.
6. You could provide in depth articles, audio sermons, and videos on a variety of doctrinal topics for those interested in learning more about the ideas that fuel your faith.
7. By now you should have plenty of resources to serve lost members of the church but you could also add special resources for those struggling with alcohol addiction, anger management, or other issues that may be hurting their church and family life.
8. All organizations develop enemies over time. Your site should be built in a way that it can not be poisoned by these people who may try to post bad things in message boards, hack into your website, or harass church leaders by obtaining too much contact information that may have been carelessly posted on the site.

When answering the questions above, you should not worry about issues of time or money. Simply imagine the perfect website for your organization.

Once your dream website has been imagined, it’s time to analyze your budget and find a web design firm who can help you understand what is doable and what is not for the price you are looking to pay. Then you will go back and prioritize your needs, putting on hold anything that you find is not necessary for the time being. Once your website has proven to be successful, you can go back and start to add all your dream features.

And that’s that
Jon Perry

As the founder of Acting Faith, the #1 question I get from my clients is “How do I get more People to my Church Website?” The answer is simple: Consistently write in your blog, and tell as many people as you can that it exists.

What is a blog?

A blog is simply an online journal. You can write as much or as little as you want, as often as you want. Most blog systems (including the ones that comes with all Acting Faith Church websites) allow people to read your blog, subscribe to your blog and even comment on your blog posts.

Why should I keep a blog on my church website?

First off, it puts content on your website that faithful readers will love (unless it’s boring). If someone reads a good blog post on your site they will be excited to see the next one you create. They will either come back often in search for more goodies, or if they are real savvy, they might even subscribe to your blog in their favorite RSS reader.

Second, it gives Google and Yahoo and those other search engines something to chew on. If you had 1000 articles on your site and many of them talk about the the power of prayer, chances are that if someone typed “the power of prayer” into Google, your website would pop up in the search results.

Third, if you write good blog posts, people will tell their friends. Even though we live in a world of mass media and costly advertisment campaigns, word of mouth is still the most effective way to share great ideas.

How often should I write in my Church Website blog?

You should write as often as you can but only if you have something worth writting about. Some preachers have been told by internet marketers that they should write in their blog every day, some have been told to write at least once a week. Those are good goals but keep in mind that QUALITY IS WHAT MATTERS MOST!

I have seen websites of great Pastors who keep absolutly horrible blogs. They will write things like “Today’s meeting was great! We all felt the Spirit of God and 5 new souls accepted Jesus!” the next post says the same thing and so on and so forth. This is worthless! Nobody will read it. Nobody cares. Write as often as you can but only write when you have something to say.

What things should I write about on my Church Website Blog?

Write about what you are studying, write about what you are doing, write abot what the church is doing, write about your family, write about how you feel, write about things you are noticing in the world around you, be friendly, be genuine, be pationate, be sincere.

And that’s that