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The cloke that I left at Troas with Carpus, when thou comest, bring with thee, and the books, but especially the parchments. - II Timothy 4:13
For a website, there is nothing that is more important than the content. In the early days of the internet content consisted of text and little else. As the internet has evolved, content can be many different things. For a shopping website like Amazon.com content is text, images and automated forms that allow a user to purchase the products online. For software companies like Microsoft' content is a sales pitch for their products and other related information such as product documentation and support pages. The content of a fan site is focused on the site owner's idol. There are even some sites where the content is nothing more than a list of links to other sites. In each case, the content is the most important part.
Some people are ideological and believe that the content of the internet should be limited to text. While there are some benefits to a text only site, the fact remains that most people grow tired of reading lengthy explanations. A good presentation is needed, but don't get too hung up on how to present the content yet. At this point you must decide what it is that you want to say to your audience.
In terms of the roles of the web ministry dream team, content falls within the role of the ministry leader. It is best if several people provide inputs, but in reality it is usually the webmaster and maybe a few other people who have the most say concerning the content of the website. It is always good to discuss these things with other people. The pastor and church staff is often a good place to start. Teachers and other church leaders should also be consulted.
It is impossible to know what you should say until you know something about what the audience needs to know. Think about the target of your website. Most church websites have a dual audience. Many churches hope their website will help to draw outsiders into the church, so part of the audience is people outside the church. Churches also like to provide information for people who are members of the church. There are so many differences between these two audiences that they must be handled somewhat differently.
The Stone Chapel Church is like many churches and one of their desires is to see their church grow. One of the reasons they want a website is to encourage more people to visit their church. The first thing they must consider is what these people are like. Some of these people have either moved into the area or have grown tired of the church they have been attending and are considering other churches. Some of these people used to attend a church, but now they have dropped out. Some of these people have seldom or never attended church and have no desire to start.
The people who are looking for a church are the easiest people in the target audience to reach with a website. There is a chance that these people will go to a search engine and type something like "churches in fort worth." If they have seen the church building they might even type something like "Stone Chapel Church." What is it that a church would want to tell these people and what are these people looking for when they visit the site?
A good place to start is the church schedule. It is a very important piece of information. Not all churches start at the same time. Some churches have multiple services. A person visiting a church for the first time does not want to walk in late. It would be very embarrassing to walk in just as the pastor is finishing his sermon. Providing the times the church meets on the website allows people to find this information without driving to the church to get it from the church sign and without the person needing to call either the pastor or the church office.
Another important piece of information is the church's doctrinal statement as well as its associational or denominational affiliation. There is a trend among some churches to remove this information from their church signs. While there are good reasons on both sides of this debate, there are people who know what they believe and desire to find a church with similar beliefs. These people will find it very helpful to have information about a church's beliefs in a written form rather than having to attend the church several times only to discover that the church teaches something that they consider to be heresy. It is a waste of their time and a waste of the church's time.
People like to know what to expect when they are in a new situation. The church website is an excellent place to tell people what they can expect when they attend church. Do people dress up for church or do they wear casual clothes? What kind of music is sung? How long is the church service? There are many questions that might be answered. The Stone Chapel Church might have a statement similar to the following:
When visiting The Stone Chapel Church for the first time you can expect that some people will be dressed in "their Sunday best" while others will be wearing more casual clothes. The music style at the Stone Chapel is best described as blended. There is a mix of the older styles of music and the more contemporary styles. During Sunday school the children are taken to age specific classes and there are three classes for adults. One class is for ladies, one is for men and a mixed class meets in the auditorium. The worship service begins as 10:50 and usually dismisses just after noon. Please ask the greeter at the front door if you need to know where the nursery is located.
Take a break from reading and write a similar statement that describes your own church. While writing it, try to think of what your experience would be like if you were visiting your church for the first time. Perhaps you have had that experience. What was it like? You might consider asking someone who has recently started attending your church about his or her experience on the first day.
Contact information is also very important for people who are considering visiting your church. Is there an office phone number? What are the office hours? Is there a number that people can call when the office is closed? Are there e-mail addresses? Is there a van ministry? If there is, who should be contacted if a person needs a ride to church?
The location of the church is very important information to put on a website. You should also provide directions. Some churches are located on the busiest street in town while others are located on a side street. If the church is in a city then people might need directions no matter how busy the street is. It will do little good to tell people about your church if they don't know how to find it.
For those who have no interest in church it is a little more difficult. One would like to tell these people how to be saved and tell them that they should be in church, but the nature of the internet makes this difficult. It doesn't hurt to have a few things like this on a church website, since people would expect that a church website would be the source of this information, but don't expect very many people to look at this information. By its nature, the internet provides people with the information for which they are looking. Very seldom do lost people go to their computer and type in "what must I do to be saved?" If your goal is to reach people outside the church then your site must go where they are, in a manner of speaking.
What are people in your community doing if they are not interested in church? Are they farmers? Are they engineers? Do they hunt or go fishing? Do they do needle work? If you want these people to visit your site then give these people a reason. For example: you might provide information about where the fish are biting in your area. If the information is accurate then the fishermen are likely to start visiting your site just to get that information. While they are there you can tell them other things that you feel they really need to know.
Providing this information can help reach these people, but there is a danger in providing information that is unrelated to the church. If one is not careful the church website will no longer provide information about the church because it is providing so much information about everything else. One way to get around this is to create more than one website. One should be dedicated to church related information while the other is dedicated community information, but provides additional church related information. In the examples in this book we will ignore the community information, but for your website you may want to include it.
There are many factors that determine what information and services the church website should provide church members. As churches get larger each person knows less about each of the individual ministries of the church while in smaller churches it is almost impossible for someone to not know what is going on in most aspects of the church's ministry. Each church has different views about what information the members need and how to provide it to them. Some ministry leaders see benefits in providing information through the church website and others do not. It is the responsibility of the church web ministry to know what the specific needs of the church are and what it can do to provide for those needs.
One feature that is very useful is an online calendar. The calendar can keep people informed about what things will be happening at the church. If all of the ministry leaders are proactive in seeing that all of their activities are included on the calendar then it can help them as they try to schedule events around other things. Some churches use online calendars to schedule shared resources such as classrooms, projectors, vehicles, etc. A calendar has the added benefit of providing those outside the church with information about the kind of activities they can expect.
Some churches provide audio or video recordings of services to shut-ins and others who request them. These same recordings can be provided via a church website. There is something of a limiting factor because not all people use the internet or have the bandwidth needed for access to large files, but having them available online makes it possible for people to listen without making a special request. Another possibility is to provide an order form for the available recordings in the church audio/video library.
Providing ministry specific information on the website can be very useful. This lets people know about the various ministries and can keep ministry workers informed. As an example, a ministry worker might check the church website to see if it is his turn to do something like mow the yard, clean the building, or teach a class. A ministry might provide a list of needs and church members can make a commitment online to meet these needs. As they do, the list would be updated and there would not be a duplication in effort.
A church only chat room or forum might be helpful in some cases. These might be used for the members of the church to discuss things without the need to call a meeting or to make phone calls.
Providing articles and useful links can also be helpful to church members. In providing articles and links, look for things that might help people as they serve the Lord. Some of this might be included in the ministry specific stuff, but some of it might be of a more general nature.
Many churches like to put pictures of activities on their website. This is primarily for church members. People outside the church will probably look at them if they happen to be at the site, but it is church members who will visit the site specifically to view them.
There are many things that you can do, but how much do you really need? In making that determination ask the following questions:
If you are having trouble deciding what you need then you may find it helpful to hold a brainstorming session with the ministry leaders in your church. At this point, don't worry about how you will do these things, but come up with ideas on what you need. It is often hard for a webmaster to do this because he or she is constantly considering how to pull this thing off. If this is a problem for you then you might consider asking someone else in the church to facilitate a meeting in which people brainstorm for ideas about should be in the website. They may come up with a few ideas that aren't feasible. That is ok. You will have the opportunity to filter these things out later.
The Stone Chapel Church held a brainstorming session and decided that it needs the following:
This list will be seen again in the examples that follow. In an engineering environment we would write a requirements document based on this list. The requirements document would be reviewed by the stakeholders and would become something of a contract between the developers and the costumer. We don't need to be so formal, but we do need to have a clear idea of the direction we are headed. The later it is in the process when we add new features the harder it will be to make changes. At this point changes can be made by adding or removing a line of text, but after coding is complete the same change may require hours of work.
This is a chapter from the book Church Website Design: A Step By Step Approach.