Well...at least take time to promote your church's website!
Seriously, if you're going to invest a lot of time in designing your site and creating great content which will help spread the Good News, you need to make sure to promote your site, so all that hard work doesn't go to waste.
There are two primary means to promote your website--offline and online. Offline methods are those methods which attract the attention of someone when they're not sitting at their computer, while online methods help computer users find your site.
Offline: Be sure that the people in your pews know about your website--list the address in your worship folder (bulletin) and on your church stationery. When I launched our sermon podcast, I put the following slogan on our sign in front of the church, "Download Uplifting Sermons - www.capenazarene.org." And, I've asked our local newspaper to include our web-address with our listing in the religion section. If you have any regular advertising--newspaper, posters, radio spots, sports team sponsorships--be sure to include your website there as well.
Online: One of your goals in online promotion is to work to increase the number of links to your site. Not only will this increase the chance of someone clicking a link to visit your site, but it may also improve your search engine rankings. Check out other websites in your town--the local newspaper, the official town website, the chamber of commerce, the tourism directory, etc.--and ask them to include a link to your site. Encourage members of your congregation who have blogs or other personal websites to link to your church website. Maybe you and a "sister church" can exchange links--and be sure your denominational website has your web address.
Promoting your site will take some time, but even if you set aside an hour once a month, you'll find that you can greatly expand the reach of your internet ministry. Next month, we'll expand our discussion on promotion by looking at simple things you can do to prepare your site for search engines and directories.
Labels: design, promotion, Search Engine Optimization
