With millions of websites out there, and a huge number of those being church and ministry websites, it is hard to figure out exactly what to do about your church’s website. I have one rule about church websites:

Your church website must reflect who you are today and where you think you are heading tomorrow.

That’s it. No worries about splashy landing pages or designer templates. It should look like you.

Of course, it should also look good, clean, inviting, and useful. But aren’t those the same traits you hope reflect your church?

a website needs to look like you. Click To Tweet

A website needs to look like you. But what exactly does that mean? And how do we make that possible?

There are many tools or directions you could go in. But we don’t need a list of all of our options, we need confidence in making the right kind of choice from among the options. I have a simple method for figuring that out. However, you have to know what kind of church you have.

What is your church model?

The easiest way to reflect your congregation and its needs in the a website is to match your site style to your church model. For those familiar with congregational size dynamics, this should be an easy correlation. If you are unfamiliar, you can find an explanation here.

In congregational size dynamics we can see common character and need based on the size of the congregation’s active membership or average Sunday attendance (ASA). These are not the only factors for the unique character of a congregation, but they expose some truth and common character. This is particularly true around the resources the congregation has in terms of finances and people and how they are best used for the common mission of the congregation.

Here are the different church models and what a church might do to make the most of its ministry in its context. (Average Sunday attendance is in parentheses)

Family Size (0-50)

If you are a small church, you probably identify strongly as a family. You have a few powerful personalities that are your go-to people in the church. They seem to be involved in everything. That’s because they are. You might think pastors come and go, but these bedrock people are always here. They have given much of their lives to the church.

Family sized churches are used to doing things together and by themselves. Everyone gets their hands dirty to make something happen. That’s because they have to! Family sized churches can be places of great possibility for mission and focus with their “let’s just do it!” attitude.

Family churches also don’t have much in the way of financial resources or (usually) a big, gothic cathedral, which they can use to attract members. Family churches should make the most of this by doing a website themselves. And, thankfully, there are plenty of free (or nearly free) options which, with just a little training, can become useful sites that 4 or 5 different people can keep up to date. A Saturday spent experimenting and watching videos on YouTube can get even a beginner up to speed in creating and maintaining a website on WordPress.com or Wix.

Pastoral Size (51-150)

A Pastoral-sized church is often seen as “the norm”. A church of moderate size, often which can afford to have a clergyperson and maybe some other staff persons. The dominant characteristic of this congregation is how pastor-centered the congregation is. It may have some go-to persons (the kind of people we used call matriarchs or patriarchs), but the pastor is involved in everything and is seen as the principal authority.

Pastoral churches have more resources and can probably afford a few more bells and whistles in their presentation. They likely have more diversity in membership and in gifts for ministry. More people doing more things. Recognizing this may help the Pastoral church avoid the pitfall of its size: that the pastor needs to be in charge of everything. Having a team website model in which the congregation maintains the site is a way to put those gifts to use.

Here, a self-hosted site or a low-cost suite makes a lot of sense. If you want total control and function for your site, choose WordPress.org. This is a self-hosted option with tons of flexibility and unlimited choices. It is a bit complicated, and should be placed in the hands of someone who likes figuring things out. There are excellent resources to help guide you through the setup process.

If you are less interested in getting your hands dirty, but still need a better looking site, that is secure, and will allow several people to make use of it, try Squarespace. Depending on the host chosen above, this may cost a little more (or a lot less) than a self-hosted site. Though there is less versatility, there is plenty of customization and its simple interface makes it easier for people to use.

Program Size (151-300)

Program-sized churches are hubs of activity, with things going on all over the place. People are meeting in the church building daily, there may be a school or outreach ministry attached. There is plenty of stuff; and plenty of volunteers and staff to make the stuff go. The pastor’s primary role is to make sure the staff and leadership keep the stuff running.

Program churches are compelled by their programs, not their pastor, so the congregation needs to produce value to the people seeking these specific programs. It needs to look more professional and be able to produce results for the congregation with a higher standard.

Chances are that the congregation has the resources to invest in a professional website: or will in the future. You may want to take advantage of more boutique options, the kind of site you won’t be able to create yourselves without a professional hand-coding your website’s CSS. If this sounds like you, then you might invest in an all-in-one resource built for churches, like Ekklesia360. Like WordPress or Squarespace, it has an accessible interface that will allow people inside the congregation access to updating the site of events, sermons, or schedules. It also has all of the bells and whistles prepackaged into it.

And for a more expensive option, you might also consider the Rainmaker platform, which is all-in-one, room for everything you might want, including podcasting and video, hosting by Studiopress. But be prepared to plunk down some money for it (at least $1,000 per year).

Corporate Size (301+)

If your church is corporate-sized, chances are you aren’t going to need this. You’ve hired the professional with an outstanding reputation to design for you, not only a unique website, but one that provides everything you need and plenty of stuff you didn’t know you needed. They’ll tell you who to host with. You’ve got the people to keep it up to date and you’ve got the copywriters to produce outstanding content. You don’t need this kind of help. Or maybe you do.

How do you use your site?

Of course, the starting question is about choosing the right site, but the real, underlying question is how your church is going to use your site. As the The Rt. Rev. Katherine Jefferts Schori recently said to a group of Episcopal communicators, if your church doesn’t have a website “it doesn’t exist.” This is how people know you, how they find you, and how they see who you really are.

How you make your site really is important, too. I am an evangelist for DIY (do it yourself) when it comes to church websites because I want the church to be in total control of its web presence.

Twice I’ve been a pastor of a church without control over its own website. This has meant that we’ve had to communicate details to people not in the church to update our site at their convenience, who write their own copy without using the language style of our congregation or with vital information missing. I want congregational leadership to have access to that site to fix it whenever we need to.

It is also a reflection of the gifts and ministry of the church. This is why I began by saying

Your church website must reflect who you are today and where you think you are heading tomorrow. Click To Tweet

because your church must use its creativity to evangelize. It must use its artists and writers and dreamers and teachers and communicators to express the nature of GOD’s grace to the community. It shouldn’t just look like you, but it should be dreamed by you and built by you and illustrated by you. It must contain the pictures taken by you capturing the events put on by you.

Your website should be one of your ministries to the community. And it must reflect who you are to anyone who finds it. And in your reflection, they can see what GOD is doing through you.

If it’s not you they see, how then will they see the reflection of GOD?

 

[Note: I have used WordPress.com a ton and self-host a WordPress.org site. I can vouch only for these options. I know some have good experience with Squarespace and the Episcopal Church has recommended Ekklesia360 to its congregations. None of these links are affiliate links.]

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