PRACTICAL SUGGESTIONS FOR GROWING YOUR CHURCH THROUGH YOUR WEBSITE Heather Folliard, Associate Pastor, HillSong Church Drew Mooney, Web Design & Development, HillSong Church

Welcome! What information are you looking for when…. …you’re a regular member/attendee? …you’ve just moved to a town and you’re looking for a new church? …you’re just visiting for the weekend and looking for somewhere to go?

VISUAL The website is often the first impression someone has about a church Style & presentation can convey a lot about the atmosphere of a church Looks good: covlife.org Needs help! mothersetonparish.org

CONTENT Is the actual content of the site presented in the best way possible? There’s a good amount of information that belongs on a church website Looks good: doorofhopepdx.org Needs help! terraceshores.com

USABILITY Is the site easy to use and navigate? Does it meet the needs of the visitors? Looks good: hillsongnyc.com Needs help! cedarbrookchurch.net

Make it happen! Starting a new site? Purchase a domain name (godaddy works well) Purchase web hosting Meet with staff & members to assess needs for the site Redoing a current one? Assess current web hosting solution Meet with staff & members to assess needs for the site Just moving to a new host? See the follow-up .

The assessment: so what does my site need? Why do people go the site? What are they looking for? Your congregation and location will determine that! Ex 1: Chapel Hill, NC -> Small city, lots of new students each year looking for basic information about the church. Ex 2: Pickett, WI -> Tiny town, members need to access same resources over and over.

Practice!

Building your site: WordPress WordPress is the best way to quickly and beautifully create a functional and powerful site. WordPress is free software that you install on your host’s server. 5 minute installation It’s free! Awesome tutorials and forums Multi-user functionality Themes Plugins Google Analytics