When you break down silos, information and ideas flow from one thing to the next. Experiences do not always start or end with your church website. Many of you have called for a product or service, only to get transferred from one person to another. Every time you needed to re-explain your situation. It is obvious that the company you are dealing with thought about seamless experiences. This article will provide tools and advice on how to avoid these situations at your church.
Your church staff and volunteers are great resources. They should also compliment all the hard work you put into your digital spaces. Knowing that your church has digital properties is only the first step. Get them better equipped for the questions they will undoubtedly receive.
Training
Your church staff cannot refer a member to another system if they do not understand it. Do not have just one group know how to check in children at your Sunday school. Have your entire usher staff trained. They will not be experts, but they can certainly help out. The usher can not only take them to your children’s area and help that new parent check in. The same goes for your social media outlets. An usher should know the types of information posted on your digital platforms. They should also know which platforms you are on. Better yet, have a Social Media Sunday just for your church staff and volunteers. Get them prepared to face questions about the digital world.
Information Hub
You have a great space to teach in, and a fantastic curriculum. Yet a month later, problems arise. Even if you are a fantastic teacher, not everything will stick. Teams will need a place to refresh their memory. This is where having a church intranet, or posting content to a cloud service is handy. Share your training material with your teams. If small updates are made, provide a short video covering those changes. Either way, create a central space for teams to keep refreshed on other areas of your church.
Communication Plan
Training material and information updates need to propagate to your teams. This is where your communication plan comes into play. Before you realize your members are out of touch, establish communication channels. This means collecting email addresses, phone numbers, and of course physical addresses. You also might want to follow them on a social media platform. You can post to private groups to notify them of updated content. I would avoid posting files, or login credentials to other sensitive information. However, letting members know about new information is key.
Action Plan
If you want seamless experiences at your church, team members need information. Your secretary will know exactly what is on your youth ministry’s Facebook account if they know it exists, and how to check it. Just like your ushers need to know information sent in this past week’s email newsletter. Keep your analog resources aware of your digital ones. This way experiences are smooth and satisfying for both new and existing church members.
Photo courtesy of Nate Brelsford
