Introducing the ‘Building Rockin’ Church Web Sites’ Series

Today, I’m officially kicking off the Building Rockin’ Church Web Sites series.

Like the Blogging 101 series, it looks to be another great series in terms of the responses I’ve received from churches and Web design firms and designers.

[I'll probably include a master story list for the series, or you can just click on the Rockin' Web Sites category tag.]

For the series, I wanted to get a couple of perspectives about Web site design for churches, so I contacted about 8-9 Web site design firms or designers and then some communications directors and staffers at churches with rockin’ sites.

For the Web firms and designers, I asked questions dealing with these topics and issues:

• The basic steps to designing a church Web site from the ground up
• How much a church should expect to pay for a quality Web site
• Advice for smaller churches who might not have the budget for a turn-key, rockin’ design
• What churches should expect from their Web sites (regarding purpose and objectives)
• What trends they see in church Web site design
• Technological innovations they wish churches would implement
• How to evaluate a Web site design firm or designer
• Search engine optimization techniques
• And any resources they’d suggest …

Then for the church communication directors or Web staffers with sites that rock, I asked them these questions:

1. How did your current web design come about?
2. Who was involved in the design?
3. Who manages it now? How?
4. What is your goal or purpose for your web site?
5. What should web sites accomplish or do for churches?
6. What do you see the future holding for church web sites? (Trends, potential, etc.)
7. Any advice for other churches seeking to design/redesign their sites?
8. Other thoughts, ideas, ramblings appreciated too …

My goal for this series is to help those churches who don’t have the money/budget to hire a full-fledged design firm, or have a communications director like myself … so along the way, I’m going to throw in my thoughts, ideas, and tips about how to build a rockin’ Web site from the ground up.

I’m also hoping to have an actual case study as a live example to demonstrate what I’m talking about. In other words, I’m probably going to help a church take their existing (or non-existing) site from scratch to rockin’ … well, hopefully, it rocks in terms of form and function and accomplishes the goals we set forth.
Tentatively, I’m looking at incorporating these topics and tips into the series too. Admittedly, some of this is going to seem incredibly basic to some of you, but my target here is those churches who need help by giving them a resource to refer to …

1. What web sites should do for their churches
2. Recruiting a web team
3. Choosing a webmaster/webminister
4. Choosing the right hosting service/plan
5. Picking a good domain name
6. Taking aim at somebody (your site’s target audience)
7. Setting goals and objectives
8. Using email newsletters
9. Designing the ever-important home page
10. Producing good content
11. Getting content by asking the right questions
12. Organizing content into categories
13. Giving something away for free
14. Having a Pastor’s bio page
15. Rolling out the welcome mat (Guest information)
16. Handling email SPAM issues
17. Optimizing photos for the web
18. Create sermon audio in MP3
19. Podcasting 101
20. Offering a calendar online
21. Evangelizing … Jesus and the Gospel
22. Using fonts and style guides
23. Offering Quality Bible Resources
24. Designing Web Sites for children
25. Designing Web Sites for Teens
26. Tracking stats and tweaking your site
27. Promoting your web site

OK, let’s get this thing going … I’m exhausted already.

[ By the way, I'm always open to suggestions, ideas, and even guest posts, email me if you're interested in participating or sharing. And of course, you can always fill out the church web site questionnaire for the series with this form.]