They sent us a special discount code for earlybird MinistryCOM registrations. The next 50 registrations that use the discount code ‘SM0912‘ will get a $45 discount per attendee. That gets the price down to $250 per person. Offer expires 12/31/09.

Register for MinistryCOM 2010 here

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If you wanna read the article, visit Church Marketing Sucks, but please remember that as Christians we should strive to be Christ-like in our actions and responses.

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Here are five great Twitter ideas you can use for your church communication efforts:

1. Celebrations: Every time a person dedicates their life to Jesus, gets married in the church, or does something awesome you can tell the world and you church members about it!
2. Prayer: While you may want to be careful on what details you provide, you can ask your Twitter followers to pray for a specific need or person — or just offer a short daily prayer people can read and feel energized by.
3. Events: You can easily keep your congregation or church members informed of planned gatherings (or even spontaneous get together’s) by sending Twitter updates — or why not use it to invite people to church in a non-threatening way?
4. Sermons or Message: Why not drop a link into your conversation and let people know you have a new sermon or message uploaded so they can listen or watch if they missed it?
5. Community Dialogue: People in your community will probably be on Twitter and you can begin conversations on pressing needs in your town, schools, or other churches.  You can discuss social issues to religion to sports…all great things for building trust and building your church “brand”.

The truth is your church will need to start taking risks and using tools such as Facebook, Blogs, and Twitter to establish connection points with the people you want to reach or help.  Just don’t let it take a back seat to personal attention and care as these will/should always be the staple in creating strong relationships in a church!

So what are you waiting for?  Go get started on Twitter today!

Please feel free to follow James Dalman on Twitter (http://twitter.com/jamesdalman)

You can also download my FREE ROCKIN’ TWITTER BIRD ICONS to plug into your site.

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It allows us to communicate in a way that is totally different from traditional websites, blogs, and e-mails.  You can tie in Twitter with your FaceBook account, send voice mesages to Twitter using your phone, TwitPic your photos, and even synch it with your Google iCalendar. The applications are many and you should consider using it for your church or ministry.

Anthony Coppedge (whom I’d love to meet and have missed at a few conferences) launched a website called Twitter for Churches (www.twitterforchurches.com) and offers a PDF book called “The Reason Your Church MUST Twitter” for only $5.00!  Having read Anthony’s posts in the past, I think this is going to be a great read and recommend checking out his new website.

Twitter could help your ministry to communicate more efficiently or carry on conversations with people in your community.  Don’t miss the boat.

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Please check it out and provide your feedback.  Thanks Darren for giving me the opportunity to share with you!

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Since I’ve joined the iThemes team, we have been blasting out a bunch of new projects which has kept us all pretty swamped.  One of the major products we released this morning is a new Wordpress theme called Flexx Theme. It is off the wall, and I believe for churches (or anyone else for that matters) it is going to absolutely change the playing field when it comes to church blogs or church websites.

Here’s just a few of the goodies that Flexx Theme is capable of doing:

• Offering 1,056 layouts variations!
• Click of the button layout and styling options.
• Easy to upload backgrounds and headers without FTP.
• No coding experience needed or required to use!
• Rotating and Fading Image Headers.
• Automatically Search Engine Optimized.
• Built in Color Picker for Background Colors
• and more things you can shake a stick at!

I will also be working on FLEXX THEME: CHURCH which will be released at ChurchTheme.com in the next week or so.  Either way you won’t want to miss getting it but if you do want the original Flexx Theme then get it now because the price will go up next week!

All this to say what ties into my headline.

We are going to load the Flexx Theme for Church Communications Pro to show it off and so you can see how it works.  So please excuse the mess as we start relaunching CCP and give it one new sweet look!

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In the meantime, Cory and I re-launched ChurchTheme.com yesterday to offer some sweet premium Wordpress themes specifcally for churches.  bChurch is the first theme design I completed for iThemes and I am pumped to offer this to you!  Why?

I have worked with churches for seven years on branding and design projects.  One of the biggest needs is church websites that are easy to maintain, quick to implement, doesn’t cost your entire budget to do, and that really looks professional.  bChurch and The Springs themes meet these needs and then some!

There are some cool features in both of these themes:

• Image Rotater and Image Fading: This really keeps your site fresh and appealling.
• Social Media: These icons help people connect to you and your church easily with one click.
• Search Engine Optimized: They are Google and Yahoo friendly, making your church a quick find.
• Blogging: Incorporate your blog with your website.
• Audio and Video: Simple to upload and plug-in.

These are only a few things to consider.  The great thing is that you can get a theme for $79.95 and hosting for less than $120 per year.  This means you can have a functional site without spending thousands of dollars – and they will be better than most of the custom websites I have seen churches invest in.

Please check out ChurchTheme.com and see what these themes can do.  I’ll be working on a couple more themes that we will add in the next month so stay tuned for those.

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• Lynchpin Design: I recently completed the design of Granite State Baptist Church’s new brand image and website. Lynchpin Design did an outstanding job implementing my design but I was really impressed with their IMMIx CMS which they customize for each churches needs, instead of just giving a canned solution.

• Ekklesia 360: It has been a while since I worked with this system but when I partnered with Church Plant Media a few years ago, this was a great Content Management System.

• Discover Sky: This platform is available through Element Fusion and is a nice, cost effective solution if you want import your own design or have a designer create the skin for your website.

• Faith Connector: I designed the Dialogue Church website and then we had Faith Connector implement their CMS into the layout. It works extremely well, but to me, it’s more cumbersome than the rest.

• Another notable CMS/Website Company that recently contacted me and that looks promising is City Gates. I haven’t worked with them personally but I talked with Matt Kirkland and he sounds like a great guy.

This also reminds me of some advice to pass along on this topic.

If you have a designer create the website branding or layout-or if you do it yourself-make sure to communicate every aspect and detail of that design to the company who is going to set up your website to ensure it’s EXACTLY the way you want it. A couple of the designs I previously sent off should have been modified to meet web standards (I’m not a programmer or CSS guru) and when the site was launched it didn’t quite have that great lookas they should have. This can also be attributed to companies who just churn and burn the work out. It’s not their fault but when you rush out so many designs per week, it opens up the chance for missing important details like columns being too small for human readable text!

Please check out these companies if you need a website or Content Management System!

- – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - – - -

James Dalman specializes in church branding, church consulting, and church marketing. He is the editor at Church Communications Pro and wants Holland to win Euro 2008.

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People have asked me if they really should brand their church or if it’s really necessary for a church to use the same methods that Starbucks or Harley Davidson does.  My response is that if you have any interaction with a live person they will form some type of opinion about you or your church, so yes, branding your church is necessary.

The reality is that a consumer or visitor is going to make an assumption about your church that may or may not be totally correct.  This is why their experience with you must be great and your connection points (website, receptionist, brochure, servant evangelism) must be right on.  Please note that I am not saying to be perfect or flawless but whatever connection they might make with your church first (and even second or third) it should be great enough to leave the right impression.

If you are promoting the friendliest church in town and your receptionist gets hateful answering the phone, you have just made a huge disconnection!  If your website communicates a youthful and emerging worship and it’s an oldschool, traditional service – you have just dropped the ball.  In the past, mistakes could easily be overlooked by visitors but in our finicky culture of today, it’s more difficult to unscrew our screw ups.

My advice is to invest in branding your church. This doesn’t necessarily mean a logo or a website, and it doesn’t even mean spending any money.  Just make sure that you do your best to communicate a positive and accurate impression through all possible entry/connection points into your church and if a person does connects the dots, it forms the right picture.

This is what real branding is all about!

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I have been talking with some awesome people who will be guest writers for Church Communications Pro and getting the details and posting schedules set. I look forward to some new insights and resources. Thanks to all who responded!

I’ve been working hard to get ahead on some projects so I can sit down, focus and finish the new edition of my book, Branded Church: Let The Truth Be Told, which has been a work in progress. I’m also getting ready to celebrate my 17th wedding anniversary with my beautiful and extraordinary wife on Monday, so we are taking some R&R.

All that to say is that starting next week, CCP is going to get some much needed love and attention again. I appreciate everyone who reads and comments as well as your patience as CCP continues to make changes.

Please have an awesome Memorial Day weekend and I pray that everyone has lots of fun and a safe time!

- James

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