Church Communications Pro | Church Marketing | Church Web Design » Giveaways

Cool Church Website: Ben Arment’s Reston Community Church

Cory Miller — Mon, 12 Mar 2007 12:33:01 +0000

I really enjoy reading Ben Arment’s History in the Making blog.

Besides his rockin cool church website (snapshot above) … here are a couple of things I saw that compelled me to post:

Easter in Reston Website and Invite Cards
This quote: “The sermon starts in the parking lot!” — Love it!
The free Bibles called On Seeing they offer at their Welcome Center

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Another Guest Giveaway Book Idea: Simple by Robert J. Morgan

Cory Miller — Thu, 15 Feb 2007 16:24:27 +0000

Check out Simple. The Christian Life Doesn’t Have to Be Complicated by Robert J. Morgan as another great guest givewaway book idea.

It’s 95 pages and covers the basics of the Christian faith or the “ABCDEs” like:

ASSURANCE – How can I know for sure?
BAPTISM - Why should I get wet?
CHURCH - What’s it got to offer?
DEVOTIONS - How can I stay close to God?
EVANGELISM – How can I share my faith with others?

According to Matt at Randall House, the book is in its third printing and “the number one reason churches/pastors are ordering the book is for “church guests and new believers.”

Amazon’s got it for about $8 … but if you order straight through Randall House, you can get 24 for $4.99 each.

I really like the concept of Simple … too often we assume that new believers and seekers understand our insider language … we have a lot of jargon that, because we’re so involved in church life we forget a lot of people don’t understand it. This book seems to put the basics in a highly-approachable and understandable way for those new to the Christian faith.

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Get Ready for Easter With This Excellent Guest Giveaway and Outreach Tool

Cory Miller — Sun, 11 Feb 2007 02:50:12 +0000

John Piper’s Desiring God ministry is offering his excellent book Fifty Reasons Why Jesus Came to Die at a special discount ($1 a book) for churches who commit to give them away as an Easter outreach.

I own this book, have given it away to others, and highly recommend it as a guest giveaway!

They list several ways you could use the book as an outreach tool and also offer a free Leader’s Guide (PDF).

See my related mini-series on using booklets as guest giveaways here.

[Found via Challies]

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Church Plant ‘Pimps’ 1989 Ford Probe

Cory Miller — Tue, 19 Dec 2006 04:26:49 +0000

Georgia church plant XL just wrapped up their XL Pimp My Ride series Sunday (previous post here) and generated some good buzz, getting the front page of their newspaper.

Here’s what XL program director Jason Alford said about the event:

“We finished up the XL Pimp My Ride series last night and revealed Jeremy’s ‘new’ 1989 Ford Probe. The place was packed and Jeremy’s reaction was priceless. When we showed the car, no one could believe that amount of work was done in just 14 days. [Pastor] Jarrod Roberts gave a great message that really told what God can do in your life if you let
Him.”

I love this quote too:

“It’s amazing what God can do through a 1989 Ford Probe and some willing people.”

Amen!

Find the video of the event on the XL website here and photos here.

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Give a Free Book Away This Christmas For Less Than a Buck

Cory Miller — Sat, 09 Dec 2006 17:25:54 +0000

I just got a flyer in the mail from Christian Book Distributors and found a great deal on Rick Warren’s “What On Earth Am I Here For?” booklet, which is based on the first 7 chapters of Purpose Driven Life.

Buy more than 10 and you’ll get it for 89 cents! This is perfect for a free guest giveaway during the holidays and especially for the New Year as people begin to ponder their meaning in life and reassess where they are in life.
Related Posts: See my guest booklets & free offers 4-part series here to learn how you could use this booklet in your church or on your rockin’ church website.

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Great Christmas Church Marketing Ideas from Fellowship Church, Creative Pastors

Cory Miller — Thu, 30 Nov 2006 18:29:55 +0000

Just got the Creative Pastors email newsletter [subscribe here] from Fellowship Church’s Ed Young and I love the ideas they are considering for getting the word out for the Christmas season:

We’re putting together a mixed-media marketing campaign including promotional packs for local businesses, car antenna balls, a direct mail send out, and something we’ve never tried before. We’re printing vibrant t-shirts featuring our Christmas service information and giving them away to our entire church to wear throughout their Christmas shopping, with an emphasis on one specific shopping day. Seeing 20,000 Fellowship Church t-shirts throughout the Dallas/Ft. Worth area is a great way to start a conversation and invite someone to our Christmas services!

I agree! Great stuff and ideas! I particularly like the car antenna balls and T-shirt ideas. Around Oklahoma City where I live, I always see tons of super-cool LifeChurch bumper stickers. What cheap advertising!

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Using a Free Rockin’ Offer for Your Church’s Website

Cory Miller — Tue, 28 Nov 2006 02:57:32 +0000

One of the most overlooked tools for maximizing your rockin’ church website is the FREE OFFER – giving away something of tangible value to your prospective guests.

This church in New York City gives away a free book, which costs less than a dollar, to guests in their area. In turn, guests fill out a short online survey.

This does three things, it helps your church:

Gather useful guest information;
Gives your congregation a tool for inviting their friends, family, neighbors, and coworkers to your church Website and prayerfully your church services and, most importantly, to the Kingdom of God through Jesus; and,
Provide solid, spiritual resources for guests and seekers.

Here are several examples of books that could be used effectively as evangelistic or guest giveaways, which I have seen advertised for less than a dollar a copy:

“What On Earth Am I Here For?” by Rick Warren – This little booklet is the first seven chapters of his bestselling book “The Purpose-Driven Life: What on Earth Am I Here For?” [Read it for free online here.]
“The Case for Christmas” or “The Case for Easter” by Lee Stroebel
“How Good Is Good Enough” minibook by Andy Stanley
Got a good sermon series on the family, parenting or marriage? Get it transcribed and turn it into a free booklet, or make it into a DVD.
Check out the booklet I produced for Midwestern called “Answering the Call: Examining God’s Call to Vocational Service”

Also, here’s a four-part series I did titled Great Guest Giveaways: Booklets – part 1, 2, 3, 4

See all the posts in the Building Rockin’ Church Websites series here.

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Great Church Guest Giveaways: Booklets, Part 4

Cory Miller — Thu, 14 Sep 2006 18:07:00 +0000

Well, I’ve talked about using booklets for your church’s guest giveaways in three previous posts. [Read all four posts of this series here: 1, 2, 3, 4]. Now it’s time to talk about designing an online form to take requests for those booklets.

There’s a couple of reasons I suggest using an online request form:

It makes it easier for people to request them
You can tie it in with a survey
It cuts down on what could be a barrage of phone calls
Requests can be made 24/7

Here’s where it gets a little tricky — especially for those [like me] with no coding experience. But thankfully, there are resources available online that can give you a basic form to take online requests for your booklet offer.

Here are a couple of examples of online forms:

Midwestern Seminary’s “Answering the Call” booklet — One I helped produce

The Journey Church in New York City — A church plant in Manhattan

Here are a couple of sites that generate online forms you could use:

Icebrrg
The Form Assembly
JotForm
Wufoo – This seems to be a great site

Note: Some of these sites put a limit on the number of requests done for free before you have to pay. Be sure and investigate this before committing.

Read all four posts of this series here: 1, 2, 3, 4

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Great Church Guest Giveaways: Booklets, Part 3

Cory Miller — Tue, 12 Sep 2006 04:06:00 +0000

Read all four posts of this series here: 1, 2, 3, 4

OK, so you’ve read my six reasons for why I’m terribly fond of booklets as free guest giveaways, right? So you know that they cost less and are more filling.

Here are a couple of booklet ideas:

Rick Warren’s “What on Earth Am I Here For?”– This booklet is based on the first seven chapters of Rick Warren’s bestselling “Purpose Driven Life” book.

Andy Stanley’s “How Good Is Good Enough?”

Create your own booklet – Have you preached a good sermon series on the family, parenting or marriage? Using your notes as a guide, have someone transcribe your audio sermons, edit the draft down into a readable form, divide into chapters, then format it into a booklet templates and have them printed at Lulu, CafePress, or email my friend Steve [steve@covingtongroup.net] at the Covington Group in Kansas City (he printed the seminary booklet and offers great prices with quality).

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Read all four posts of this series here: 1, 2, 3, 4

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Great Church Guest Givewaway Offers: Booklets, Part 2

Cory Miller — Tue, 05 Sep 2006 22:17:00 +0000

In Part 1 of this series — Great Church Guest Giveaway Offers: Booklets [Read all four posts of this series here: 1, 2, 3, 4] — I gave 6 reasons for using booklets for free offers … summarizing them, they are:

1. They’re cheap
2. They beat the ol’ standard pen or mug giveaway
3. They appeal to felt needs
4. They give value
5. You can track requests and manage follow up better
6. They help you evaluate the offer’s effectiveness

Here’s one more reason to use a booklet giveaway — I’ve seen it work brilliantly.

As the communications director at my former place of employment [a seminary], I helped produce a short booklet (42 pages or so) that was titled “Answering the Call: Understanding God’s Call to Vocational Ministry.

The booklet included articles on how to discern God’s calling to ministry, reasons why a “called” person should attend seminary, what a student learns at seminary, etc. etc. I wrote one article — “10 Reasons to Come to Midwestern” — and asked the dean [on seminary studies], our theology prof [on discerning a call], and VP for student services [why they should come to seminary] to write the others.

For the cover, I purchased this incredible (and inspirational) stock photo from AlaskaStock.com for a VERY reasonable price. [I just love to look around that site to take in God's beautiful creation!]

We initially printed 2,000 booklets and ran out within a couple of months. A story [press release] on our online denominational news service generated roughly 100 requests in the first day.

In two years, we sent out 1,600 copies directly [printing roughly 7,500 in total] to those who requested them through our Web site form.

Half of those 1,6000 requests came straight from the Web site promo alone (I had no idea the number of people surfing our site, but the booklet allowed us to make a personal contact with them). The other half roughly came from our print advertisements, placed in our denomination’s state newspapers.

Cost per booklet: About 75 cents!

[My printing contact for the booklet? Steve at The Covington Group. Great prices, great quality, outstanding service.]

THE BOOKLET’S IMPACT

Our recruiting department loved them … the balance of those 7,500 printed were given out at conventions, recruiting events, to prospective students who made campus visits, their pastors, our denominational leaders, etc.

Our administration loved them … they could take that to donor meetings, trustee meetings.

But most importantly — the recipients, from best I could tell, loved them and appreciated the wisdom and counsel they received from them.

Not all of the booklet recipients came to the seminary — not even close — but we got our money’s worth in PR, publicity, and … ministry.

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NEXT SERIES POST: Part 3: Ideas for Your Own Church Booklet Giveaway

COMING UP in the “Great Guest Givewaway Ideas: Booklet” Series:
Part 4: Designing an Online Request Form

Read all four posts of this series here: 1, 2, 3, 4

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