Starting Off with a Good Church Website

Designers may tell you that church websites need the same features as other sites, but that's not the case. There is a big difference between the two and we're here to tell you why. We'll help you figure out everything you need to start your new church website - and gain new members to your congregation!

The Definition of Regular Websites

A typical website is better known as a WYSIWYG setup. If you're not familiar with this acronym, it stands for; What You See Is What You Get. These are your basic websites that offer up to 5 pages (about us, contact, etc.) and provide you with choices for templates and other areas of the design.

We consider these to be great choices for affiliate marketers, bloggers, or people that want to build a website for hobby purposes, but not for a church website. Why?

Explaining a Church Website's Needs

Well, churches have to build a website that not only reflects itself, but also the congregation as a whole. A lot of times a simple web hosting design isn't going to cut it. If the completed project looks dull, not very compelling, or only worth a couple bucks; it will turn everyone off.

Think about the type of impact it will have on your congregation. What if a member of your congregation tells someone to go to your website and they are extremely disappointed? This will not only reflect poorly for the church but also embarrass the person who promoted it. The majority of all the websites out there don't have this kind of stress on their hands.

Easy Access

Church website designs need easy navigational elements. A user-friendly approach is the key to gaining more people interested in your congregation. A great example of this would be the Shepherds Land's website, Shepherd's Land makes building a website for churches and ministry very simple with easy access from any computer, any time and anywhere.

In the good old days it was all about word of mouth. However, those days are long gone. If you can get your church website's design the way you want, it will play a major role in the growth of your church for years to come. The Internet provides easy access to any church, so don't be afraid to take advantage of it. Your congregation will need to easily access information on your site.

What's Next?

These are all important things to consider, but you should already know the next step. Church website designs should be considered as a necessity. You have to find the right company to create and develop your website, these companies should be able to provide full packages from your domain name, web hosting and easy to use church builder plug-ins. A well structured and user-friendly website will provide a higher acceptance level amongst your congregation and anyone else that joins the church later down the road.

Things to Consider Before You Start to Build a Church Website

Learning how to build a church website doesn't have to be complicated. We also understand the importance of keeping your congregation informed via the Internet. A lot of churches are skeptical about taking this approach, because they're afraid it's going to be hard to learn. These days an all-in provider is all that is needed for people with no or little website design experience.

Finding the Right Company

Choosing the right company should be your first order of business. They need to have all the essentials available to make this as easy as possible. There are regular hosting companies like GoDaddy or HostGator, but the benefits won't be nearly as plentiful. This is especially true if you don't know where to begin. It is best to use a platform mainly focused on churches and ministries like shepherdsland.com.

If you are not technology savvy finding a website building platform that makes it very easy in three steps is your best options.

Know What You Want

Every church has different factors they want to be included into their website. You should take the time to write this down. So, if you want to have text, images, audio files, videos, or anything else on the website, make sure you take it into account before making a decision and purchasing a package.

Pages you can consider adding are sign-up forms and online donation areas to a bulk emailer and images of the church. These areas alone are hard to complete on your own, especially if you don't consider yourself "technically savvy".

Getting the Church Out There

One of the most important pieces to building a website is learning how to promote it. In a world where newspapers and landline telephones are becoming obsolete, learning to market your church online is essential. One of the ways to do this is by using social media networking. It's possible you already started do this before you wanted to build a church website.

The two most popular ways is by using Facebook and Twitter. Churches can build organization "fan" pages on Facebook, which allows your congregation to link to it through their own personal profile pages. This could create new followers and increase yearly revenue in a flash.

Twitter allows followers to keep up to date with all your current events. This could be as simple as providing meaningful short scriptures and tweeting them to everyone. After all, most people love encouragement and this is the perfect way to provide it for them!