Popular Content Management Systems (CMS’s) for Church Websites – Our Research Results
We wrote a web crawling script to research the most popular content management systems used by church websites. We gathered data on 1,600 churches, and our web crawler inspected those 1600 church websites in late 2015. This article describes what we learned....
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Top WordPress Pitfalls for Church Websites
What are the top three WordPress pitfalls people face when building a church website? WordPress pitfalls? Wait, isn’t WordPress supposed to be wonderful? Yes. And it is. But then, taking a road through the Rocky Mountains is gorgeous and worthwhile — and you still...
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The Three Biggest Excuses People Make for Neglecting Their Church Websites
There are three main ways churches often neglect their websites: NOT having a website at all. NOT updating the design of your website to keep pace with advancements in web technology. Most designs have a "shelf life" of three to five years. NOT logging in to the...
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Picking the right technology for your church website
Use a web content management system (web CMS) rather than static HTML “Static HTML” is shorthand for the way people used to build websites in the 1990s. You would individually create web pages using a text editor or software such as Microsoft Frontpage or Adobe...
read morePicking the right people to build your church website
A couple of days ago, I shared a quote which emphasizes the importance of people in making your church website an effective tool for outreach: Technology is not the hard part. For most ministries, spending less time on technology and more on people and processes will...
read moreDoes my church need a new church website?
Answering this question involves three things: Understanding the people to whom you are ministering . Reflecting on your mission and purpose. Diagnosing whether you have the right tools for the job. Step 1: Understand how people in your church and community use the...
read moreHow to build a church website: a 30,000 foot view
It's more than just technology Building a church website involves three components: technology, people, and processes. Technology, people, and processes form what Dave Bourgeois of Biola University calls “the digital ministry framework.” To build a church website...
read moreWhat is the value of a church website?
Every church in North America should regularly evaluate the effectiveness of its use of mass communication tools God is at work building the church on the foundation of Jesus Christ to be a witness in society. Communication is necessary in this work. “Face-to-face” is...
read moreReview: Ministry in the Digital Age
Ministry in the Digital Age: Strategies and Best Practices for a Post-Website World by David T. Bourgeois. Downers Grove, IL: IVP Books, 2013. Paperback, 144 pages, list price $15.00. As a "Millennial" who builds church websites and studies Reformed theology, I've...
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Praise the Lord and Change Your Password
There's a huge cyber-war happening on the Internet. You may not see it, but the battles are very real. Last September, Bank of America was hit by a massive cyber attack, which Fox News described as originating from a radical Islamic group. Largest Battle in Internet...
read moreAre we living in a “post-website world”?
"Technology is not the hard part," said Dr. David Bourgeois in a recent interview on ReformedCast. "People and processes are the hard part." Dr. Bourgeois is Associate Professor of Information Systems at BIOLA University and author of a forthcoming book...
read more20 photo ideas for your church website
Photography is a key component of every website we do. Over the years, we've combed through thousands -- probably tens of thousands -- of photos for church websites. In this post, we share some things we've learned along the way. These 20 photo ideas are divided into...
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