More Than a Building: 3 Ways to Make Your Church Known in Your Community - Katlyn durrence, marketing communications coordinator

In today’s digital age, it is easier than ever to reach people right where they are with the Gospel.

Do you remember 20-30 years ago, when your church would start a capital campaign to raise a large sum of money to build a brand new welcome lobby that would be the best first impression you could put forward as a church? Well, it comes as no surprise that those days are gone. 

Your first impression is now beyond your physical walls as a church, which is a good thing! Because this means you can reach the people outside your church walls, where they are, with the Gospel and then assimilate them into the life of your church! 

When you’re working to reach more people as a church, you are practicing marketing and building brand awareness of your church in your community. When you are thinking about growing your church’s brand awareness, you should ask the questions: “How can I grow my church’s known presence in my community?  How can I make sure my community knows about my church and feels invited to walk through the doors on Sunday?”

Building an action plan for these questions will allow you to build relationships with people in your community whom you may have never interacted with before, because you went beyond your four walls! 

Let’s talk about 3 key strategies that will help your church grow your reach and awareness in your community, ultimately sharing the gospel with more people and seeing more unchurched families connected to the life of the local church and Jesus. 

1. Clarify Your Church’s Mission, Vision, and Goals

Before you can communicate with your community and grow your reach, it is important to have clarity around your church’s mission, vision, and overall ministry goals. These three components will inform how and when you communicate with your community and congregation. 

• Define Your Mission and Vision:  What is the overall purpose of your church? Where are you trying to go? Clearly define the direction you are going as a church and allow that to direct your church’s other strategies. Make sure that your congregation can articulate your mission and vision statements, too!

• Establish Your Goals and Benchmarks: What are some goals you have as a church staff? Where would you like to be in 5 years? How are you going to get there? That’s where your goals and benchmarks come in! Maybe you want to see a 5% growth in church attendance. Or maybe it’s the fact that you want to see 12% of your pre-Covid families come back that are still watching online or have yet to re-engage altogether. Establish your ministry goals and then set extremely tangible benchmarks, or key dates of smaller goals, along the way so that achieving those goals doesn’t feel so out of reach. 

Overall, having a clear mission and direction with established goals will help you have a compelling and memorable message that will make your community know your church and its presence in the community. 

2. Develop a Strong Online Presence

We’ve already touched on it: your online presence is your new front door. With this in mind, having a strong digital presence as a church is a must. Your church’s online presence consists of two key components:

• Your Website: In order to engage new people and have a lasting impression, the digital front door of your website must be set up and ready to receive people. Whether someone is brand new to your community or has lived there for a while and attended your church once or twice, it is essential that your website is user-friendly for a new visitor. Key information and next steps need to be easy to find. How can they get involved in the life of your church? Your website should help the user easily find church details like service times and location, as well as provide them with next steps for getting connected! A new prospective churchgoer should never get lost on your website.

• Your Social Media: Social media can feel intimidating if you don’t know where to begin or don’t have clearly defined initiatives for your social media presence. BUT social media doesn’t have to be challenging or complicated! And it's just as important as your website. For Gen Z, social media is the new Google, so if you want to meet Gen Z, you’ve got to meet them right where they are— social media.
  (44% of Gen Z discover new brands on social media daily. - Emarketer)

Your mission and goals inform how and where your church establishes and maintains its online presence. Everything you communicate on your website and social media should help your church accomplish your goals and help grow your awareness in your community.

3. Share Engaging Content

There’s strategy and intentionality behind all of the content you put out as a church. You should never be sharing or posting just to check a box. The good news about content is that as a church leader, you are already creating and communicating a lot of content in person already! Our challenge for you is to take your content beyond a Sunday morning or Wednesday night to engage with those who don’t have your church on their radar. It’s also important to create the right type of content for the people you are trying to reach in your community! The strategy that you have in place to reach a mom down the street is probably different than the plan you are trying to execute to engage the college student in your town. Here are some content ideas for your social media to get you started meeting these people:

• Video Sermons: Odds are you have at least one ministry gathering a week, if not 3 more! If you are trying to reach new people and stop them while they are scrolling or searching the internet, it is a wise idea to have your sermons or services recorded. Then, you can post these online in multiple ways - YouTube, Instagram, Facebook! 

• Photography: You probably have some ministry events and gatherings on your church property every month. What would it look like to find a volunteer in your church who has this skill set to capture photos of those events for you to use on your website and social media?

• Inspirational Stories: As believers, we have the greatest story ever told! And what makes it even better is the personal ways the Lord works in each one of our lives. In your congregation, there are dozens of stories of how the Lord has worked just this year alone! What would it look like to capture those stories and share them with your church and ultimately reach your community? 

The best part about reaching new people in your community through these marketing and communication efforts is that it is possible for any church in any context! It just requires a clear communication plan that is outreach and assimilation-focused! By leveraging these 3 strategies, your church will have an increased presence in your community both physically and digitally, and you’ll see more new people walking through your church doors!!  

If you need help getting started, submit the Connect Marketing discovery form and a team member of the Connect Ministries Marketing Team will follow up with you! You can visit connect-ministries.com/connect-marketing today!

- Katlyn Durrence is the Marketing Communications Coordinator at Connect Ministries, where she has worked since 2020. With a deep passion for enhancing church outreach strategies, Katlyn thrives on leveraging marketing and communication strategies to create impactful first impressions in today’s digital age. She believes that a church’s online presence is often the first encounter for newcomers, shaping their perceptions before they set foot on church property.

Additionally, Katlyn serves as the Communications Director for 5 Points Church, a local church plant in Athens, GA. Originally from Coastal Georgia and a graduate of the University of Georgia, she enjoys traveling, photography, a good cup of coffee, walks with friends, and, of course, watching Georgia football.