As a child in church, I walked by a large bulletin board hung in a well-traveled hallway. I ignored it. So did everyone else.

Later, someone in the church office figured out that those bulletin-board messages could be printed in the Sunday worship bulletin, too. Next came verbal announcements during worship. Then came placing messages on the church’s new web site, where they accomplished little because people don’t go to web sites to read bulletin-board notifications. Then came a monthly printed newsletter. Finally came a weekly newsletter sent by email, pushing bulletin-board material onto members’ computer screens.

By now, the same messages were being distributed in five different ways. Surely that would be enough. No, it wasn’t enough.

The issue wasn’t repetition. It was the message itself. Telling people when the 10:00am Sunday service will be offered this Sunday means nothing. Insiders already know it, and outsiders would be receiving the wrong message. Instead of knowing the schedule, they need to know Why. Why come to the Palm Sunday service; what is Palm Sunday, anyway? Why come to the foot-washing or Stations of the Cross?

Indeed, why think about church at all? Why take a nascent yearning for God and turn it into an activity on Sunday morning? What does church have to do with their lives? Who is this writing me, and what does he or she stand for?

I am advising church leaders that they need to have at three different blogs or newsletters, each delivered electronically for maximum impact and each targeting a different audience.

Pastor’s Blog

This is the most important and widely distributed.

This blog is from the pastor as a person and thought leader. It doesn’t promote the church as such, nor does it promote the writer as the official pastor. This blog reaches across religious chasms and communicates directly with the reader. It doesn’t try to drive readers to Sunday worship.

For example, in a community filled with young families, the writer might reflect on the doubts and worries that accompany parenting in 2016, on issues of work-life balance, or on the questions children ask. The point is to connect. and to establish the writer as someone worth reading.

The audience for this blog should be enormous. If your in-house mailing list is 200 recipients, think 10,000 for this blog. Build your email list by obtaining email addresses in every possible way (other than buying a list, which is illegal). Ask for email addresses every time you meet someone, or they come to a church event, or they download a white paper on some broadly interesting topic, or sign up for a raffle. We call them “touches,” not “prospects” or “leads.” You can touch their lives, that’s all.

Prospects blog

This blog is for people who have expressed some interest in knowing more about faith. You still aren’t trying to drive them to Sunday worship. But you are overtly dealing with faith issues (not church issues), such as bad things happening to good people, the problem of evil, understanding the yearning for God that lies within, and the writer’s own faith experiences. This blog can invite reader comments and questions.

Use the 10,000-person pastor’s blog to build readership for the prospects blog. Include a call-to-action button on the former, such as “Learn More” or “Ask a question.” Offer to send them your blog about faith.

Out of 10,000, you might expect 1,000 to receive this faith-centered blog.

Faith community blog

This blog is for members and for those considering membership. It’s about being part of a faith community, what the community’s values are, what the community is doing to make this a better world, and how readers can participate. Don’t turn your faith community blog into a bulletin board.

This blog invites people to care deeply about the mission and ministry of the faith community. It should be brief and concise. It should anticipate the passions people can feel about God and serving. It doesn’t seek to build worship attendance.

This blog might reach 100 not-yet-constituents, as well as the ongoing 200 constituents. Your goal is to draw at least half of this 100 into affiliation.

How can the pastor possibly handle three blogs a week? By shedding other load. Communications should be a much higher priority than it tends to be. This is your congregation’s future we’re talking out. If you do nothing more than say the same-old things to the same-old people, your congregation will dwindle and die.
 

About the Author

Tom Ehrich is a writer, church consultant and Episcopal priest based in New York. He is the publisher of Fresh Day online magazine, author of On a Journey and two national newspaper columns. His website is Church Wellness – Morning Walk Media