Tag Archive for: church management system

How to Choose a Church Management Software

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So you’ve decided to look into a church management software (ChMS), but aren’t quite sure where to start? When trying to decide which ChMS is right for your church, there are a few things you need to consider.

You do a lot for your church. Your responsibilities include managing volunteers, leading your staff, event planning, keeping your website up to date, adding events to the church calendar, staying in constant communication with your members, and so much more. With such a wide range of responsibilities, you need to pick a ChMS that can do just as much as you do!

But when it comes to deciding which management software is the right fit for your church, there’s a lot to consider. Not every ChMS offers the same features and some have expensive add-ons to use all the bells and whistles. 

So here are four major things you need to consider when choosing a church management software:

Security

It is the 21st-century and the days of giving your tithes by check or cash are gone for the majority of churchgoers. That means your church needs to offer the ability to give online. But the number one concern when it comes to online giving is security.

You don’t have to be an expert in online security or know all the lingo and latest vulnerabilities in fraud, but an easy way to confirm security is to check to make sure the system you’re considering is a PCI-Compliant Service Provider (like One Church Software). PCI stands for Payment Card Industry and they represent the highest set of security standards in the industry.

Here at One Church Software, our giving platform uses 256-bit SSL technology for data transactions. All personal, credit card, and bank information is submitted using 256-bit encryption. There is no stronger form of protection than this encryption.

Read More: How to Know if a Church Giving Solution is Secure

Customer Service + Training

Regardless of which ChMS you choose, you will have questions along the way. Whether you need help setting up a feature, contextualizing a feature for use, or reporting an issue you’re running into, you’ll want to know in advance that you can get help.

Check to see what contact options each church management software offers before you buy. Do they have a phone number where you can access support easily? A chat feature? A good test is to try their support contact information and see how quickly you get a response.

You should also double-check to see if they offer training for the software or if they have an online help center. (This is also a great way to get a look under the hood before you commit!)

Integration & Functionality

There are some features every church should have like volunteer management, kid’s check-in, event management, and service planning. One of the mistakes often made when choosing a ChMS is picking one that only does one thing or requires costly add-ons to get access to additional features.

When you choose a ChMS with too few features, you typically end up with numerous monthly fees and have to spend extra time learning a new system each time. With an all-in-one solution, you’ll only need to learn one system and it will likely have all the features you’ll need as well as some others you didn’t know you needed.

Some additional functionality to look for is automation, room management, group management, and communication management. You want the software you invest in to work for you!

Consider Cost and Efficiency

For a ministry, cost is often at the top of the list (and sometimes it is the entire list!) when considering which ChMS to get. That is completely fair!

While cost should certainly be a factor, be sure to balance that out with the value and efficiency a church management software will bring you. Have you ever tallied up the number of hours you spend individually contacting your volunteers? Or making a schedule and then re-making it? How long does it take each week to plan out a service, link music, and share it with your team? What gets forgotten in the midst of sermon planning each week? A good ChMS will save you hours on behind-the-scenes tasks so that you can focus on what you do best—connecting and encouraging people.

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Start your search with One Church Software and benefit from our all-in-one solution which includes volunteer management, kid’s check-in, background checks, online and text-to-give giving options, service planning, small group management, sermon archives, push and text notifications, automation, and more! You can try One Church Software for free for 14 days, no credit card required.

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How to Create a Guest Follow-Up Workflow for Your Church (w/ Email & Text Template)

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As a church leader, you know how important it is to follow-up with new guests. Without these touchpoints, someone could easily slip through the cracks before truly getting to know if your church is the right place for them.

To borrow insight from the business world, it is widely accepted that closing a sale takes a minimum of about 6-8 interactions. And a study by The University of Kansas quantified how many hours it takes to move from a mere acquaintance to a casual friend. The result was an astounding 50 hours spent together. 

It should come as no surprise, then, that when it comes to creating effective guest follow-up systems, you need to have several interactions planned to connect with people in a thoughtful way. We can’t expect deep connection to form if we aren’t prioritizing multiple interactions with guests.

But what should that look like?

To help you get started, we are providing examples of what a good guest follow-up workflow looks like using One Church Software. After guest information is collected by your physical or digital visitor card, we encourage you to use these examples and templates to set up your own guest follow-up in your church management system or by trying our free trial!

Welcome Email

The first thing you will want to do is input the data (if you have collected the information on a physical form) and check to be sure everything has been formatted correctly. This means double-checking to be sure their name is capitalized and you have a complete email or physical address. You don’t want to miss out on a potential relationship because there was a typo in their email of “gmail.co” instead of “gmail.com”.

Your first interaction should often be in the form of a welcome or thank you email. A good welcome email thanks visitors for attending and provides helpful links as well as ways to get connected further.

(Pro tip: You can also let guests determine how they’d like to be contacted through options in your first-time guest form. For example, if someone were to select “texting” as their preference, you could have an automated workflow that sends a welcome text instead.)

Here’s an example of what your welcome email might look like:

Hello [FIRST NAME],

Thank you for visiting one of our services! We hope you enjoyed your time worshiping with us and that it nourished your soul.

We know finding a church to call home can be a difficult task, so we’ve provided some helpful links to help you get connected easier and to help you know more about us:

  • LINK TO EVENTS PAGE
  • CONNECT WITH A PASTOR
  • HOW TO JOIN A SMALL GROUP

As you go through your week, we hope it is encouraging to know that I and the rest of our staff are praying for you! If there are any questions we can help answer or ways we can serve you, please let us know.

YOUR NAME
000-000-0000

Feel free to use this template as you create your own guest follow-up workflow, but don’t forget to add any relevant links and make it sound like your own.

Schedule Pauses Between Communication

No one likes to get blasted with one communication after another. That’s why we’ve made it possible in One Church Software to plan pauses in communication so your workflow will have a more natural cadence to it.

We recommend you add at least 2-3 days between most communication. This allows for appropriately paced follow-up that doesn’t feel overbearing.

Send a Text

For some people, email is harder to respond to or might seem more formal. That is why it can be valuable to use several different methods of communication in your workflow. Texts are typically a bit more on the personal and informal side so it might sound something like this: 

Hey NAME! This is YOURNAME from CHURCH. I wanted to personally reach out to see what you thought about your visit last Sunday. Here if you have any questions or feedback!

You might even add a call-to-action or a link to a form they can fill out to sign-up for a group or a class, somewhere they can find more information, etc. Just like this:

You may recall hearing about some of the new groups starting-up soon. You can learn more about those here: [LINK]

Assign Additional Follow-Up to a Key Leader

If you have a Guest Experience Coordinator, Discipleship Pastor, or if you know some of the guest’s interests or stage of life, it can be a good idea to have an associated leader reach out personally after some time has passed.

Let’s say that you know this guest has young children because they were in your children’s ministry. You could take this opportunity to assign a task to your Children’s Coordinator to reach out to them and tell them about the different children’s events going on.

(Pro tip: Task assignments like this can be automated in One Church Software as well!)

By having a key leader reach out to a guest, you are helping them make genuine connections with additional people within your church.

A Few More Guest Follow-Up Tips to Keep in Mind

  1. Be ready to respond! The goal of automating an effective guest follow-up system is to sustainably engage new visitors in a meaningful and consistent way. There will be people who don’t engage with the follow-up, but be prepared for people to respond! We want to be quick to return emails or texts as people engage back with us.
  2. Don’t go overboard. A great guest follow-up system is clear and is intentionally crafted to not be overwhelming. Too many messages will start to get annoying, which is why it’s crucial to have clarity about what you’re trying to accomplish and respect when people are choosing not to engage further.
  3. Know what next steps you want people to take. What next step are you trying to lead new people towards? Signing-up for a group? Taking a class? Grabbing coffee with a staff member? Keep that purpose and goal top-of-mind as you’re crafting follow-up material so it’s clear to the people being contacted as well.

And there you go! Just incorporating some of the suggestions here will give you 3-4 interactions with a guest that you can already have planned out in addition to their experience in-person. While we can’t automate a full 50 hours of interactions to help form deep relationships, automating the first few steps will allow follow-up with guests to happen in a timely manner, save you the time of having to repeat regular tasks, and help lead towards that genuine connection between new people and your church.

If you don’t have a church management system or are considering switching, you can try One Church Software FREE for 14 days to see all the ways it can help you care for your members, empower your volunteers, and serve your community.

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Get the Most Out of Our Software with the Learning Center

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As a church leader, you have one of the most important jobs in the world: Leading a team to help your community take their next steps with God. With such an important job, how you structure your ministry and organize your efforts matters deeply in your ability to be effective.

One of the biggest reasons churches don’t feel like they could update to a Church Management Software (ChMS) is because it can feel like it’s too difficult to learn and set-up. Understanding it can feel like a hurdle to implement a ChMS or transition to a new software, we strive to provide every resource to make the transition as smooth as possible.

One Church Software is an all-in-one technology solution but our goal isn’t just to bring your church up-to-speed. The goal is to help you care for your members, empower your volunteers, and serve your community, just as Christ calls you to. In order to do this, we offer best-in-class customer service that can help you overcome any obstacle you might encounter.

As part of that customer service, we want to make sure you know about our Learning Center. This holds frequently asked questions, tutorials, and deep dives on a variety of functions available in One Church Software.

The topics covered include:

  • Contacts
  • Contributions
  • Accounting
  • Groups
  • Events
  • Check-In
  • Rooms & Resources
  • Forms
  • Connections
  • Mobile App (App Builder)
  • Reporting
  • Automation
  • Sermons
  • Service Planning
  • Volunteer Scheduling
  • Communication

Under each section, you’ll find videos just like this one:

Additionally, under each section, you’ll find links to help articles that answer specific questions about the software, such as:

Explore the Learning Center

If you are still considering a ChMS, the Learning Center is the perfect place to get familiar with all the features as you test out our free demo. And if you already have One Church Software, be sure to check out these topics and more!

We know that setting up a ChMS can seem like a daunting task, but with the right support team and resources, it doesn’t have to feel that way. Regardless of where you are at implementing a ChMS, we are here to help! Give us a call or check out the Learning Center for yourself. 

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7 Common Issues with Church Websites

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It’s 2023, so your church has likely had a website for quite some time! But did you know there are common issues that may be deterring visitors from your church’s website, or communicating messages you don’t want to be sending? Thankfully, there are simple checks you can do to see if these obstacles are impacting your website.

1. Missing Service Times or Physical Address

Helping people get connected to your weekend services is typically a primary push for church websites. However, it’s very common for us to take a look at a church website and not be able to find a physical address for the church or the times services take place. Let’s remove barriers by making sure that information is as accessible as possible!

For any website, it’s pretty common to list a physical address in the footer (the bottom of each page) of the website and on a contact page if you have one. Those are likely the first places people will look. You may consider putting service times near where your address is listed as well as on the header (the top) of your home page so they can’t be missed.

2. SSL Certificate Errors

It may sound complicated, but it’s actually super simple to check if you have an SSL Certificate Error. Check your browser’s address bar right now (if you don’t know, the address bar is where you type in the web address). There is a locked padlock to the left of our web address of onechurchsoftware.com. That locked padlock is a sign that the information shared through the website has been encrypted. This is especially important if you offer online donations, but it is also the industry standard for almost any website nowadays. If you don’t see that locked padlock, you’ll want to get in touch with your website hosting provider or try checking your site through https://www.whynopadlock.com.

3. Outdated or Inaccurate Privacy Policy

Another important consideration for your website is, if you collect any sort of information from visitors to the site, then you are required to have a privacy policy. And even if you aren’t required to have one, it’s still a good idea. By having a customized privacy policy, you show visitors that you are good stewards of their information. If you need some help coming up with a customized privacy policy or just want some more information, we recommend checking out this article.

4. Sermon Archives are Difficult to Find

Do visitors have to click more than three times to find where your sermon content is located on your website? If so, then it’s too hard to find. When visitors want to get a taste of your church or if members want to catch up on sermons they missed, it’s important to make them easy to find and well organized. If you utilize our sermon archive through One Church Software, then we’ve already done the hard work for you to keep your Bible teaching organized and easily accessible for others to enjoy. One Church Software also integrates with YouTube and Vimeo to make video hosting a breeze.

5. Target Audience and Next Steps are Unclear

Many church websites tend to talk to insiders first, instead of targeting people who are not yet a part of your community. And even when church websites target the right audience, the next steps to get connected are often unclear. Should they be reaching out for more information, “Planning a Visit,” signing up for a resource, watching a sermon, or something else?

Be sure to define the next steps you are wanting to lead people towards, and make those next steps as clear as possible on your church’s website.

6. There’s No Contact Form or Clear Contact Information

If people have questions, we want it to be as easy as possible for them to reach out and get those questions answered. The most common way for that to take place on websites is through a contact form (or something similar, like a chat function—that’s what we use here at One Church Software).

In addition to a form, making sure your contact information (phone, email, address) is clear limits frustration and ensures that people can get in touch with your church easily when they need to.

7. Your Website is Disconnected From Other Tools

While this may not only relate to your website, integration across all the tools your church uses saves you a lot of time and makes you more effective in ministry. Too many churches are using different tools for everything from registering for a special event, email sign-ups, event management, volunteer organization, texting software, and online giving. Having to maintain that many systems can get exhausting. Not to mention that it can create confusion and makes it difficult to manage all those systems.

One Church Software is an all-in-one system that connects everything together. If you don’t already have a church management software or if the one you have doesn’t take the place of additional tools, try out our free demo video to see how One Church Software can help.

You don’t have to be a tech wiz to have a website that welcomes visitors and serves your current members. By making sure your church website doesn’t have any of these common issues, you can rest easy knowing that it shows care to your members and guests and points them to resources that can connect them to the life of the ministry.

If you found any of these issues with your website or want some help getting an all-in-one technology solution to help you care for your members, empower your volunteers, and serve your community, we’d love to connect. Give us a call at 855.932.2060 or take advantage of our free trial.

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7 Metrics You Should Track in Your Church

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As a church leader, your goal is to connect people to Christ. You want to see your community discover who Jesus is and what it looks like to follow Him.

But let’s be honest: No matter the size of your church, it’s not always clear which metrics you should keep track of to keep an eye on where people are at in their spiritual journey and how effective your ministry currently is.

The metrics every church tracks will be unique, as your vision for the impact you want to make in your community is unique. However, if you want to make genuine connections and get an idea of how healthy your church is, there are a few metrics we highly recommend you keep a close eye on.

Here are 7 metrics you should be tracking in your church:

1) Lapsed Attendance

In other words, when someone stops coming to church.

Metrics may sound like you are converting people into a pile of data and numbers, but metrics can help you uncover areas of opportunity that will help you make genuine connections.

For instance, when you track your attendance intentionally, you can uncover individual lapsed attendance patterns. Of course, this could be for a number of reasons, such as an unexpected illness, a move, or some other personal reason. When you track lapsed attendance, you will know when to reach out and offer pastoral care to people who may have otherwise fallen through the cracks.

2) Overall Giving

Giving is a crucial area to track for any church. As this is the primary way your church is funded, tracking giving and budgeting accordingly is a key part of stewarding your ministry’s resources well.

Put simply, you can’t ignore your finances and just “hope for the best.” Regular giving is an indicator of the financial health of your church and determines what financial resources you have available to give back to your community and congregation through the ministries you provide.

3) Lapsed Giving

Along with your overall giving, lapsed giving is a metric to help you track giving on a personal, pastoral level. Halted giving can be a sign of something happening in other areas of an individual’s or family’s life. Oftentimes changing jobs, losing a job, or some other life change can mean a change in finances.

If someone in your church changes or pauses their giving habits, this could be a sign that they have other circumstances happening in their lives. By noting this metric, you can make sure your church is offering support when they need it the most.

4) Digital and Physical Attendance

When it comes to measuring the health of your church, you can’t ignore this one! While attendance is not the only metric to indicate the health and impact of your ministry, it is one of the big ones to pay attention to. It’s important to keep track of how many people are engaging with your church in-person and online.

Tracking attendance will help you see patterns across the year, look honestly about where your church is at from an attendance perspective (growing, declining, or stagnant), and make strategy decisions accordingly.

5) Engagement: Are people taking next steps?

We’ve all talked from the stage about the next steps guests and visitors can take to get more connected, but do you know how many people take that step? Whether it’s stopping by a welcome desk, signing up for a class, meeting with a pastor, giving, or signing-up to serve, engagement is a crucial metric to consider, especially alongside attendance trends.

This is exactly why attendance isn’t the only metric that matters in ministry. Since our goal is to connect people to Jesus and help them take steps with Him in their life, seeing people take action is a crucial part of our purpose as a church.

6) Baptisms and Salvations

It’s always exciting when someone makes a profession of faith or is baptized! You may already have a plan to follow-up or mark the day for them (if not, you should!). But it’s important to keep track of the number of baptisms and salvations in a year.

By tracking the number of baptisms and salvation that occur as a result of your church’s ministry, you can track your true effectiveness and celebrate them with your members, staff, and with the individuals themselves!

7) Vision-Specific Wins

What is your unique vision as a church? How are you tracking the metrics related to that vision?

For example, if you support missionaries abroad or have a ministry that impacts your community, you should track their effectiveness. If your church has a focus on foster care, you should track the number of children your people have helped and share those metrics often.

One Church Software is a church management software that allows you to track and read all these metrics and more! Once you are tracking these metrics, it’s time to connect the information to actions that will help you care for people better. One Church Software allows you to track connections and can prompt you to follow-up or automate those actions on your behalf.

If you don’t have a church management system or are considering switching, you can try One Church Software FREE for 14 days to see all the ways it can help you care for your members, empower your volunteers, and serve your community.

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5 Examples of How to Use QR Codes in Your Church (& What Are They!?)

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As you are looking at a black-and-white square that kind of looks like a mix between a crossword puzzle and a barcode, you might be thinking: A Q-what? What is it and how am I supposed to use it in my church?

QR codes are a great way to direct people to information, send them to a website quickly, and gather feedback. The key is to know what they are and how to use them in a way that benefits your church.

What is a QR code?

A QR code (quick response code) is a type of barcode. Fun fact: QR codes were invented in 1994 by a Japanese company to keep track of manufactured automotive parts. Unlike barcodes that were linked to a single item, QR codes could contain a variety of complex data.

Today, every smartphone is enabled to read QR codes from the camera automatically. These codes can be read off of a computer screen, printed on paper, or even painted on a building!

Now you may be thinking, that’s all well and good, but what does a QR code do? 

Let’s say you wanted to tell someone how to find the event page on your website. Instead of telling them, “Go to www.churchwebsite.com, then click on events, then click on the calendar…,” you could have them pull out their phone and scan a QR code that automatically opens their browser to the event calendar page on your website.

If you’ve never tried it before, pull out your smartphone and give it a shot with the QR code below:

This is just one example of how you can link a website, video, form, survey, or really anything to a QR code.

How do you make a QR code?

You might be looking at the maze of boxes and shapes that make up a QR code and wonder how you could make one. The good news is you don’t have to be an expert to make a QR code!

While there are some QR code generators online, the easiest way to make one is to use the built-in QR code generator in One Church Software that will create one at the click of a button. There’s no complicated coding. All you have to do is know where you want the QR code to direct people and what background color you’d like. It’s as simple as that!

Check out this guide for where to find and generate a QR code in One Church Software.

How can I use QR codes in my church?

QR codes can feel like a pretty “technical” concept, especially if you have never heard of them before. However, now that you understand what they do and how easy it is to make one, let’s talk about some examples of how they can benefit your church:

1) Digital Bulletins

One of the most difficult parts of switching to a digital bulletin is getting people to the right spot on the website to read it. With a QR code, people can scan a code and be taken directly to your digital bulletin. We have seen churches get really creative here by putting the QR code for the digital bulletin on the seatbacks throughout the sanctuary for easy access or by putting a large QR code on the main screen.

2) Link to Sermon Notes or Outline

Even if your church has an app, a new visitor isn’t likely to download it just to get access to your sermon outline. By providing a QR code, they can easily access the notes without having to download anything right away.

3) Event Registration

If you are talking about events from the stage, you should be providing an easy way to get more information and register! Instead of people having to remember to go to your website later to RSVP, you can give them a way to do it at the moment by putting a QR code in your slides.

4) Gathering Data or Surveying a Group

Have you thought about integrating data from your congregation into your sermon? What if you could poll your congregation in advance or in real-time? You can use a QR code to direct people to a survey link.

5) Simplify Online Giving

Instead of having to click multiple times on your website to locate online giving, you can provide a QR code on digital or printed media that takes people to the page immediately. This can also be helpful if you have a special offering that your congregation can donate to that day.

QR codes can provide a way to quickly and easily direct people to information, forms, and resources that would otherwise take multiple clicks to find. By utilizing them throughout your ministry, you can optimize how people engage with your church.

If you already use One Church Software, then you have access to make your own QR codes right in your church management system!

If you don’t have a church management system or are considering switching, you can try One Church Software FREE for 14 days to see all the ways it can help you care for your members, empower your volunteers, and serve your community.

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Pro Tips for Using Forms in One Church Software

One of our favorite parts of working with church leaders is helping them discover new ways to use every part of One Church Software. Whether you have made the decision to update your church management system (ChMS) or are still considering it, today we are sharing some advanced ways you can use the form feature within One Church Software to support your ministry most effectively.

Read More: 7 Signs You’re Ready for a Church Management System

How are forms used?

Forms can be used for a number of purposes, including registration for an event, sign-ups, purchasing tickets for a special event, joining your church newsletter, requesting a resource, and the list could go on.

You can share a form in a variety of ways as well through One Church Software. For example, you can send your congregation a direct link to a registration form, you can provide easy registration for groups (or anything else) in the mobile app, or you could even create a custom QR code that sends people to a survey.

With all this is mind, you can take your forms to the next level by utilizing the following features you may not know about:

1) Uploading files through forms.

Did you know that you can collect practically any type of file using One Church Software forms?

This could mean that you can collect a signed waiver at the time of registration for an event.

Or you might be trying to get pictures and stories from a community outreach initiative that your church sponsored. Create a form with a field to upload files and you’ll be able to not only get details and stories from the ministry event, but also photos all in one form.

The options here are vast!

2) Collecting payments.

Gone are the days of paper lists to keep track of who has and hasn’t paid for an event. You can add payments to a form to collect the fee for an event, Awana registration, etc. You could even use the payment option for a t-shirt or Bible study purchase.

If you have One Church Giving, you can utilize the payment option in forms. With this feature, you can also set-up a promotion or coupon code for an item and allow people to cover the processing fees as part of their total payment amount.

3) Creating conditional fields on a form.

The conditional fields feature allows you to create an experience that is relevant to everyone. Conditional fields are submission fields that will only appear if someone answers a question a certain way. For instance, when collecting registration for an event, you don’t have to ask every single person how many children they need childcare for. You can make that question depend on if they answer “Do you require childcare?” with an affirmative answer.

Perhaps if Awana registration requires a waiver for a special activity for a specific age group, you can create a follow-up question only for people with children who are in that age group.

Conditional fields can be a great tool to help streamline the experience for each person!

4) Automating emails and task assignments.

We do a deep dive into some processes you should automate here, but it’s important to consider that your forms can be a trigger to kick-off any automation you create.

For example, if you are looking for volunteers, you could create an automated task assignment for your worship leader when someone checks the box for “Worship” under the areas they are interested in serving in.

For special events, you can have form responses go to each team leader rather than one person trying to send each response manually.

You can even set-up an automated email to send after someone completes the form to thank them or give them some important follow-up information.

As you can see, there are many different ways you can utilize forms in One Church Software to benefit your church. By considering how you might use these form features to make your systems more seamless, know that the sky is the limit! This is just one of the many features we have worked hard on in order to provide an effective church management system for you to utilize.

Need additional help setting up a specific form for your church? Reach out to our team anytime!

If you don’t have a church management system or are considering switching, you can also try One Church Software FREE for 14 days to see all the ways it can help you care for your members, empower your volunteers, and serve your community.

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5 Ways to Use Texting in Your Church

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You’ve likely noticed that fewer and fewer people in your church bring a hard copy of the Bible, opting to use a Bible app on their smartphones instead. We have the power in our pocket to do any number of things from reading the Bible, taking notes, surfing the web, and responding in the moment to a message.

With the ability to do all this at your member’s fingertips (in church and outside of church!), it’s important that you consider all the ways that church text services can actually help your ministry.

Why?

Well, according to Nonprofits Source, it takes 90 seconds on average to respond to a text while it takes 90 minutes on average to respond to an email. That is a staggering statistic that points to how texting can help make your church more effective at communicating with your current members and new guests.

Here are the top five ways a church text messaging feature in your church management software can benefit you:

1) Ministry to Others

Ministry doesn’t happen just in our Sunday services. In today’s world, we have the opportunity to more easily minister to people as they navigate their day-to-day lives. Did you know that you can use texting to do that?

For example, you could send a link to an encouraging devotional or a Bible verse. You could share an encouraging word or reminder throughout the week. You could send a question to ponder. Texting allows you and other church leaders to easily step into people’s lives during the week and minister to them as they go through their routines.

2) Sign-ups

Have you ever tried getting people to sign-up for an event or to get more information? It can be a chore to verbally tell them all the information in a conversation or from the pulpit.

With church text services, however, you can have people text a word like “BAPTISM” to sign-up for the next baptism or get more information. The text response they automatically get back can have a link to all the details they need. So when you talk about an event or getting more information, you can keep it short and sweet and let your text send the extra details.

3) Reminders

Got an event coming up or perhaps you need to communicate a last-minute change? Texting can be a great option to notify people of changed locations, an important detail, or just a reminder not to forget that the event is happening. Nonprofits Source reported that 90% of text message reminders are read within three minutes, which means that you can make sure vital information is being read by most people!

4) Giving

Regardless of if your members are giving their regular tithe or if they want to give generously to a special area of ministry, online options for giving are more popular than ever and text-to-give options are one of the easiest ways to give today. When it comes to special giving or spur-of-the-moment gifts, the easiest way for people to be generous is by providing a simple way to meet the calling to give.

5) Guest Follow-Up

Visitors and first-time guests can feel awkward about being contacted with a phone call or even via email at times. Texting is a great way to casually and personally say hello and let them know how grateful you are they visited your church. You can even provide some links to next steps they can take if they’d like to learn more!

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Texting is a great tool that can help inform and encourage your church’s members and guests. If you are interested in using texting in your church to do any of the things we mentioned here or if you’ve been on the lookout for a texting service that connects to your church management software, check out a demo of One Church Software to see how texting alongside our other features can support your ministry.

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6 Tips for Church Leaders Navigating the Summer Slump

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As the warmer weather approaches, calendars fill up with vacations, sports, and other fun activities to take advantage of the summer sun! If you are a church leader, you have probably seen how this season impacts attendance at your church.

This dip in attendance is commonly referred to as the “summer slump.” Churches see attendance hit an all-time low as the snowbirds return to their summer homes, college students travel back to their home states, and parents are looking for ways to occupy their kids during the break from school.

Even after years of recognizing this as “normal,” this can be a discouraging reality for leaders. We can start to see it as a setback rather than an opportunity. We can focus in on the stark difference from where we may have been a month ago in comparison to where we are now.

While you can’t bypass the summer slowdown/slump altogether, we’ve got a few tips for church leaders to help deal with the summer slump and prioritize your church calendar:

1) Set Realistic Expectations

This is first for a reason. It’s important that you intentionally don’t become discouraged when you see the summer slump start to impact your attendance.

It truly is normal for the large majority of churches to see a dip in attendance, and it is in some ways unavoidable. By setting realistic expectations, you can guard yourself against feeling major disappointment or discouragement when those numbers start to dip.

Your expectations and goals may even need to change over the summer months in comparison to the rest of the year. You may find yourself targeting different types of goals during this season (such as vision clarity, team growth, or digital ministry milestones rather than attendance metrics).

“Even after years of recognizing this as ‘normal,’ this can be a discouraging reality for leaders. We can start to see it as a setback rather than an opportunity.”

2) Get Creative with Your Ministry

During the summer months, it might be difficult for some people to show up on a Sunday morning consistently. But that doesn’t have to mean they want to be disconnected from their church community during this time.

Look for ways to minister to your members and community outside of your prescribed service times. Look for local festivals, events, and service projects that you can participate in as a church and have a presence at to invest in the community.

This typically requires creativity, and that can be an exciting opportunity for you and your team to problem-solve together. Rather than focusing on the question, Why aren’t our people showing up right now?, we can focus on, What creative opportunities are there to show up for our community in a fresh way right now?

3) Prioritize Digital Ministry

If you haven’t already, this is a great time to consider digital ministry options that people can partake in whenever it fits their schedule. Some questions to ask: How can we add value to people’s spiritual life through a digital ministry? Can we provide resources for a family worship night? Or maybe bite-sized devotionals that can easily be done in 5-10 minutes? The possibilities are endless to provide alternative ways to keep people connected to your church online.

This is a great time to be reminded of the reality that digital ministry is not “second-rate” ministry. When we can show up in meaningful ways in the places that our congregation and community are spending time, we have the opportunity to make a real difference in their day-to-day life. That’s exciting!

4) Make Giving Accessible

Just because people are less likely to be physically at your church every week over the summer doesn’t mean that they don’t want to give regularly. Make sure your giving is accessible to those members with busy schedules.

Online giving is a great way to provide flexible options to your members, whether they want to give once or set up a recurring monthly gift. Make sure your members know online giving is an option before the summer slump is in full swing!

READ MORE: How to Know if a Church Giving Solution is Secure

“Just because people are less likely to be physically at your church every week over the summer doesn’t mean that they don’t want to give regularly.”

5) Plan Ahead for the Fall

Remember all those times that you’ve wanted to do some strategic planning, but have felt too “in the weeds” of the day-to-day requirements of church leadership?

This might just be your opportunity!

With a decrease in attendance, the summer slowdown is the perfect time to review and plan for the Fall and the vision your church should be pursuing moving forward.

Set aside some time to review any systems you currently have in place and see if there is a way to improve them. When involvement gets more consistent, how will your ministry need to change? What initiatives need to be planned out now to be most effective? What goals and milestones feel important for the church as a whole to pursue and champion together? What major areas of growth do you and your team have?

6) Provide Special Events for the Whole Family

With children out of school and one or both parents working, it can be difficult to find events the whole family can enjoy. Take note of the demographic of your church: Do you have more families, singles, or young couples? Then look around to the demographics of your community: What kinds of events will serve your community best?

Depending on what you find, you might consider offering VBS, movie nights, water park days, or picnics in the park. By offering events that help bring the family together, you can make sure connecting with your church feels beneficial to those you’re trying to reach and doesn’t feel like another obligation to fill-up their busy calendar even more.

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The summer slowdown/slump can be discouraging if you aren’t prepared for this season and don’t adjust what your church offers to support your community. If your church needs help setting up online giving or adding systems to be better prepared to get back into your stride in the Fall, now is the perfect time to try out a demo of One Church Software.

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5 Benefits of a Check-In Station at Your Church

You may wonder if using a check-in station is the right call for your church. It may seem like it’s just a fancy new piece of technology that is nice, but is it really necessary?

The truth is that the purpose of using check-in system software is not just about technology; it’s actually to make it easier to reach and serve your community, and easier to manage the day-to-day life of your church.

Check-in stations have a number of benefits that provide connection, organization, and safety, and help you stay prepared to make a connection with the people you are called to serve. From checking kids in to your children’s ministry all the way to tracking attendance at special events or classes, here are five benefits a check-in station offers your church:

Benefit #1: Keep Your Children’s Ministry Secure

Whether the child care you are offering is for a special event or as a part of your regular Sunday morning service, there is no other place in your church where security matters more. With easy check-in, you’ll know who the child’s guardian is, the child’s name, and any dietary restrictions all on one label! This ensures that only an authorized adult can pick up the child.

If you ever need to look back at a full attendance roster for a service, or past attendance for a specific child, the system makes it really easy to track that information down.

Benefit #2: Track Attendance

Some churches use a check-in station to track attendance for their Sunday services, and some use it only for special events and classes. Either way, this is a huge benefit to a check-in station that allows people to check-in as they come in.

For special events, if you utilize a pre-registration, tracking the event attendance using a check-in station will allow you to compare the number of people that registered versus those who came to the event. Having attendees check-in at the event will also allow you to send follow-up emails and helpful resources only to the people who that information would apply to, and automatically print labels or name tags necessary for that event.

Benefit #3: Helps Identify New Guests

Church can be a busy place, especially if you have kids running about or are busy keeping a big event organized. With event check-in system software, you’ll know exactly who came to your event and be able to narrow down who wasn’t part of your regular attendees. So in the case you aren’t able to make a personal connection at the event, you can still send them a special follow-up afterward.

Benefit #4: Advance Registration for Events

One of the toughest parts of planning for an event is knowing how many people to plan for. With advance registration, you can collect an accurate number of how many people to expect, as well as compare that number with the number from your event check-in. If you have any conferences or events where there is a fee to attend, you are able to easily add that into the advanced registration.

Benefit #5: Provides Valuable Data

Coordinating events is more than just getting them scheduled in the calendar. You also need to know how many kids to expect (if you are offering childcare), how many volunteers you’ll need to watch the children, and how to set up your space for the amount of attendees expected. If you have a weekly event, a check-in station provides valuable data to tell you how many people are regularly attending, and the average number of children, so that you can properly prepare and adjust for the next event.

These are just a few of the benefits that come with having a check-in station at your church! The goal of utilizing a tool like this is to improve the experience for guests at your church, make organization easier for you and your team to manage, and allow you to connect more easily with the people in your church.

Interested in how One Church Software’s check-in station integration and all-in-one church management software could support your ministry? Learn how it works.

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