Ministry Marketing CoachMinistry Branding and Marketing that Works

The Great Disconnect in Church Marketing

Each year, millions are spent in outreach in churches. Yet the effectiveness crisis continues year after year. Some researchers estimate 70% of churches are plateaued in growth. Seventy two churches close their doors each week in the United States according to the North American Mission Board. All this while marketing activities are up. Some churches are busting at the seams—with transfers from other churches. Where is the outreach to the unchurched? No wonder people are critical of marketing in the church. It seems to be contributing to the problem!

Some people criticize church marketing using spiritual sounding language, but the reality is they have bad attitudes about something that really could be a part of the outreach solution they are looking for. Their criticisms sound like godly counsel–but turn out to be more like short-sightedness toward communication strategy. Here’s what they say adapted from John J. Considine’s work “Marketing Your Church. Concepts and Strategies” into the Six Church Marketing Bad-Attitudes:

1. Blessed are Those Who Avoid Marketing Because Marketing Wastes Money!

Not necessarily so. Marketing, properly planned, is an investment. I find it is much easier to get a church to spend $18,000 renovating their bathrooms, than it is to get them to invest in media to reach people. They want the $10,000 dollar covered awning by the back door, and the $100 dollar website. Marketing is not the only way churches can waste money—see also single-purpose gymnasium nobody can wear shoes in, for more information!

2. Blessed are Those Who Avoid Marketing Because Marketing Invades Privacy, Bothering People Who Want to Be Left Alone

When you know your audience, understand their needs and offer them something they perceive as a solution to their life situation, the marketing is invisible to them. As long as you are polite and respectful of them, that is. I have never heard people say, “Stop offering me great things I really need!” The problem is we usually show up with something that they don’t feel they need. Hey, we need to bother people anyway—they are going to HELL. Time to yell, “FIRE!”

3. Blessed are Those Who Avoid Marketing Because Marketing Manipulates People

Actually, marketing is intended to persuade people, like the Apostle Paul did. We leave manipulation to the phony Christian TV Evangelists. Your church shouldn’t try to control people in the way you communicate. If you do, it won’t take long before people figure you out. “Fool me once, shame on you! Fool me twice, shame on me!”

4. Blessed are Those Who Avoid Marketing Because Marketing is Not Spiritual Leadership Since You Pander to What the Masses Want

Some marketers do this, so I see they have a point. Some leaders do stick their thumb out in the wind to see what is popular. These are also the ones who run down to the Christian bookstore or denominational office to see what the latest programs are. It is ungodly to pander to the masses. Godly leaders are polite leaders, they want to know what people need, how what they do affects them, so they can become more responsive to them.

I have heard this criticism usually come from certain theological camps that don’t really do outreach anyway. They have a theological criticism for everything. Their churches are usually dying and have very little witness in their community. Eventually, you have to ask yourself, if nobody is following, are your really leading?

5. Blessed are Those Who Avoid Marketing Because Marketing Yields to Consumerist Attitudes

This is another verse of the chorus above. Yes, indeed some marketing has become consumerist. For the most part this mentality feeds the transferring of members from one church to another. One church gets a good program going, and then the one down the street gets a better one and begins to market it.

In my opinion, the reason we have such movement from church to church is not because churches are intentionally trying to attract other church members (maybe some are–and shame on them!), but because they only know how to speak to church members. They attract them by default. They don’t understand the lost.

If churches were attracting droves of unchurched people and exposing them to the gospel, I wonder what the problem would be? What we all find disagreeable, is the huge church that grows..err… huger.. by getting people to change their memberships.

6. Blessed are Those Who Avoid Marketing Because Marketing is a Business Discipline, and We All Know Things from the Business World are Evil

I don’t know why we think ideas that come from business are evil. I can think of several business disciplines I am glad most churches use. Budgeting is a business discipline, and we use it to help us be better steward of our money. Time management is a business discipline, and we use it to be better stewards of our time. Marketing is a business discipline, and we need to use it to be better stewards of our communication.

Business disciplines are not evil, they are neutral. It is the person who uses it that makes it good or evil. Bad people do bad marketing—and bad money management—and bad time management. Marketing is what you make of it.