The Last Should Be First
by Chris Forbes
Free tips for getting the word out about your church from the Ministry Marketing Coach
Sometimes the last thing on our minds in ministry outreach is the first thing we ought to think about. If you reach out and your outreach works, people will come. So, how is your Follow-up? When ministry marketing brings in more people, are you ready to take care of them?
Most churches aren’t ready, and don’t have a plan to do so. Follow-up is hard work and it takes away from other things ministers feel are important. In a real sense, however, marketing is your ministry, since marketing can help build relationships with people who need the gospel. That’s why churches need to build a follow-up plan shortly after they develop the marketing plan.
Every ministry endeavor should be planned with the follow-up in mind first. Make sure every person who visits your church receives follow-up within 36 hours of their first visit to you. Send them a letter. Give them a call. Let them know you are glad they visited. Have a plan to keep contacting them for several weeks after their visit.
If your church wants to make ministry marketing work for you, you will have to move beyond how most churches plan their follow-up. If a typical church has 25 visitors on a Sunday and only five people show up to help contact and visit, they will only visit five people. That leaves 20 people who still need to be contacted. Then, the following week, another group of new contacts are made and a number of them get neglected too. So the prospects and contacts list grows colder and colder. This way, people fall between the cracks in your ministry.
The situation is so bad, that most churches have lost touch with more than half of the people who have made contact with their ministries. Many of those either get lost in the cracks or go elsewhere. Some people may need a personal contact to feel welcome, or to want to come back. Don’t let this happen to your church.
Action Point!
Evaluate your follow up ministry. An easy way to do that is to take the names of the people who have come and visited for the last four weeks and to follow them up, give them a call, give them a visit, or send them a note or email to make sure they have been contacted in some way.
