Three Reasons Churches Need a Marketing Plan

By David Tonen • March 3rd, 2009

Does a church have to plan before it starts to advertise?  Absolutely!  Any organization has to have a plan before it takes on the task of advertising itself or an event it is planning.  Churches are no different.  However, sadly, churches often leave the promotion as a last-minute add-on to their event planning.

Chris Forbes at Ministry Marketing Coach got me thinking about that with his post today Five Things to Do Before You Advertsie Your Chuch.  Chris’s first point is:

Put more effort and thought into your communication planning.
Take it slower and be more methodical when planning your communications. Too often, the promotion of church events and activities is treated almost as an afterthought. Churches often needlessly find themselves in a flurry of last-minute activity when doing ministry promotion. It is hard to plan creative and effective media in a rush.

Here is why this happens and what you can do about it for your church:

  1. Church promotion is often done by a committee of volunteers who have little or no training or experience as marketers or communicators.  If your church does not have people with marketing training and experience, please hire someone who does – you get what you pay for!
  2. Promotion of church concerts, conferences, or events is usually done as the last stage of the event planning.  When you begin planning your next “big” event – the promotion and marketing plan should be written at the event inception.
  3. Churches are afraid to spend money on marketing.  No other organization in our society decides to do an event and does not create a marketing budget to promote it.  With church events, it is not a situation of “if you build it they will come”.  Churches in your city and mine are out of touch with each other.  They have so much going on in their own ministry that they are often oblivious to what you are doing.  Marketing helps tells them what you have coming up that they should consider attending as well.  If people don’t know it’s happening, they can’t plan to attend!

Without a plan you’ll be lost and your event will needlessly suffer from lack of exposure.  It is so sad to see a ministry pour excellent resources and time into putting on an amazing event only to have it poorly attended and in the end even lose money.  Be a good steward – if you are led to create an event, please make sure you promote it with excellence too.

What are your thoughts about marketing planning at churches?

Comments(6) Advertising, Church Marketing, Marketing, Ministry
  • http://www.marketinginprogress.com Brett Duncan, MarketingInProgr

    The lack of planning is more often the norm in any organization, although it does seem to be amplified in churches. Too many churches only think in terms of what’s going in the bulletin this month, what’s announced from stage this month, and that’s about it. And too many good events get overlooked.

    Another problem I see is that, as churches get bigger, they struggle with segmenting their communication. Most ministry leaders want EVERY MEMBER to be involved in their ministry, and therefore they want it blasted out to the masses. But, the more ministries a church has, the more cluttered the communication becomes.

    If a church is going to have a specific ministry, then it needs to be comfortable with a specific audience, and simply find ways to communicate with that audience.

  • http://www.marketinginprogress.com Brett Duncan, MarketingInProgress.com

    The lack of planning is more often the norm in any organization, although it does seem to be amplified in churches. Too many churches only think in terms of what’s going in the bulletin this month, what’s announced from stage this month, and that’s about it. And too many good events get overlooked.

    Another problem I see is that, as churches get bigger, they struggle with segmenting their communication. Most ministry leaders want EVERY MEMBER to be involved in their ministry, and therefore they want it blasted out to the masses. But, the more ministries a church has, the more cluttered the communication becomes.

    If a church is going to have a specific ministry, then it needs to be comfortable with a specific audience, and simply find ways to communicate with that audience.

  • http://navigateyourmarketing.com/ David

    Brett, thanks for you your insights. You draw to the surface an interesting problem which is that

    1) all organizations have planning issues – I see this in business all the time!

    2) small churches and large churches both have communication problems but both are different. Small churches don’t plan well and you are right, larger churches really need to segment their communication better so people who are not in the target demographic don’t get frustrated!

  • http://navigateyourmarketing.com/ David

    Brett, thanks for you your insights. You draw to the surface an interesting problem which is that

    1) all organizations have planning issues – I see this in business all the time!

    2) small churches and large churches both have communication problems but both are different. Small churches don’t plan well and you are right, larger churches really need to segment their communication better so people who are not in the target demographic don’t get frustrated!

  • http://triunedesigns.com/blog Leo Wurschmidt

    I deal with the same things when talking with small businesses about their own marketing. The ownders do not want to plan their marketing efforts prior to a release, new product, etc.

    I have found that their mentality is “we have so much going on right now that I will wait to begin marketing once all of this [other stuff] is done.’

    The problem with web marketing is that it takes time to build momentum. It is not like a blitz t.v. advertising campaign. If churches (and small businesses) began web marketing from the beginning of the process they could truly utilize the benefits of today’s marketing tools.

  • http://triunedesigns.com/blog Leo Wurschmidt

    I deal with the same things when talking with small businesses about their own marketing. The ownders do not want to plan their marketing efforts prior to a release, new product, etc.

    I have found that their mentality is “we have so much going on right now that I will wait to begin marketing once all of this [other stuff] is done.’

    The problem with web marketing is that it takes time to build momentum. It is not like a blitz t.v. advertising campaign. If churches (and small businesses) began web marketing from the beginning of the process they could truly utilize the benefits of today’s marketing tools.

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