Does A Church Have “Competition”?
Does a church have competition? In the business world I have spent most of my career in publishing. Our major “competition” for book sales is always other publishing companies. So, for a church, when it is doing church marketing, is one church racing against or competing with all the others churches in its community to get people to come there? A business person might say yes. Most churches would probably say yes as well. But they would be wrong!
Alan Jones wrote a blog post today called The Church and Marketing where he nails it when he writes:
“For the local church, the competition is….other churches….right? Wrong. The competition for a local church is every thing that vies for the attention, time and commitment of people in our community – NOT other churches.”
You see, church marketing is different from business marketing. Even though across denominations and historically churches have tried to compete with each other, out do each other, and put each other down, this was not Jesus’ plan. He was all about unity. At the foundation, most Christian churches are built on the same core spiritual and doctrinal values. Therefore, our mission as given to us by Jesus is to work toward the same purpose – reaching those who do not yet have a relationship with Jesus. We are not fighting each other, in fact we should be helping where we can and encouraging and rejoicing when others are successfully connecting people with God – as much as we would celebrate when it happens in our own church!
It is not an “internal” Christian competition. We are, as Alan points out, competing with everything else that society throws at individuals and families. There is so much marketing reaching into the lives of people and trying to get their attention – all selling them on the fact that a plethora of products and services out there are all designed to meet people’s deepest needs. In the end all of that “stuff” is just fluff. The base need that every person has can only be fulfilled by connecting with Jesus – God – our creator.
Churches therefore need to passionately pour as much creativity as they possibly can into marketing themselves for the sake of changing people’s lives. Yes, there are many tools a church can use to market itself…but the best is resourcing people for representation. I agree with another statement Alan makes in his post:
“At Cedar Creek when we ask people, 95% of first time guests come because of a personal invitation.”
At the church I attend, LifeBridge, the number may not be as high as 95%, but it is definitely 80% or higher. The most effective church marketing campaign by far is one that equips people to invest in relationships with people in their sphere of influence and then personally invite those people to their church when the opportunity for an invitation presents itself. All the other church marketing initiatives simply support that main thrust. So, if you want to see your church grow and see people who are far from God experience a life-transforming encounter with God…equip the people who are already in your church to genuinely and passionately invite their friends. There is no substitute for this marketing plan…Jesus came up with the idea…I guess that would make him the best marketer of all time!
Tomorrow’s post will take the concept of Jesus as the Best Marketer of all time a little farther…
What do you think? What has been your expereince with churches competing with each other? Would you agree that Jesus was the best marketer of all time?
(photo via Flickr – Pixeltopia)
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