Volunteering...It's Not Just Stuffing Envelopes Anymore - Ministry & Business Marketing, Media and Strategy Blog

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On to volunteering...

If your ministry is anything like most of the organizations I help, you need more volunteers. In fact, you'd love to have a few extra pairs of hands around, even if it's just for an hour a week.

But what is your volunteering strategy? How do you use volunteers? I bet if you stop to think about it, you could use more than just an army of envelope stuffers?

Whether you realize it or not, there's a new wave in volunteering, mirroring the recent seismic shifts in giving and ministry involvement. For those of you unaware, many donors are no longer content to simply write a check and pray for you. They want to be hands-on with the ministries they're passionate about and financially supporting...a very good change indeed.

And now even volunteers are looking to do more than help with the latest mailing or play part-time janitor. They want to volunteer strategically. That is, they want to give skilled time to your cause e.g., web design, plumbing, financial consulting, strategic planning, and more.

In response, ministry leaders need to prayerfully consider ways to use skilled labor to further the work God's called them to. Remember Paul's wonderful Spirit-led exhortation: "...we are to grow up in all aspects into Him who is the Head, even Christ, from whom the whole body, being fitted and held together by what every joint supplies, according to the proper working of each individual part, cause the growth of the body for the building up of itself in love," (Eph. 4:15a-16). Paul wrote other great stuff on the Spirit-led workings of the body of Christ in 1 Corinthians 12:11-27 and elsewhere.

Reality check: if ministries would put to Kingdom use the skilled labor of the people whom God has partnered with them, literally billions of dollars could be saved! You need to stop looking for people simply willing to do your grunt work and start praying and thinking about what your key needs are and who you know that might be able to fulfill them. (If you don't currently know somebody who can fill your needs, pray that God will gather those strategic volunteers to you.)

As you consider your needs and prayerfully recruit folks to meet them, be sure to design opportunities that are manageable for folks who presumably are seeking Christ wholeheartedly and therefore already time-committed to their personal walk with Him, their family, and their church. Practically-speaking, you should aim for skilled laborers to help you an hour a week. If they want to give more time than that, great! But don't lean on them until they break (or snap!).

Shameless plug alert! MinistryHour.com is a new free service that connects biblical ministries with Christian professionals willing to offer skilled service, starting with an hour a week (a ministry hour). Just fill out their simple form, which remains confidential, and MinistryHour will do its best to connect you either with a like-minded ministry with a need you can fill, or with a Christian professional willing to serve.

Churches and parachurch ministries must completely revolutionize their volunteering scheme and make it just as much a part of their strategy as prayer, leadership choices, and more. Volunteering...it's not just stuffing envelopes anymore.

Ministry Branding and New Distribution Opportunities for Your Ministry - Ministry & Business Marketing, Media and Strategy Blog

Check out this recent article covering The Daily Show with Jon Stewart offering all of their show archives online (eventually including all nine years of episodes). Now think about your ministry.

Even if you're not a Crown Financial Ministries, which offers many different broadcasts in a variety of formats, your mp3s and videos could get a second life on your website. Imagine folks being able to search your ministry audio/video by keyword, sermon title, date, guest, etc. This could open a tremendous new channel for ministry without your spending a dime on new content or technology.

Take it a step further.

Don't just list your ministry archives. Enable links to clips to be sent by email or (even better) text messaged to the friends, family, and ministry partners of your site visitors. And allow "contagious" site visitors to post your content to their own blogs and to tag your content with their own keywords. (Your web guy should know how to do this. If you're the web guy, just cruise Google for html code on blog links, etc.)

As The Daily Show marketing execs know well, hosting content on your site not only provides you with an easy distribution channel; it helps you brand your ministry. Unfortunately, a simple podcast stream on ITunes a ministry brand does not make. Neither does merely offering your ministry goodies on oneplace.com, no matter how great your content is.

Think back to Southwest Airlines' prescient decision to offer tickets exclusively on their website rather than on Expedia, Travelocity, and other online locales. The result was that the Southwest brand concept remained strong while the brand identities of Southwest's competitors melted into the faceless fare war inherent to travel websites. The lesson: don't depend on other venues to brand you; do it yourself.

It is critically important that we exercise shrewdness in our ministry branding, not over and against other biblical ministries, but so as to mazimize the profit of every opportunity God gives us, (see Matt. 10:16, Col. 4:5). Offering viral-friendly content on your site will allow you to efficiently extend your ministry brand and, in turn, effectively reach many more folks than simple outside distribution alone.

Soon I'll blog about how to best tap outside distribution opportunities, especially for parachurch ministries.

Quick Tips for Revamping Your Website - Ministry & Business Marketing, Media and Strategy Blog

As a business and ministry consultant, I spend a great deal of time scouring the net for good web design and so much more time fixing poorly fashioned websites. Unfortunately, most biz & min websites are dreadful, featuring obnoxious color schemes, too much text, tacky background art, and lots more. This in spite of the fact that 75% of people admit that they judge an organization by their website.

The good news is that simple fixes can make a world of difference. Whether your site should come with a warning label or only requires a simple face lift, you might consider the following:

1) Direct the reader's attention to the things you most care about. This doesn't mean flashing text or animated gifs. But you should use headline text and other simple means to highlight what matters most.

2) Pictures tell the story. Use them wisely. Think about your product offerings or ministry focus and highlight them through quality pics & graphics. Note: quality is absolutely essential. Blowing up your small, low-resolution pics will make you seem cheesy and clueless.

If you're focused on foreclosures and short sales, show visitors shots of the buying possibilities. If your church is focused on outreach, grab a shot of a team from the church sharing Christ.

3) Color. Wonderful Color. Whether you're the Monet of web design or you don't have a clue how to "paint" your website, you can create a look that's inviting not intimidating, warm not overbearing. One easy solution is to Google "Kuler." From there you can download a free desktop application that acts as a color wheel with great palettes from design professionals. Heck, I even use them!

4) No Manual Required. I hate installing ceiling fans; what should take ten minutes almost always takes an hour to figure out. Now think about your website.

Can visitors easily find contact info & products or service times & core beliefs? Why not? What about brief intros to your various offerings with links to dedicated pages for each?

Organize key information in an intuitive manner and keep it short and sweet.

5) Don't Steal. Be inspired. One of the best ways to become a great writer is to read incredible writing. The same is true of great web design. If you want your site to propel your biz or ministry, then check out the websites of businesses and non-profits that get it.

AM Design (www.amdesign.com) does amazing work. No, I don't work for them. No, you shouldn't simply "borrow" their designs. But I encourage you to use their work as inspiration for your own online offerings. A lot of their stuff is based in Flash and other programs you may not be able to afford and may require expertise you don't have, but you can still learn from their great design and think about what's achievable in your context.

This is the just the beginning. But following these tips will get you on the road to a visually-vibrant, user-friendly website. Remember, 75% of folks will judge you by your online home. A few simple fixes will help you pass the test.