Faith and Web

According to a recent study “the most valuable brands in the world are experiencing a direct correlation between top financial performance and deep social media engagement.”

I wonder.  Is this also the case for churches, denominations and other religious organizations?  While we’re not Toyota, Dell, Amazon or even Starbucks (much as my congregation loves coffee and coffee hour), I can’t help but think if it’s true for corporations, it’s true for us too.  It might even be more so.  Religion is much more personal.

The study was done by two groups: Wetpaint,  a company I hadn’t heard of before, and Altimeter, the company of Charlene Li, co-author of Groundswell and one of the world’s most trusted voices on social media.

Here are some of the findings that leap out at me as particularly helpful and noteworthy for religious organizations.

• “Socially engaged companies are in fact more financially successful.”
• “Resembling any in-person exchange, socializing requires more than just being there — you have to interact with others, instigate discussions, and respond during conversations.”
• “As the number of channels increase, overall engagement increases at a faster rate.”

And here are a few of the lessons learned that might be of use to us.

• Deputize people throughout your organization.
• Centralize coordination.
• Be in it for the long haul.
• Engage in new channels where people already are.
• Be conversational from the start.

To learn more, see the study itself, ENGAGEMENTdb: Ranking the Top 100 Global Brands (a 34 page PDF) or visit the companion website, engagementdb.com.  If you are very brave, you can even take their  five-question survey and see how your institution compares to the very top brands.

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Consider this a cautionary tale.

On the surface, one of the simplest improvements to your church’s website is adding its institutional policies and procedures. It’s equally true that there are few time investments in your site more worthwhile. Why?

• Adherence to policies is easier to achieve when policies are readily available.
• On the Web, not only are they available, they become searchable.
• The webmasters don’t have to worry about content. Policies and procedures are already written.
• The audience is obvious. It’s church leaders.
• Ergo, it should be clear where in your site it resides, not only for those building the site, but also for those using it.
• In this era, church members often expect to find policies on the website.

A Culture Shift?
And yet, from an informal sample, many churches still don’t do this. My theory is that while it’s easy to include policies on a site from a technological standpoint, it represents a major cultural shift.

Bylaws, policies and procedures by their very nature represent tradition. After forms of worship, they seem to be the aspect of church life most bound by the we’ve-always-done-it-this-way mindset.

As soon as I got on the Board of my church (in the late 1990s), I started pushing for bylaws and policies to be added to our site. People were happy to oblige, especially when I was the secretary of the Board, but then we ran into upkeep. The bylaws changed, but I wasn’t on the Board, and no one thought to send them to our webmasters.

My next tactic was to request that inclusion on the website be required in the bylaws themselves. Once again all agreed this was a good thing. Thus five years ago Section 8.1.3 was updated to read: “A current and complete copy of all policies and procedures adopted by the Board shall be available from the Church office and on the Church website for reference by the general membership.” In earlier versions, as you might guess, they were only required to be in the church office, and you can imagine how few people had access to that.

At first, even with it mandated in the bylaws themselves, the webmasters still didn’t get the updated bylaws, let alone policies, without rattling cages. It was then I realized that cultural change was the issue.

Thus patience and persistence became key. At times I think these are the most important requirements for webmastery in a church. It’s not how much PHP or JavaScript or CSS that you know. It’s knowing what’s most needed and shepherding transition.

Now I’m happy to report that our culture has changed. After our most recent congregational meeting, I was not only sent a copy of the bylaws to post within 24 hours, but a few weeks later when I still hadn’t gotten to it, a Board member (Mr. Web Diva, as it happens) sent me a reminder.

And so it goes now with all of our policies. Even our most tech-resistant church leaders count on the web as a repository for policies.

If your church has not yet made this transition, I would encourage you to don the web shepherd’s mantle and ease them in this direction. The ROI is enormous.

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O brave new religious world. Today’s New York Times has a quick article on a few of the realities of congregations using Twitter and Facebook: Lead Us to Tweet, and Forgive the Trespassers.

Here’s a sampling:

• “The anxieties are different for every group. Some Muslim clerics have told followers to avoid making statements on social networking sites that antiterrorist investigators might misinterpret as suspicious.”
• “[S]ome in the clergy see a basic tension between the anonymous world of online life and the meaning of religious community.”
• “‘In Judaism, we believe that God resides in the community — among people in the same room at the same time, hearing each other’s voices and looking in each other’s eyes,’ said Rabbi Gerald C. Skolnik of the Forest Hills Jewish Center in Queens, who also wanted it known that he carries an iPhone and a laptop and is talking with his congregation about a Facebook page. ‘But can you tweet a minyan?’ he asked, referring to the quorum of 10 people required for most Jewish devotions. ‘I don’t think so.’”

It also mentions the Rev. Bill Reichart, a Presbyterian in Atlanta and an acknowledged leader in this area.  I googled a little, and sure enough, found his terrific blog that’s full of tips and insights for those of us interested in faith and the Web, particularly 2.0-inclined ministers: Ministry Best Practices. From a quick foray, here are a few of the posts I found.

• Why Should Your Church Invest in Social Media?
• Language Tools for Ministry.
• Fire Your Volunteers.

What fun it is to be back, exploring such delightful e-avenues.

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Friends,

I’m just back from my faith’s annual assembly.  It’s been a heady few days — and to my complete surprise my batteries for working on Faith and Web seem to have been recharged.  Of course, I’ll need to see if this stands the acid tests of time and competing priorities, but there are many, many things I am itching to talk about.

Here’s a sampling.

• Email newsletters vs. email marketing.
• How to harness the power of blogs for your church.
• What’s in analytics aside from a sea of numbers?
• What about this new kid on the block, Squarespace?
• And most of all, faith and the groundswell (a.k.a. the social web or Web 2.0).

So buckle your seatbelts, and send me suggestions.  I’m all ears.

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