There are two approaches to making a church site.  The first is to make a church site that does not require up-to-date information.  It will have information for newcomers; information about the church, directions, service times, and even a few upcoming events.  

     The other approach is to have a dynamic site, where one's congregation and others would visit often.  In this case, there must be something worthwhile that draws your congregation back regularly.  This approach requires more labor from the webmaster but may be very rewarding.  In addition to church information, these sites may have "active" forums, recent pictures from events, and last week's sermon audio.  Dynamic content is very attractive and useful.  Streaming audio content is very popular.  Whatever approach you take, don’t strive to do something in the middle.  A site with 2 prayer requests from 1998 in the member forum will repel visitors!

     No matter which approach you take, your site will need promotion.  You can promote your site among church members by giving out email addresses @yourdomain.com, announcing your website in church bulletins, and maintaining an email newsletter.  For churches striving to reach a large audience, the most important promotion is search engine submission.  There are over 200 different Christian search engines that may drive your traffic up.  While secular search engines will recognize websites that have valuable content, meta tags, which give a summary of your site to search engines, may improve your site rankings.

      Please see this page for links to meta tags generators, different search engines, and streaming audio tutorials.

      Remember, your work is not wasted!  Go and change the world and store your treasures in heaven!

Written by Peter J. Louie