The iChurch Method TV - Ep. 9 - How to Become an International Ministry

Continuing The iChurch Method TV series, here is the transcript from the video above.

You become an international ministry as soon as we flick the switch on your website, as soon as you set up the Facebook fan page, as soon as you set up your Twitter account. What ministries don’t realize is they may have, we’ll say 100, a couple hundred, or a couple thousand people that will come into their sanctuary. But, if you get one person that tunes in to your ministry, your website, your online stream, from India, from Europe, from Africa, that makes you an international ministry. Had you not utilized those technological tools, that person would not have been receiving the ministry from your church.

That’s the thing that ministries have to understand; as soon as you give people a way to connect with your ministry that are not in your regional or national area then you become an international ministry. Just those simple steps of setting up your website or setting up your social media channels, that makes you become an international ministry.

[You] have to realize that initially we start off and we only think in the box that we’re in. We think about only having our services in English. We think everybody is watching the service at the same time we would watch it, or we think people are connecting with the ministry at the same time we’re connecting with the ministry. A typical example would be a ministry might have office hours from 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Monday through Friday. Well, international time that may be midnight to 8:00 a.m., so they’re not connecting with your ministry at that time. They’re connecting with the ministry at the hours that they would like to.

So, when you have social media then you have to look at the fact that people want to connect with you 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. So, you just have to basically evolve your strategy to accommodate ministry at hours outside of what you’re used to, at times outside of what you’re used to, and in languages outside of what you’re used to.

Church Documents You Should Post on Your Website

Posting documents on your church website is relatively easy and doesn't cost anything, beyond the time and effort required to create them. You can create documents in any kind of software such as Microsoft Word and convert them to an Adobe PDF (Portable Document Format) file, which you can place on your server for linking to your site. You can generate directories, brochures, committee reports, meeting minutes or any other sort of document that you might otherwise provide in printed form, and allow members to print them out directly from your site. This will save quite a lot of money in printing costs as well as creating an added convenience for your parishioners.

Some documents you might consider making available on your church website are:

• Your church newsletter. Create it in Word, convert it to PDF, and you can email it to everyone who has subscribed, and then make it available in a Newsletter Archives page on your site; • Digital magazines are similar to newsletters, but tend to focus on a broader topic rather than specific church events; • E-books can be made available for download as PDFs, either for free or for a price via your Web store. This is particularly useful if your pastor has written a book that is already available as an e-book download through Amazon or some other site; you can also sell it in PDF format directly from your site; • Information about the various missionaries your church supports. You can provide biographical information, where they are working, contact information if appropriate, and use this information to get church members to pray for them and their success; • Committee reports, meeting minutes and any other sort of formal or informal notational material regarding church committees and working groups. This ensures that everyone feels connected to the work that the church is doing, and stays informed of current plans and goals; • Important contact information, for outreach centers, crisis hotline numbers, volunteer centers and such; • Forms, such as registration, sign-up sheets, and anything else you prefer the user fill out and physically return to the church rather than filling them in online.

Documents are the easiest of all the media to post on your website, with no added expense or hosting requirements.

For more information on this and other topics, get your copy of "The iChurch Method Volume 1: How to Advance Your Ministry Online." or The iChurch Method Volume 2: Changing the World When You Login or even sign up for the iChurch Method Online School.

Hawaiian Island Ministries Presentation Downloads

The iChurch Method TV - Ep. 8 - How to take a sermon and distribute it as digital content

Continuing my series on The iChurch Method and how it works, in this segment I speak on How to take a sermon and distribute it as digital content. Here is the transcript:

First thing I’m asking is if we have a way to get it recorded on video, because from video we can get video and audio. If we can then we try and look at that approach. But, say for instance we just can’t, then we look at taking that audio message and we’ll still let people tune in to it and archive it and watch it. We’ll create a page where they can listen to it during the week and we’ll also put a link right underneath so they can download it for a fee. We’ll also distribute that via podcast. If we start, say, putting a bumper on the front and end of it letting people know to come to the website or come visit the ministry then we can start distributing that content to a variety of outlets as opposed to just waiting for people to come to the website.

It’s good that people are coming to the website and they’re listening to the sermon but we also want to make sure we’re taking that ministry to the people and getting it out to the masses.

Get Your Ministry on TV…Internet TV

Over the last few years there has been a variety of stories on cutting the cable cord, rising costs of cable and the unnecessary bundles that cable offers. With streaming options such as Netflix, Amazon Instant Video and Hulu Plus, streaming video options are becoming more popular, especially among young people who don’t feel the need to own cable. Thus the question is how can your church take advantage of this viewing transformation, well, i’m glad you asked. Internet TV is a great solution for ministries because it removes the cost barrier that currently exists for traditional TV and the average church budget. The average church doesn’t have the budget to get on a national TV station or even the budget to produce a nationally televised broadcast, but that doesn’t mean that they don’t have a word that needs to be heard nationally. Instead of paying TBN (Trinity Broadcasting Network) $15,000 a week to broadcast a 30 minute show, a ministry can pay $250 a month to build a channel on Roku and broadcast 24/7/365.

In addition to Roku, Google TV has allowed ministries to build channels (apps) that can be installed and watched on television. Additionally, Google TV has a built in web browser (Google Chrome) that can be utilized to watch streaming services online. Later this year Apple TV is reportedly opening up it’s Apple TV software for apps, this would give churches yet another opportunity to establish a presence on people’s TVs and in our living rooms. Now the real opportunity lies in Microsoft’s Xbox. Xbox currently is leading the charge into the living room and ever since they started offering Internet TV options such as Netflix, Hulu TV, Amazon Video and ESPN Watch Now, there has been anticipation building as to when they would allow the masses to build channels for their hardware.

Overall, churches have a great opportunity to establish themselves in people’s living rooms for a fraction of the cost that are associated with traditional methods. As churches move from streaming videos on traditional websites to tablets to mobile devices to internet televisions, the impact and reach will continue to grow and reach the masses.

The iChurch Method TV - Ep. 7 - How to Identify and Distribute the Content of Your Church

Continuing my series on The iChurch Method and how it works, in this segment I speak on How to Identify and Distribute the Content of Your Church. Here is the transcript:

The first thing I talk to you about is content. I keep stressing content because I’ve dealt with some small ministries, whether it’s a bible study in a living room with ten people or a mega church with 20,000 people and the issue is always content. Where is your content coming from and how can we gather it all together and get ready to distribute it online?

Once we identify all that content and we’re looking at how often are you preaching; are we talking about bible study during the week, are we talking about a sermon on the weekend, do you have any other type of content that you want to get out that the church distributes regularly, which most often people think announcements or maybe some other events going on at the church. I need all that content and whatever else the pastor has done, books, devotionals, anything, and let’s talk about how we can distribute that online. Once we get that done then we start looking at the ways we distribute it online; social media, websites, mobile, multimedia. We start looking at stuff like that.

Then we start talking about the financial aspect and if you want to create an online store. We’re not talking about CDs and DVDs, let’s talk about digital products; that’s no overhead and it’s all profit. Let’s talk about online donations. If you don’t have that already, let’s set up a free PayPal account and start getting online donations. Let people support you and support the ministry from wherever they’re at and stop limiting them to supporting it only when they step inside the sanctuary.

The iChurch Method TV - The method behind the iChurch

Continuing my insight into how The iChurch Method can help ministries, I spoke about how the actual method came into existence.

Looking at these five aspects that I had, each chapter to me was something I actually would do in a typical week at work. In a typical week I’d work on the websites, multimedia, eCommerce, social media, and mobile. So, when I’m putting this book together I’m thinking, “What is it that I do that people would need to know from the most basic level all the way up to the most technologically advanced level?”

I want to make sure that if we have a pastor who’s not as technically savvy, he can look at the book and kind of understand and have a conversation and hand it off to someone who is technically savvy. But, what if the technology savvy person picks up the book? I want to make sure that this book challenges them as well and gives them new ideas and strategies so that they can utilize them within their ministry.

Five Aspects Website — First we need a website that’s interactive and innovative. You definitely need that because that’s the door to your ministry. Most churches don’t understand that the website is one of the most effective resources that the ministry has. A lot of people will go to your website before they’ll step foot inside your sanctuary.

Multimedia — That’s online streaming, online videos, and podcasting. When we look at the popularity of YouTube we see that video is the fastest growing form of content on the internet. We look as mobile as well; people are just consuming video via mobile just at alarming rates. So, you have to have a multimedia strategy.

eCommerce — eCommerce is your online donations and your online stores. Well, of course online donations make it easy for people to support the ministry financially from wherever they’re at. They don’t have to come into the sanctuary and do the typical old traditional way of putting tithes in the bucket or something like that. They can donate online and from their mobile device.

Social media — We know social media just transformed the way we use the internet. Everything is social now. Facebook has over a billion users that are signed up for it, and Twitter is continuously growing. So, social media has just transformed the way we use the internet and it gives ministries a way to reach people that may not ever step foot inside their building.

Mobile — There are over a billion mobile devices around the world. People carry around mobile devices everywhere they go, so that gives you an actual way to take ministry to the people. When your ministry is accessible via mobile device you now are accessible to this person wherever they’re at; 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

The iChurch Method at The Biola Digital Ministry Conference

Last year I attended a great gathering called the Biola Digital Ministry conference, this year I was invited to speak. I am looking forward to this engagement because not only is The iChurch Method a sponsor, but I have always had aspirations to attend Biola and/or be a professor there (online of course). I will be speaking from my two most recent releases, The iChurch Method vol. 2 (as well as The iChurch Method vol. 1) and How to Get One Million Social Media Fans. I look forward to enlightening and educating the attendees and leaving them inspired and motivated to go do great things for the kingdom.

Here are synopsis of my two sessions:

Session 1 The iChurch Method is a five part method that can help any church advance their ministry online and give them a global presence. Using Websites (Interactive and Responsive), Multimedia (Online Video and Streaming), Ecommerce (Online stores and donations), Social Media and Mobile (Apps and Websites), each and every church can develop an online strategy that can reach people all around the world and give them the capability to hear the gospel. This session will provide the strategies and explain the iChurch Method's approach to helping ministries advance online.

Session 2 Social Media has fundamentally changed the way we use the internet and this has opened up an amazing opportunity for the church. People are already looking for the solutions that the church has, the church just needs to meet them where they are, which is on social media. By focusing on a strategy of high quality visual content, a variety of sharing features, external social media advertising and establishing a presence on the top social networks, a ministry can build up an online audience that exceeds the number of seats in its sanctuary. This session will provide ways to take your social media to the next level and connect with millions of fans/followers/subscribers online.

Things Churches Should Post on Social Media Sites

The great thing about social media is that it's timely. Unlike websites, which may be updated once a week, social media sites are all about the here and now. Posts are made several times a day, as a minimum, and in many cases, social media sites provide literally up-to-the-minute updated information. While your older parishioners probably aren't all that interested in what's trending in social media, your younger members certainly are. Bring them into the fold with regular posts, tweets and updates about your church. Here are some examples of ministry content you should definitely post on your social media sites:

• Products - post hot products, sales and promotions going on at your online store;

• Pastoral/leadership updates - have your pastor and other leaders of your congregation post occasional status updates, which will serve to humanize them and make your church members feel more connected;

• Photographs - people love pictures! Appoint somebody in your staff to be an official photographer and give them a decent camera, so you're not posting low resolution cell phone pix. Get pictures at all your church activities, snapshots of new babies, new church members, staff acting crazy, graduations, weddings, christenings and any other opportunities you can find to share, share, share;

• Daily inspiration - send out a daily prayer, quotation, or other words of inspiration to give your members hope and encouragement;

• Video clips from church services, sermons, and other church activities - make sure you sit down and edit them so that you have a short, 1 - 3 minute clip to post. They can follow the link back to your website to view the whole video;

• Interactive polls - get people talking by asking provocative questions about their views on topical issues of a spiritual nature. This is a great way to get a dialogue started, and poll results can be calculated and also posted online;

• Weekly reminders - take advantage of social media to remind your congregation about time changes for services, church events, community outreach events and more.

Social media is a powerful tool for reaching out to your congregation, and staying in touch much the way a country pastor would make his way from house to house in the days of horses and wagons. Congregations are much larger now, schedules are hectic, and face to face communication is pretty well a thing of the past. Your congregation's needs have not changed, however. They still need encouragement, comforting, guidance and prayer. Social media offers a way for you to provide it to them.

For more information on this and other topics, get your copy of "The iChurch Method Volume 1: How to Advance Your Ministry Online." or The iChurch Method Volume 2: Changing the World When You Login or even sign up for the iChurch Method Online School.

Harness the Power of Audio in Your Church

With all of the wonderful technology available to us today, it's easy to get so caught up in videos and visual effects that we forget about the power of audio. While videotaping sermons and making them available as streaming video, on demand video downloads or even selling them through your Web store is a wonderful idea, don't forget about the potential for podcasts and CDs. Whether in conjunction with video and DVDs or on their own, podcasts of your sermons should be a regular part of your Web offerings. Even if you decide not to go with video and DVDs, recording your sermons requires the simplest technology, and audio files are small and much more easily uploaded and downloaded than video files.

There are times and places that audio files are much more appropriate, as well. Busy people who don't have time to sit down and watch a videotape of a whole sermon will listen to it instead while driving, especially during a long commute, while on a train or bus, while jogging or walking, at the gym, while doing laundry and many other times during their day. Audio sermons are great for multi-taskers!

Community Outreach for House Bound Members

You can also feature live streaming audio during your actual sermons, for parishioners who are ill at home or in the hospital. They can sit and listen to your sermon much as people once sat by their radios for live broadcasts. You don't need to limit your audio recordings to sermons, either. Since they are so easily made and virtually cost-free, consider having volunteers read bible passages, or portions of books, record church meetings, telephone interviews with missionaries and more.

These are all items that will not only let people catch up on what's going on in your church, but can provide a measure of solace for home-bound parishioners, so that they can feel as though they are actually there at the church. Consider using them as outreach, for retirement communities and convalescent homes, where your flock might be possessed of willing hearts but failing bodies.

Never underestimate the power of the spoken word. With today's technology, it can be used to reach out to the whole world, easily and inexpensively!

For more information on this and other topics, get your copy of "The iChurch Method Volume 1: How to Advance Your Ministry Online." or The iChurch Method Volume 2: Changing the World When You Login or even sign up for the iChurch Method Online School.

The iChurch Method in Dubai

About two years ago, June 2011, I came to my wife and told her I had an idea about a book I wanted to write. It was a book on how churches could better understand and utilize technology. Fast forward to May 2013 and next week I am headed to Dubai, U.A.E. to speak at a conference on The iChurch Method and how it can help ministries advance online. I am very excited and look forward to helping this international audience learn the benefits of The iChurch Method. The conference is May 15 - 19, 2013. http://gain.adventist.org

Why is Social Media Important for Churches?

Never before has the world been so interconnected. Events that happen in the world can ricochet around the globe almost instantaneously. News, videos, quotes and photos go viral and are shared via social media sites like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube all around the planet. Governments have literally been toppled by people communicating through social networking sites. Why not take advantage of this new technology to spread your message?

Consider how it works. Your church has a Facebook page, and you encourage your followers to visit regularly to catch up on what's new at your ministry. Facebook is extremely interactive, so visitors can comment on your posts, which is a great opportunity to receive feedback. They can also choose to "share" your posts, effectively reposting them to their own pages, which are then viewed by all of their "friends". If one of their friends likes your post, he or she can also choose to share it, and now it will be viewed by a whole other group of people.

Reach Thousands of People - or More It is not uncommon for avid Facebook participants to have hundreds of friends; all who view posts and shared items, and can repost or share them on their own sites, to be viewed by their hundreds of friends. You can see how quickly something can spread. Post a meaningful quote, photograph or bit of news and it will likely be shared.

Twitter works in a similar manner, but whereas people generally check in with Facebook once or twice a day, Twitter users are constantly reading and sending "tweets." Tweets are short messages, limited to 140 characters, and quite short-lived. You only need to post on Facebook once or twice a day, but to get your message out on Twitter, you should send your tweet out at least five or six times a day.

It's All About the Access When it's so difficult to call up a commercial organization these days and actually get to speak with a human being, people appreciate the direct access they get through social media. They can comment on your posts, and you can read their comments and respond. This give and take is perhaps one of the strongest reasons that people visit social media pages run by large commercial or not for profit organizations.

And even though you're only responding to one individual, hundreds or even thousands of people may be reading your response. What an opportunity!

For more information on this and other topics, get your copy of "The iChurch Method Volume 1: How to Advance Your Ministry Online." or The iChurch Method Volume 2: Changing the World When You Login or even sign up for the iChurch Method Online School.

The iChurch Method TV – Ep. 4 – A Recap of early usage of The iChurch Method

Continuing The iChurch Method TV series, here is the transcript from the video above, in this episode I am discussing a recap of the first time I applied The iChurch Method to a church. I was asked to revamp a church's entire online presence and I started to put together the basics of what would become The iChurch Method.

Day one, my objective was to figure out what was going on within the ministry in terms of where they were technically. When I started looking at some of the things that were going on, I saw just some of the basic things. They had a website but there were some things that just weren’t working. They were having issues with their online store and they were having issues with donations. They were generating a lot of money via online donations but the process was no as seamless as it could be. Basically I just looked at everything they were doing and I started dissecting it and figuring out how we could make this easier, better, and faster.

I put together a plan and I said, “Here’s where you guys are at,” and I made a real simple streamlined map of what was going on currently and where people were getting lost in the process. Then I said, “Here’s where it could be,” and I started showing them new things that we could do to make this process much simpler. In addition I also had to show them here’s the software that can actually make it happen. “We need a new website and here’s the software we can do that with. We need a new online store; here’s the software. We need an easier process to do online donations and here’s the software to do that.” Basically, that made it so easy for them to understand and see that eventually they allowed me to continue on with the other things I talk about, social media and mobile, just because I showed them that I actually knew how I could make this process easy for them.

The iChurch Method Vol. 2 is now available

http://youtu.be/Stpi_4aXcPI

In this book we’re just basically building upon The iChurch Method Volume One. We’re taking every chapter to another level.

This book talks about how to take your website to another level, how to develop a good content strategy, how to utilize more up-to-date and current technological tools to build your website.

With multimedia we're looking at taking that to the next level, the whole entire internet church campus. Let's bring all the online video and the streaming into one coherent campus so that people can come interact with your ministry online.

With eCommerce we're looking at how you make more effective, more secure, and more streamlined online donation modules. How do you have a better and more effective online store.

With social media we're looking at the advancements and the rise of visual social media and how to utilize that with Facebook timeline, Pinterest, and Instagram. Social media is going entirely visual so we want to make sure that we address that.

Then we're looking mobile. In the last book we talked about mobile websites, it's time to talk about mobile apps and how to utilize those and tablets and all these new mobile devices that are coming down the line.

So, in this book we just want to help ministries take their ministry to another level online and continue to stay ahead of the technology trend.

Click Here to Get Your Copy today

The Importance of User Interaction for Your Church Website

Why is user interaction so important when building a website for your church or ministry? User interaction is a tool to get visitors to your site to explore, to delve more deeply into the various pages and features. User interaction turns your site from a one-dimensional newsletter into a three-dimensional world, where they can virtually come inside your church and take a look around. Some interactive features you should consider adding to your site are: • I am New button, that takes new visitors to special introductory content to familiarize them with your ministry; • Watch Now button, so visitors can see streaming video of a live sermon, or listen to a live audio broadcast of a sermon, church meeting or anything else that may be going on; • Multimedia section, so that interested viewers can go directly to your multimedia page and see the latest postings; • Self Help section, for visitors who are in need of spiritual guidance to go directly to useful content that will help them with their current difficulties; • Web store button, to take visitors directly to your online store, where they can purchase DVDs, CDs, downloads and more.

Other ways to get visitors to interact with your website are to include things like:

• Online registration forms, for church events and activities; • Online ministry forms, which will save your church printing costs when members print them out themselves, fill them out and return them; • Online donations modules, where visitors can donate via credit card or their PayPal account; • Online events calendar, where visitors can check times and days for mass, Sunday school, bible study, church events and more; • Online prayer requests, to allow visitors to submit prayers for the ministry, causing them to feel more connected.

Your church is a House of God, and as such, your website should also be a virtual House of God, where visitors can come inside and see everything that your ministry has to offer. User interaction features make that possible, and encourage visitors to become part of your congregation. A visitor who has had an opportunity to take a long walk through your website is more likely to come and visit your church in person.

For more information on this and other topics, get your copy of "The iChurch Method Volume 1: How to Advance Your Ministry Online." or The iChurch Method Volume 2: Changing the World When You Login or even sign up for the iChurch Method Online School.

The iChurch Method TV - Ep. 2 - Social Media usage by Pastors

Continuing The iChurch Method TV series, here is the transcript from the video above.

A lot of churches are basically personality driven. A lot of the churches that I’ve dealt with are personality driven; the pastor is the face of the ministry. So, I let them know that 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, if you decide you want to be accessible via Twitter then also understand that your life is going to be one continual show for people that want access and availability for you. Once they get that, they understand that there are things that they want to let people in on in their lives and there are times when they just have to disconnect from social media.

So, I want them to be social and understand that it’s not just a one-way street where they’re constantly broadcasting to people and talking at people not responding, but they also have to understand there are limitations to social media and how much access they give people to their lives.

Let’s say the pastor decided they didn’t want to be accessible via social media because they don’t want stuff like that. The conversation is going to happen whether they participate or not. So, as you stated earlier where people are outside with their phones recording and taking snapshots, they’re going to have the conversation about you. Some pastors have PR people and some pastors can be genuinely truthful and speak about the situation and kind of guide that conversation, some pastors will just try and disconnect and hope the conversation will go away, but it won’t. So, it’s better that they can help address that and give some truth to the situation, otherwise the internet will create its own truth, and you don’t want that.

2013 Pastors and Leadership Conference

This Year, I will be teaching at the 2013 Pastors and Leadership Conference. The topics that I will be teaching are Social Media for Ministry (Beginners and Intermediate) and How to Advance Your Ministry Online. At this conference I will be releasing quite a few new products and services. First and foremost, The iChurch Method Vol 2: Changing the World When You Login will be released and on sale. Additionally, I will talk about my new online training course based on The iChurch Method and finally, I will release a surprise product that I have been working on for the last 6 - 9 months. http://youtu.be/GV9iu-5Uawk

Join me in Dallas at the 2013 Pastors and Leadership Conference at the Dallas Convention Center, April 25 - 27, 2013. Me and my amazing web team from TD Jakes Ministries will be teaching on Thursday at 3pm and Friday at 10am and 1:30pm. Register TODAY

The iChurch Method TV - Ep 1 - Where did The iChurch Method Come From?

Continuing The iChurch Method TV series, here is the transcript from the video above.

This idea came from when I was out working at [unnamed church] and they decided to let me know that they needed me to revamp the entire online presence. So, I looked at five key areas that I thought could really help them out; those were websites, multimedia, eCommerce, social media, and mobile. I started to notice that these five areas were not only key to them but were key to any type of ministry.

When I transitioned from that ministry out to Dallas, I implemented this method and I saw enormous results and then I realized that I might actually have something here. So, with those five key areas I put it all together in a book and that’s what we’re talking about here today. I would advise that initially once you purchase the book and start reading through it and get familiar with it, then you start looking for probably two to three people. First I would look for somebody like a volunteer or somebody you trust to do social media. If not, then get versed in social media yourself.

Secondly, you need to look at somebody who is a web developer. Again, the iChurch Method gives you the strategies that a web developer should use so that you can have a coherent conversation with the technically savvy person and not let them take advantage of you.

The third person I would look for would be some type of financial person or something like that because you’re going to have to look at online donations and possibly setting up an online store and you want to make sure that your finances are well taken care of. This may be the pastor himself or maybe an accountant or something. But, when you start generating finances for nonprofits then we get into a whole other arena that needs to be addressed legally as well as technically. So, those are the people I would start off with.

[After reading the book] you should be able to understand how to effectively advance your ministry online. You should be able to know how to set up a digital ministry. If you desire, you can go and do it yourself. But, if you do not then you’ll be able to have a good conversation and identify the people who can go and do this for you.