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Top 10 Effective Church Communication Software - Tips & Tools

Top 10 Effective Church Communication Software - Tips & Tools

Explore the most effective church communication software and practical tips to help your team reach the right people, streamline collaboration, and share ministry messages with clarity and impact.

Top 10 Effective Church Communication Software - Tips & Tools
Category
Church Tech
Publish date
August 14, 2023
Author
Robert Carnes
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CHURCH TECH PODCAST
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Top 10 Effective Church Communication Software - Tips & Tools

Your church has a great deal to communicate—ministry updates, upcoming events, volunteer opportunities, and community announcements. All of these things and more must be communicated both externally and internally. 

The challenge is reaching the right people with the right message on the right channel. Thankfully, technology gives church leaders plenty of options for tools to choose from. Here’s an overview of the types of tools you’ll need and some tricks for maximizing their effectiveness.

1. Office Suite

Regardless of the size of your church’s team, your staff needs an internal suite of tools to do their work. At a minimum, this includes an email inbox, a calendar, and collaborative documents. 

This is a few of the most basic applications bundled together into a single environment. Many of these suites will have tools that cover some of the other categories below, including video, chat, files, and note-taking.

Office Suite Tool Options

2. Chat

Sometimes you need to get a quick answer from someone. Or you don’t want to bother them with an email or text message. That’s why chat tools like Slack are so helpful—they cut down on cluttered inboxes and speed up collaborations.

The key here is to distinguish between messages that should be shared in a chat vs. an email vs. a meeting. Don’t let your people get confused about which channel to use. Chat is better for quick check-ins and email is often preferable for longer communications that need to be documented.

Chat Tool options

3. File Sharing

No matter what kind of projects you’re working on at your church, you need a place to save and share files across your team. That could be everything from text documents, images, videos, and beyond. This requires a multi-user file-sharing system.

Be sure to share one single system across your entire team including volunteers. Then work hard to keep your files updated, clearly labeled, and organized into folders. This cuts down on time trying to find the right file, or losing a file and having to start over again.

File Tool options

4. Project Management

Running a church requires many moving parts and countless tasks that need to be accomplished. This doesn’t happen by accident, and won’t be efficient without a clear system. That’s where a project/task management tool comes in.

The beauty of any project management tool is begin able to assign projects to people and set deadlines. This keeps people accountable and every project moving forward on time. Just ensure that everyone is bought into the tool and checks in on their tasks regularly.

Project Tool options

5. Video Chat

More church teams embraced remote work since the pandemic. Many church functions still require a physical presence. However, offering a virtual option makes things accessible to more people. So you need to have a video chat tool.

Most of these tools are similar to one another, and many come standard in office suites. There will always be technical difficulties with cameras and dropped calls. But having a universal tool that works with your calendar function is essential to scheduling online meetings.

Video Tool options

6. Worship Planning

Unique to churches compared to other organizations is the need to plan for Sunday morning worship. This includes everything from planning worship songs, selecting Scripture verses, managing sermon series, and handling church announcements.

There’s a smaller range of tool options because they’re all specifically designed for churches. However, this can also be an advantage because it means each has the features you’ll need. The trick is finding a tool that integrates with your existing systems and has a good user interface.

Worship Planning options

7. People Database

The church is not a building, nor is it the church’s staff. A church is made up of people—those members of your community who come to worship, volunteer, and donate. Having a record of these people and their interactions with your congregation is virtual to effective ministry.

Like worship planning software, these databases are usually created specifically for churches. In the business world, these are known as Customer Relationship Managers (CRMs)—a single database with contact information and tracking different engagements over time. The most challenging part of this is keeping the records updated, which is why this is sometimes a full-time dedicated position within the church.

Database Tool options

8. Social Media Managament

If you hope to communicate with an external audience, social media is an obvious place to start. This can include a wide range of channels—including Facebook, Instagram, and beyond. But rather than managing each of these networks separately, you can find a tool that streamlines your efforts.

Using a social media management tool allows you to schedule posts on multiple channels, manage user engagements, see analytics, and communicate internally with your team.  If you’re serious about using social media at your church, having a management tool is a major boost.

Social Media Tool options

9. Email Marketing

Email marketing is different from individual email communications. But both are equally as important. Individual emails are sent specifically to a few people. Email marketing refers to wider emails sent to a list of people using a mass email tool. Don’t try to email the entire church from your personal Outlook or Gmail account.

Choosing the right email marketing platform requires a connection with your people database. These two systems must communicate with each other to make sure your email list is updated. You need to send the right emails to the right people.

Email Tool options

10. Text Messaging

Not everyone communicates frequently using email or social media. However, text messages are a reliable and consistent way to reach people directly in their pockets. Like email marketing, this shouldn’t come from your personal cell phone, but rather an official management tool.

Be careful about overdoing it with text messages. People are more willing to give up their email than they are their cell phone number. Sending too many texts from the church can cause them to unsubscribe and miss out on future messages.

Text Tool options

Use a ChMS to Reach Your Congregation

The science of cultivating the spiritual life of your church revolves around the tools and resources you use to communicate.

One of the best tools to easily keep in touch with your church members and communicate with them is church management software (ChMS).

In no particular order, here are five great ways church management software helps you stay in touch with your church.

Mass communication

With Tithe.ly Church Management, you can access your church members' contact information and communicate with multiple people via email, SMS, or printed letters.

To save yourself time, you can also create templates for emails or letters your regularly send out.  

Keep track of families

Need to update the contact information for a family?

Making contacting parents and guardians easy, as well as generate reports, by linking everyone together in your database.

Find who you forgot

Can't quite remember someone's name? Need to find specific people for a new project? 

With Tithe.ly Church Management, you can specify what people group you’d like to find. You can also search for people based on their gender, location, or customized criteria you create.  

Know who's active or inactive

Do you need help knowing who's active or inactive in your church? 

Have you observed a few families absent from your worship services for a few weeks? 

With church management software, you can create categories to help you distinguish between different people groups in your church—e.g., active members, first-time guests, or inactive people.

Know what else?

You can add custom fields to store additional information, such as allergies, interests, or other relevant info.

Stay up-to-date with everyone

Helping first-time guests get involved with your church is crucial for their spiritual development.

To help visitors get more involved with your church, you can create and track different processes in your church with step-by-step flows. For example, you can create a process from welcoming a first-time guest to leading them toward participating in a small group or Bible Study.

Keep notes

In addition to these features, church management software helps you to keep personal notes on all your members, have an updated member directory, and track people via check-ins. This not only records event attendance. But it also ensures that parents know their children’s whereabouts at all times.

‍

Which digital communication tools do you need?

That’s a lot of different church communication tools serving a wide range of functions. But don’t be overwhelmed. You’re likely using a few of these tools already—either personally, professionally, or both. So these shouldn’t be unfamiliar to you or your congregation.

It can take a while to find the right tools and build up your communication stack. Start one tool at a time and grow from there. Get input from your staff on what they prefer and collaborate on the decision. Onboarding a new tool takes time but saves you time in the long run.

Keep in mind that many of these tools have significant nonprofit discounts that apply to churches like yours. Even if the cost of the tool seems too much, you may be able to save just by being a ministry. It never hurts to check.

‍

AUTHOR
Robert Carnes

Robert Carnes is a writer and storyteller. He's the author of The Original Storyteller: Become a Better Storyteller in 30 Days. A former church communicator and nonprofit marketer, Robert works as a managing editor for Orange in Atlanta.

Top 10 Effective Church Communication Software - Tips & Tools

Your church has a great deal to communicate—ministry updates, upcoming events, volunteer opportunities, and community announcements. All of these things and more must be communicated both externally and internally. 

The challenge is reaching the right people with the right message on the right channel. Thankfully, technology gives church leaders plenty of options for tools to choose from. Here’s an overview of the types of tools you’ll need and some tricks for maximizing their effectiveness.

1. Office Suite

Regardless of the size of your church’s team, your staff needs an internal suite of tools to do their work. At a minimum, this includes an email inbox, a calendar, and collaborative documents. 

This is a few of the most basic applications bundled together into a single environment. Many of these suites will have tools that cover some of the other categories below, including video, chat, files, and note-taking.

Office Suite Tool Options

2. Chat

Sometimes you need to get a quick answer from someone. Or you don’t want to bother them with an email or text message. That’s why chat tools like Slack are so helpful—they cut down on cluttered inboxes and speed up collaborations.

The key here is to distinguish between messages that should be shared in a chat vs. an email vs. a meeting. Don’t let your people get confused about which channel to use. Chat is better for quick check-ins and email is often preferable for longer communications that need to be documented.

Chat Tool options

3. File Sharing

No matter what kind of projects you’re working on at your church, you need a place to save and share files across your team. That could be everything from text documents, images, videos, and beyond. This requires a multi-user file-sharing system.

Be sure to share one single system across your entire team including volunteers. Then work hard to keep your files updated, clearly labeled, and organized into folders. This cuts down on time trying to find the right file, or losing a file and having to start over again.

File Tool options

4. Project Management

Running a church requires many moving parts and countless tasks that need to be accomplished. This doesn’t happen by accident, and won’t be efficient without a clear system. That’s where a project/task management tool comes in.

The beauty of any project management tool is begin able to assign projects to people and set deadlines. This keeps people accountable and every project moving forward on time. Just ensure that everyone is bought into the tool and checks in on their tasks regularly.

Project Tool options

5. Video Chat

More church teams embraced remote work since the pandemic. Many church functions still require a physical presence. However, offering a virtual option makes things accessible to more people. So you need to have a video chat tool.

Most of these tools are similar to one another, and many come standard in office suites. There will always be technical difficulties with cameras and dropped calls. But having a universal tool that works with your calendar function is essential to scheduling online meetings.

Video Tool options

6. Worship Planning

Unique to churches compared to other organizations is the need to plan for Sunday morning worship. This includes everything from planning worship songs, selecting Scripture verses, managing sermon series, and handling church announcements.

There’s a smaller range of tool options because they’re all specifically designed for churches. However, this can also be an advantage because it means each has the features you’ll need. The trick is finding a tool that integrates with your existing systems and has a good user interface.

Worship Planning options

7. People Database

The church is not a building, nor is it the church’s staff. A church is made up of people—those members of your community who come to worship, volunteer, and donate. Having a record of these people and their interactions with your congregation is virtual to effective ministry.

Like worship planning software, these databases are usually created specifically for churches. In the business world, these are known as Customer Relationship Managers (CRMs)—a single database with contact information and tracking different engagements over time. The most challenging part of this is keeping the records updated, which is why this is sometimes a full-time dedicated position within the church.

Database Tool options

8. Social Media Managament

If you hope to communicate with an external audience, social media is an obvious place to start. This can include a wide range of channels—including Facebook, Instagram, and beyond. But rather than managing each of these networks separately, you can find a tool that streamlines your efforts.

Using a social media management tool allows you to schedule posts on multiple channels, manage user engagements, see analytics, and communicate internally with your team.  If you’re serious about using social media at your church, having a management tool is a major boost.

Social Media Tool options

9. Email Marketing

Email marketing is different from individual email communications. But both are equally as important. Individual emails are sent specifically to a few people. Email marketing refers to wider emails sent to a list of people using a mass email tool. Don’t try to email the entire church from your personal Outlook or Gmail account.

Choosing the right email marketing platform requires a connection with your people database. These two systems must communicate with each other to make sure your email list is updated. You need to send the right emails to the right people.

Email Tool options

10. Text Messaging

Not everyone communicates frequently using email or social media. However, text messages are a reliable and consistent way to reach people directly in their pockets. Like email marketing, this shouldn’t come from your personal cell phone, but rather an official management tool.

Be careful about overdoing it with text messages. People are more willing to give up their email than they are their cell phone number. Sending too many texts from the church can cause them to unsubscribe and miss out on future messages.

Text Tool options

Use a ChMS to Reach Your Congregation

The science of cultivating the spiritual life of your church revolves around the tools and resources you use to communicate.

One of the best tools to easily keep in touch with your church members and communicate with them is church management software (ChMS).

In no particular order, here are five great ways church management software helps you stay in touch with your church.

Mass communication

With Tithe.ly Church Management, you can access your church members' contact information and communicate with multiple people via email, SMS, or printed letters.

To save yourself time, you can also create templates for emails or letters your regularly send out.  

Keep track of families

Need to update the contact information for a family?

Making contacting parents and guardians easy, as well as generate reports, by linking everyone together in your database.

Find who you forgot

Can't quite remember someone's name? Need to find specific people for a new project? 

With Tithe.ly Church Management, you can specify what people group you’d like to find. You can also search for people based on their gender, location, or customized criteria you create.  

Know who's active or inactive

Do you need help knowing who's active or inactive in your church? 

Have you observed a few families absent from your worship services for a few weeks? 

With church management software, you can create categories to help you distinguish between different people groups in your church—e.g., active members, first-time guests, or inactive people.

Know what else?

You can add custom fields to store additional information, such as allergies, interests, or other relevant info.

Stay up-to-date with everyone

Helping first-time guests get involved with your church is crucial for their spiritual development.

To help visitors get more involved with your church, you can create and track different processes in your church with step-by-step flows. For example, you can create a process from welcoming a first-time guest to leading them toward participating in a small group or Bible Study.

Keep notes

In addition to these features, church management software helps you to keep personal notes on all your members, have an updated member directory, and track people via check-ins. This not only records event attendance. But it also ensures that parents know their children’s whereabouts at all times.

‍

Which digital communication tools do you need?

That’s a lot of different church communication tools serving a wide range of functions. But don’t be overwhelmed. You’re likely using a few of these tools already—either personally, professionally, or both. So these shouldn’t be unfamiliar to you or your congregation.

It can take a while to find the right tools and build up your communication stack. Start one tool at a time and grow from there. Get input from your staff on what they prefer and collaborate on the decision. Onboarding a new tool takes time but saves you time in the long run.

Keep in mind that many of these tools have significant nonprofit discounts that apply to churches like yours. Even if the cost of the tool seems too much, you may be able to save just by being a ministry. It never hurts to check.

‍

podcast transcript

(Scroll for more)
AUTHOR
Robert Carnes

Robert Carnes is a writer and storyteller. He's the author of The Original Storyteller: Become a Better Storyteller in 30 Days. A former church communicator and nonprofit marketer, Robert works as a managing editor for Orange in Atlanta.

Top 10 Effective Church Communication Software - Tips & Tools

Your church has a great deal to communicate—ministry updates, upcoming events, volunteer opportunities, and community announcements. All of these things and more must be communicated both externally and internally. 

The challenge is reaching the right people with the right message on the right channel. Thankfully, technology gives church leaders plenty of options for tools to choose from. Here’s an overview of the types of tools you’ll need and some tricks for maximizing their effectiveness.

1. Office Suite

Regardless of the size of your church’s team, your staff needs an internal suite of tools to do their work. At a minimum, this includes an email inbox, a calendar, and collaborative documents. 

This is a few of the most basic applications bundled together into a single environment. Many of these suites will have tools that cover some of the other categories below, including video, chat, files, and note-taking.

Office Suite Tool Options

2. Chat

Sometimes you need to get a quick answer from someone. Or you don’t want to bother them with an email or text message. That’s why chat tools like Slack are so helpful—they cut down on cluttered inboxes and speed up collaborations.

The key here is to distinguish between messages that should be shared in a chat vs. an email vs. a meeting. Don’t let your people get confused about which channel to use. Chat is better for quick check-ins and email is often preferable for longer communications that need to be documented.

Chat Tool options

3. File Sharing

No matter what kind of projects you’re working on at your church, you need a place to save and share files across your team. That could be everything from text documents, images, videos, and beyond. This requires a multi-user file-sharing system.

Be sure to share one single system across your entire team including volunteers. Then work hard to keep your files updated, clearly labeled, and organized into folders. This cuts down on time trying to find the right file, or losing a file and having to start over again.

File Tool options

4. Project Management

Running a church requires many moving parts and countless tasks that need to be accomplished. This doesn’t happen by accident, and won’t be efficient without a clear system. That’s where a project/task management tool comes in.

The beauty of any project management tool is begin able to assign projects to people and set deadlines. This keeps people accountable and every project moving forward on time. Just ensure that everyone is bought into the tool and checks in on their tasks regularly.

Project Tool options

5. Video Chat

More church teams embraced remote work since the pandemic. Many church functions still require a physical presence. However, offering a virtual option makes things accessible to more people. So you need to have a video chat tool.

Most of these tools are similar to one another, and many come standard in office suites. There will always be technical difficulties with cameras and dropped calls. But having a universal tool that works with your calendar function is essential to scheduling online meetings.

Video Tool options

6. Worship Planning

Unique to churches compared to other organizations is the need to plan for Sunday morning worship. This includes everything from planning worship songs, selecting Scripture verses, managing sermon series, and handling church announcements.

There’s a smaller range of tool options because they’re all specifically designed for churches. However, this can also be an advantage because it means each has the features you’ll need. The trick is finding a tool that integrates with your existing systems and has a good user interface.

Worship Planning options

7. People Database

The church is not a building, nor is it the church’s staff. A church is made up of people—those members of your community who come to worship, volunteer, and donate. Having a record of these people and their interactions with your congregation is virtual to effective ministry.

Like worship planning software, these databases are usually created specifically for churches. In the business world, these are known as Customer Relationship Managers (CRMs)—a single database with contact information and tracking different engagements over time. The most challenging part of this is keeping the records updated, which is why this is sometimes a full-time dedicated position within the church.

Database Tool options

8. Social Media Managament

If you hope to communicate with an external audience, social media is an obvious place to start. This can include a wide range of channels—including Facebook, Instagram, and beyond. But rather than managing each of these networks separately, you can find a tool that streamlines your efforts.

Using a social media management tool allows you to schedule posts on multiple channels, manage user engagements, see analytics, and communicate internally with your team.  If you’re serious about using social media at your church, having a management tool is a major boost.

Social Media Tool options

9. Email Marketing

Email marketing is different from individual email communications. But both are equally as important. Individual emails are sent specifically to a few people. Email marketing refers to wider emails sent to a list of people using a mass email tool. Don’t try to email the entire church from your personal Outlook or Gmail account.

Choosing the right email marketing platform requires a connection with your people database. These two systems must communicate with each other to make sure your email list is updated. You need to send the right emails to the right people.

Email Tool options

10. Text Messaging

Not everyone communicates frequently using email or social media. However, text messages are a reliable and consistent way to reach people directly in their pockets. Like email marketing, this shouldn’t come from your personal cell phone, but rather an official management tool.

Be careful about overdoing it with text messages. People are more willing to give up their email than they are their cell phone number. Sending too many texts from the church can cause them to unsubscribe and miss out on future messages.

Text Tool options

Use a ChMS to Reach Your Congregation

The science of cultivating the spiritual life of your church revolves around the tools and resources you use to communicate.

One of the best tools to easily keep in touch with your church members and communicate with them is church management software (ChMS).

In no particular order, here are five great ways church management software helps you stay in touch with your church.

Mass communication

With Tithe.ly Church Management, you can access your church members' contact information and communicate with multiple people via email, SMS, or printed letters.

To save yourself time, you can also create templates for emails or letters your regularly send out.  

Keep track of families

Need to update the contact information for a family?

Making contacting parents and guardians easy, as well as generate reports, by linking everyone together in your database.

Find who you forgot

Can't quite remember someone's name? Need to find specific people for a new project? 

With Tithe.ly Church Management, you can specify what people group you’d like to find. You can also search for people based on their gender, location, or customized criteria you create.  

Know who's active or inactive

Do you need help knowing who's active or inactive in your church? 

Have you observed a few families absent from your worship services for a few weeks? 

With church management software, you can create categories to help you distinguish between different people groups in your church—e.g., active members, first-time guests, or inactive people.

Know what else?

You can add custom fields to store additional information, such as allergies, interests, or other relevant info.

Stay up-to-date with everyone

Helping first-time guests get involved with your church is crucial for their spiritual development.

To help visitors get more involved with your church, you can create and track different processes in your church with step-by-step flows. For example, you can create a process from welcoming a first-time guest to leading them toward participating in a small group or Bible Study.

Keep notes

In addition to these features, church management software helps you to keep personal notes on all your members, have an updated member directory, and track people via check-ins. This not only records event attendance. But it also ensures that parents know their children’s whereabouts at all times.

‍

Which digital communication tools do you need?

That’s a lot of different church communication tools serving a wide range of functions. But don’t be overwhelmed. You’re likely using a few of these tools already—either personally, professionally, or both. So these shouldn’t be unfamiliar to you or your congregation.

It can take a while to find the right tools and build up your communication stack. Start one tool at a time and grow from there. Get input from your staff on what they prefer and collaborate on the decision. Onboarding a new tool takes time but saves you time in the long run.

Keep in mind that many of these tools have significant nonprofit discounts that apply to churches like yours. Even if the cost of the tool seems too much, you may be able to save just by being a ministry. It never hurts to check.

‍

VIDEO transcript

(Scroll for more)

Top 10 Effective Church Communication Software - Tips & Tools

Your church has a great deal to communicate—ministry updates, upcoming events, volunteer opportunities, and community announcements. All of these things and more must be communicated both externally and internally. 

The challenge is reaching the right people with the right message on the right channel. Thankfully, technology gives church leaders plenty of options for tools to choose from. Here’s an overview of the types of tools you’ll need and some tricks for maximizing their effectiveness.

1. Office Suite

Regardless of the size of your church’s team, your staff needs an internal suite of tools to do their work. At a minimum, this includes an email inbox, a calendar, and collaborative documents. 

This is a few of the most basic applications bundled together into a single environment. Many of these suites will have tools that cover some of the other categories below, including video, chat, files, and note-taking.

Office Suite Tool Options

2. Chat

Sometimes you need to get a quick answer from someone. Or you don’t want to bother them with an email or text message. That’s why chat tools like Slack are so helpful—they cut down on cluttered inboxes and speed up collaborations.

The key here is to distinguish between messages that should be shared in a chat vs. an email vs. a meeting. Don’t let your people get confused about which channel to use. Chat is better for quick check-ins and email is often preferable for longer communications that need to be documented.

Chat Tool options

3. File Sharing

No matter what kind of projects you’re working on at your church, you need a place to save and share files across your team. That could be everything from text documents, images, videos, and beyond. This requires a multi-user file-sharing system.

Be sure to share one single system across your entire team including volunteers. Then work hard to keep your files updated, clearly labeled, and organized into folders. This cuts down on time trying to find the right file, or losing a file and having to start over again.

File Tool options

4. Project Management

Running a church requires many moving parts and countless tasks that need to be accomplished. This doesn’t happen by accident, and won’t be efficient without a clear system. That’s where a project/task management tool comes in.

The beauty of any project management tool is begin able to assign projects to people and set deadlines. This keeps people accountable and every project moving forward on time. Just ensure that everyone is bought into the tool and checks in on their tasks regularly.

Project Tool options

5. Video Chat

More church teams embraced remote work since the pandemic. Many church functions still require a physical presence. However, offering a virtual option makes things accessible to more people. So you need to have a video chat tool.

Most of these tools are similar to one another, and many come standard in office suites. There will always be technical difficulties with cameras and dropped calls. But having a universal tool that works with your calendar function is essential to scheduling online meetings.

Video Tool options

6. Worship Planning

Unique to churches compared to other organizations is the need to plan for Sunday morning worship. This includes everything from planning worship songs, selecting Scripture verses, managing sermon series, and handling church announcements.

There’s a smaller range of tool options because they’re all specifically designed for churches. However, this can also be an advantage because it means each has the features you’ll need. The trick is finding a tool that integrates with your existing systems and has a good user interface.

Worship Planning options

7. People Database

The church is not a building, nor is it the church’s staff. A church is made up of people—those members of your community who come to worship, volunteer, and donate. Having a record of these people and their interactions with your congregation is virtual to effective ministry.

Like worship planning software, these databases are usually created specifically for churches. In the business world, these are known as Customer Relationship Managers (CRMs)—a single database with contact information and tracking different engagements over time. The most challenging part of this is keeping the records updated, which is why this is sometimes a full-time dedicated position within the church.

Database Tool options

8. Social Media Managament

If you hope to communicate with an external audience, social media is an obvious place to start. This can include a wide range of channels—including Facebook, Instagram, and beyond. But rather than managing each of these networks separately, you can find a tool that streamlines your efforts.

Using a social media management tool allows you to schedule posts on multiple channels, manage user engagements, see analytics, and communicate internally with your team.  If you’re serious about using social media at your church, having a management tool is a major boost.

Social Media Tool options

9. Email Marketing

Email marketing is different from individual email communications. But both are equally as important. Individual emails are sent specifically to a few people. Email marketing refers to wider emails sent to a list of people using a mass email tool. Don’t try to email the entire church from your personal Outlook or Gmail account.

Choosing the right email marketing platform requires a connection with your people database. These two systems must communicate with each other to make sure your email list is updated. You need to send the right emails to the right people.

Email Tool options

10. Text Messaging

Not everyone communicates frequently using email or social media. However, text messages are a reliable and consistent way to reach people directly in their pockets. Like email marketing, this shouldn’t come from your personal cell phone, but rather an official management tool.

Be careful about overdoing it with text messages. People are more willing to give up their email than they are their cell phone number. Sending too many texts from the church can cause them to unsubscribe and miss out on future messages.

Text Tool options

Use a ChMS to Reach Your Congregation

The science of cultivating the spiritual life of your church revolves around the tools and resources you use to communicate.

One of the best tools to easily keep in touch with your church members and communicate with them is church management software (ChMS).

In no particular order, here are five great ways church management software helps you stay in touch with your church.

Mass communication

With Tithe.ly Church Management, you can access your church members' contact information and communicate with multiple people via email, SMS, or printed letters.

To save yourself time, you can also create templates for emails or letters your regularly send out.  

Keep track of families

Need to update the contact information for a family?

Making contacting parents and guardians easy, as well as generate reports, by linking everyone together in your database.

Find who you forgot

Can't quite remember someone's name? Need to find specific people for a new project? 

With Tithe.ly Church Management, you can specify what people group you’d like to find. You can also search for people based on their gender, location, or customized criteria you create.  

Know who's active or inactive

Do you need help knowing who's active or inactive in your church? 

Have you observed a few families absent from your worship services for a few weeks? 

With church management software, you can create categories to help you distinguish between different people groups in your church—e.g., active members, first-time guests, or inactive people.

Know what else?

You can add custom fields to store additional information, such as allergies, interests, or other relevant info.

Stay up-to-date with everyone

Helping first-time guests get involved with your church is crucial for their spiritual development.

To help visitors get more involved with your church, you can create and track different processes in your church with step-by-step flows. For example, you can create a process from welcoming a first-time guest to leading them toward participating in a small group or Bible Study.

Keep notes

In addition to these features, church management software helps you to keep personal notes on all your members, have an updated member directory, and track people via check-ins. This not only records event attendance. But it also ensures that parents know their children’s whereabouts at all times.

‍

Which digital communication tools do you need?

That’s a lot of different church communication tools serving a wide range of functions. But don’t be overwhelmed. You’re likely using a few of these tools already—either personally, professionally, or both. So these shouldn’t be unfamiliar to you or your congregation.

It can take a while to find the right tools and build up your communication stack. Start one tool at a time and grow from there. Get input from your staff on what they prefer and collaborate on the decision. Onboarding a new tool takes time but saves you time in the long run.

Keep in mind that many of these tools have significant nonprofit discounts that apply to churches like yours. Even if the cost of the tool seems too much, you may be able to save just by being a ministry. It never hurts to check.

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AUTHOR
Robert Carnes

Robert Carnes is a writer and storyteller. He's the author of The Original Storyteller: Become a Better Storyteller in 30 Days. A former church communicator and nonprofit marketer, Robert works as a managing editor for Orange in Atlanta.

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Top 10 Effective Church Communication Software - Tips & Tools

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