Web & Google

Learn how to gain access to your church website and make changes here: https://www.adventistchurchconnect.com/help/getting-started

See how to obtain and set up a custom domain here: https://www.adventistchurchconnect.com/help/knowledge-base/custom-domain

Learn more about Proclaim at proclaim.faithlife.com

Learn more about Faithlife Bulletins at support.faithlife.com/hc/en-us/articles/360007376051-Faithlife-Bulletins

Set up your church with Google My Business at google.com/business

If you're interested in a service that can manage your listing information on all the databases at once, among other useful tools, check out M77 at https://m77.media

TRANSCRIPT

Does your church have the most basic information for people to find you, readily available online? is your Google Maps listing accurate?

If you’re not sure, now is the time to check!

Every church in the NAD has a free website, automatically populated with the information that is on eAdventist.

By default, each church has an attractive website, hopefully, populated with the latest and most accurate information. Your local church supplies the data for eAdventist, so you should check yours often to ensure it’s accurate. Let your church clerk and the conference communication department know if any of the data needs to be updated.

It is possible for your church's website to feature a calendar of events, sermons in audio format, and even a link to your live stream and all of this is available to your church free of charge.

Adventist Church Connect manages this website for your church, but you can request to take manual control of the site to make custom changes, like the ones I mentioned before. I’ll leave a link below where you can go and request that..

If you want more advanced features or different designs. you can hire a professional or find a skilled volunteer to either work within the Adventist Church Connect system or create a new site with another platform like Squarespace or Wix.

What else should be on your website?

Location and service times.

It is also a nice feature to post your weekly bulletin.

I spoke about Proclaim church software in a previous video, if you utilize it for your announcements, it can create a digital bulletin for free each week. You can then make one link from your website to this digital bulletin, and it will be updated automatically, every week. As long as you continue creating the worship services in Proclaim.

Your church website can be the backbone for your church’s outreach because it gives you a place to put information that is editable and update-able.

Instead of placing every detail in your physical bulletin or church event flyer, have the basic information on the physical card and list a link to more details on the church website.

It helps to clean up the design of your physical media, and points people to a place where you can adjust the information as needed.

We all know that church plans can change, and having a web page for an event allows us to make those adjustments where printed media does not.

By default, your church web address can be a bit long. It has the name of your church or city and state .adventistchurch.org

You can easily improve this by purchasing a custom domain online, usually for $20/yr or less, and mapping it to your church site. I'll leave a link on how to do this below as well.

Having a custom domain also allows you to create your own email addresses for your church, like pastor@localchurch.org, or volunteer@localchurch.org. Zoho offers a free email service to use with your custom domain, or you could also pay for G Suite from Google to access your domain accounts using Gmail.

Having a good, consistent website also makes your church easy to find when people are searching online.

When it comes to your Google Maps listing, each church should obtain an account at Google My Business. This allows you to access and adjust information like service times, photos, respond to reviews, and more.

Part of the validation process requires Google to mail you a physical postcard with a code on it. This process can take several days, but it is worth it to make your online church presence be the best it can be.

I'll see you in the next one!