Tag Archive - marketing

A bold mission demands bold living

March 4, 2010 in for Churches, Outreach

Avis car hire has a bold mission statement (or tagline). I’m sure you’ve seen it:

Churches have mission statements too.

  • College Park Church has the mission: “Igniting a passion to follow Jesus”.
  • Church by the Bridge has the mission: “Living for Jesus. Loving like Jesus”.
  • Redeemer Presbyterian has the mission: “Seeking to renew the City Socially, Spiritually and Culturally”.
  • Covenant Life Church has the mission: “to build a community of gospel-centered people.”
  • Emmanuel Church has the three-fold mission: “to glorify God – Father, Son and Holy Spirit by listening and responding to God’s word obediently;
    loving one another practically; and proclaiming Christ boldly”.
  • St Andrew’s Cathedral has a slightly longer mission: “To glorify God by proclaiming our Saviour the Lord Jesus Christ in prayerful dependence on the Holy Spirit, so that everyone will hear his call to repent, trust and serve Christ in love, and be established in the fellowship of his disciples while we await his return”.

These are mission statements set big expectations.

What’s the mission statement for your church?

The challenge for us (and for Avis) when we set and then promote these mission statements is to actually live up to them.

Too often, corporate mission statements are dreamt up in board-room meeting of the marketing executive, who forgot to tell the staff that they should actually try harder. (Avis – this hasn’t been my experience with you – you just have a mission that’s easy to use as an example!)

My point is, too often the behaviour doesn’t come close to matching the mission – there is a disconnect between the bold mission of the company, and the people who have face-to-face contact with the customers (i.e. the people who actually need to implement the mission).

And as a result we cause harm to our brand, or more importantly in our case, tarnish the reputation of our God.

We need God’s help to live out these missions. We really need God’s help. But, by God’s grace and with his power at work within us, we can live up to these bold missions.

And when we miraculously do, all the glory goes to God.

Envy – a powerful motivator

February 14, 2010 in for Churches, Outreach

Two car companies are unashamedly using envy to motivate Australians to buy their cars. Check out these advertisements for the Mitsubishi Outlander, Ford Territory, and to a lesser extent, the Mistsubishi Triton.

This got me thinking – what emotions do we tap into in church marketing to encourage people to come along to church? We might not have multi-million dollar advertising budgets, but our marketing materials usually try to connect with our neighbours on an emotional level.

Mitsubishi Outlander

Ford Territory

Mitsubishi Triton

Ad critique: Webjet’s ‘Experience the wonder’

January 11, 2010 in for Churches, Outreach

If a product sold itself with the tag-line ‘experience the wonder’ – what would you imagine it to be?

  • standing at the base of Niagra Falls?
  • scenic helicopter flights over Antarctica?
  • a dishwashing detergent that washes the dishes for you?!

‘Experience the wonder’ is a bold invitation.

And my guess is that you wouldn’t imagine this invitation to be to ‘experience the wonder’ of paying for flights using PayPal. But this is the campaign that Webjet has launched.

It comes complete with a television advertisement with grandiose music suitable for a Presidential address or the climactic scene of a Hollywood blockbuster.

It strikes me as an over-dramatic over-sell. Big claims should be saved for equally big (innovative/one-of-a-kind/life-changing) products, events or services.

The difference with Christianity, is that the message really is life-changing. Any Christian can testify to the life-changing message that the gospel of Jesus Christ is. However, I don’t think this opens the doors for us to use ‘experience the wonder’ in our church promotion. Sure, we could do:

  • ‘Experience the wonder of carols this Christmas’
  • ‘Experience the wonder of Jesus – sign up for a Simply Christianity course’
  • ‘Experience the wonder of fair trade. Visit our fair trade market this weekend’

But in a world of big claims (where many aren’t half as big as they claim to be), I’m not sure how effective this kind of promotion would be. What do you think? Is it time to ‘experience the wonder’ in our promotion of Christian events?

Confronting ads promote the UN World Food Programme

January 3, 2010 in for Churches

Thanks to Ads of the World, I came across this confronting campaign for the UN World Food Programme:

and:

The artwork isn’t particularly cutting-edge – we’re used to seeing images of starving people.

However, I’m feeling increasingly convicted that Christians need to be on the front foot, at the forefront of caring for the poor, the marginalised, those who have been the victims of injustice and oppression. You can’t read Amos and not feel uncomfortable.

Should we have posters like this out the front of our churches, encouraging the people in our church and community to remember the poor and oppressed? Why or why not?

Uncomfortable about child sponsorship incentive

November 5, 2009 in Christian Living

I am a massive fan of Compassion.

I love the fact that they care for disadvantaged children. I love the fact that they are unashamedly Christian. When I heard the CEO of Compassion Australia, Paul O’Rourke, speak several years ago I was impressed by his faith and commitment to the cause of releasing children from poverty, in Jesus’ name. All this is to make very clear, Compassion does a great work.

However, I saw a promotion today that made me feel uncomfortable.

In an effort to encourage people to sponsor a child, the United States branch of Compassion is running an online promotion to sponsor a child and receive two Veggietales DVDs:

Compassion Veggietales promotion

I’m all for getting more child sponsors, but something about this promotion made me feel a little uncomfortable. Perhaps I feel uncomfortable because this kind of promotion is so common in our world (e.g. “buy two pizzas, get a free coke and garlic bread”). Perhaps I feel uncomfortable because the intrinsic value of the children themselves should be a good enough incentive to sponsor a child. I can’t put my finger on it, but it just doesn’t sit well with me as a marketing strategy.

What do you think?

Seminar: ‘Why church marketing sucks and what you can do about it’

September 16, 2009 in for Churches

Steven Fogg, Communications Manager at Crossway Baptist Church in Melbourne, is running a selective (breakout group) at the Crossway Conference next week. It is called ‘Why church marketing sucks and what you can do about it’. This selective is free and open to anyone at the conference and beyond who is interested.

The selective is focused at equipping church leaders, Christian not-for-profits and creatives/communicators. Contact steve.fogg@crossway.org.au or just turn up!

When: 24th September, 1.30pm – 3.30pm
Where: 2 Vision Drive, Burwood East, Melbourne
Room: Warehouse

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