For churches that do some form of pay-per-click advertising (on Google or Yahoo, for example), I wonder if you have some mechanism of tracking response in terms of people who attend one or more services as a result of seeing one of your PPC ads.

If you currently are engaged in a pay-per-click program, I would be very interested in knowing if you have devised a method to track response. Feel free to use comments to respond.

Cynthia Ware left a comment for my recent post about Marqui, and as I normally do when someone new (to me) comments, I went to visit her blog — The Digital Sanctuary. It looks like a great resource to add to the growing list of bloggers who discuss how the church can effectively use technology to reach the world.

From her introductory post in July:

Welcome to the online intersection of technology and the Church.  This site is designed to embrace, explore, evaluate and enhance the vehicle of technology as it is used by the Church to deliver information, connect individuals and revolutionize the way we interact with our world.

I’d encourage you to visit her blog and spend some time reading her articles. Her educational and vocational background would seem to give her a unique perspective on technology issues facing the church and how the church can embrace technology for good.

Churches and ministries might be interested in an announcement from Marqui today about their intention to give away a free web marketing solution to one non-profit organization. The Marqui press release can be found here.

Applications are being accepted through October 15 at this page.

Marqui has "developed the first Web-based suite that simplifies and automates a broad range of marketing communications activities, including e-mail campaigns, Web content management and blogging." They are perhaps best known for their controversial "Pay Bloggers" initiative in which they paid approximately twenty bloggers $800 per month to write about the company.

I have a question for Christian bloggers.

Are there any Christian sites you routinely ping when you post to your blog? I know about the traditional sites bloggers might ping (the sites listed at http://pingomatic.com/, for example). But are there any similar sites which accept pings from bloggers which are specifically Christian in nature?

Does such a thing even exist? Thanks for any help you can offer - I really appreciate it!

I have a question for church webmasters.

Does your church website have a private area just for members, and if so, what do you do when someone stops attending your church? Do you revoke their access? Do you let them continue to access the private areas of the site? Does it depend on their reasons for no longer attending (I can imagine that if a person moves out of the area, it might be treated differently than if someone left the church because of a moral failure, an intense disagreement with leadership, etc.).

Please leave your answers in the comments section. I’m very interested in learning about the different approaches to this issue.

I came across a very interesting blog a couple of days ago: MicroExplosion. Written by Bill Seaver, a Christian internet marketing strategist, MicroExplosion “seeks to extend an organization’s message and meaning using the new media (web 2.0) technologies, ideas and strategies from a Christian perspective. Specifically, MicroExplosion focuses on the awareness, explanation and application of this technology for churches, ministries and Christian businesses. Generally, MicroExplosion should be helpful for anyone interested in the application of web 2.0 technology.”

His article on The Six Categories of Web 2.0 was especially interesting.

Think Christian, which is well worth adding to your list of regular blogs to read, is talking about whether or not a Christian blog should have a gospel presentation.

So I’m curious what you think about this. Does your blog have a Gospel presentation, and why or why not? Does it seem strange to you that a Christian blog wouldn’t have a link to a Gospel presentation? And lastly, can you suggest any online Gospel presentations that might serve as a good model for such a thing?

Not surprisingly, most of those who have commented are in favor of including a gospel presentation. Perhaps just as not surprising (is that good grammar? — it doesn’t sound right), I’m going to suggest a different perspective.

When Mark Batterson (the pastor of National Community Church in Washington, DC) talks about podcasting, he never fails to stretch my mind and make me think in new ways.

If you’ve read what I’ve had to say about podcasting before, you know that in the past, I have had some reservations about how podcasting is typically used by churches (because I believe that everything we do in the digital realm should be actively encouraging face-to-face community and podcasting sermons may not, it has seemed to me, facilitate that process). But everytime I read an article by Mark, he tweaks my thinking a little bit more.

Leadership Journal recently published an article, written by Mark, called Godcasting. In the article, one paragraph in particular struck me:

How many people last month visited National Community Church? 12,771. I couldn’t see them. I didn’t shake any of their hands. Truth be told, they didn’t really visit us. National Community Church visited them.

That resonated with me so much, I believe, because it brought to mind one of my favorite passages of Scripture regarding evangelism — Luke 14:16-23:

And the master said to the slave, “Go out into the highways and along the hdeges, and compel them to come in, so that my house may be filled. (verse 23)”

I like that because it shifts the emphasis from how many of us seem to think evangelism should be done (bring people to church) to a more natural, more authentic approach (go live your lives among the people).

Mark’s thoughts about podcasting mirror that philosophy in many ways. First it was his comparison of podcasting to the field preaching of Wesley. Now he makes me think about one of my favorite passages in relation to podcasting.

I would encourage you to read Mark’s article in its entirety. No matter what your opinion about podcasting, he will make you think!

An article in the current issue of BtoB Magazine called Let’s face it - faces sell caught my eye this morning. Here’s an excerpt:

They are visual magnets that readers, visitors and viewers simply can’t resist because people are enormously curious about their fellow human beings. Faces have a place in b-to-b advertising, despite its reputation for being cold and clinical.

In fact, a human presence in b-to-b ads may be even more critical than in consumer advertising because of the more clinical nature of the product or service being promoted. Networking equipment, servers and software certainly lack the visual sizzle of fashion, travel or automobiles.

This brings to mind a simple tip for church webmasters that while mentioned quite a bit in the Christian website blogosphere, nevertheless bears repeating. Make sure your website is primarily about people rather than organizations, buildings, programs, ministries, etc. The church is people. One of the best ways to get a good start on ensuring that this is conveyed to your website visitors is to liberally use photos of people (photos that show people’s faces!) throughout your site.

A side note: one additional thing to ask yourself in this regard is what does your church website convey if the most prominent photo on your website is of your pastor?

What are other ways that we can help our church websites to reflect the principle that the church is people rathan than an organization, a building, a set of programs, etc.?

Don Wright of Reaching Japanese for Christ has an interesting article on Japanese Web Evangelism

The emphasis on personal relationship in this excerpt:

Few Japanese are likely to know an evangelical personally. Since most conversions result from personal relationship, this means that few will hear the Gospel from a person they know.

was especially interesting.

That’s the title of a seminar taking place on Wednesday, August 2 at Whitley College in Melbourne, Australia. The seminar will be conducted by Darren Rowse. Some may know Darren because of his well-known business blogs, ProBlogger.net, Digital Photography Blog, and Camera Phone Zone. What some might not realize is that Darren is also a Baptist minister and on the leadership team of Living Room, an emerging missional community in the north of Melbourne.

If you’re in the Melbourne area, I would strongly encourage you to make time to attend the seminar. Registration is required and closes on Thursday, July 27, so you will need to hurry.

If you’re not in the Melbourne area, check out Darren’s post about the seminar in which he asks for some feedback on online Christian resources. Why not stop by and leave a comment to help him out?

Here is a set of good links on cell phone usage in Africa. Lots of implications for how we might use digital technology to reach the African continent.

In War-Torn Congo, Going Wireless To Reach Home
The Amazing Growth of Mobile Tech in Africa
Forget the $100 PC
Phones Teach Written Literacy

I came across all of these links by following one link from Robert Scoble.