In today’s world, church websites have become much more important than they used to be. If you’re unsure of what should be included on your church’s website, you’ve come to the right place.
Here’s everything you need to know to make your visitors feel welcome while also providing them with all of the important information they need!
Make a Good First Impression
First and foremost, when people visit your church’s website, you want to make a good first impression. This is going to be the hero section. In this section, you want to include your church’s mission statement, a way to watch live/past sermons, or a short “I’m new here” video for potential visitors to watch. You could also have an announcement card/newsletter that pops up when you first visit the website.
You want to have the first thing visitors see to be something inviting and informative. However, you don’t want to bombard them with too much information all at once. That could be overwhelming and drive visitors away.
A good way to provide a lot of information without it being too much is to have your hero section change between multiple slides. Additionally, if your church is fairly large, you may want to make this the home page instead of just one section.
Get People Involved
In the next section, you can include ways to get plugged into the church. Ensure that guests know what to expect for Sunday mornings and list all other ministries that people can join.
Many people want to get plugged into small groups. Be sure to cover all age groups and include details about childcare, as well as when and where these ministries meet. If there are any upcoming events, be sure to include these here also since those are a great way for first-time visitors to get introduced to the church.
Depending on how many activities and ministries your church has going on, this may need to be its own page. You certainly don’t want to leave anything out on this one, so be conscious when writing this section.
Tell More About the Church
In this section, you want to tell web visitors more information about your church. You could include a welcome video or the church’s mission statement as well as the church’s beliefs. Be sure to include what most people are going to ask when they are considering a new church. For example, you could define what your church believes about missions, baptism, the Lord’s Supper, salvation, etc.
Provide Ways to Give
In this section, you can provide details about how to give online or in person. This is a great place to add a plugin where people can give online, whether for weekly tithing, missions, or other church projects/ministries. You could provide a service where they could give one time or set up a recurring tithe that could be taken out every week, every two weeks, every month, etc.
Again, this section may also be better as its own page, especially since it will require members to include a lot of information. Including this page will offer a convenient way to give for members who have switched to mostly online transactions.
Show Where They Can Find You
The next things you will want to include are a way for people to contact you/visit the church. If your church has multiple campuses, be sure to include the address for each one so that they can find the campus closest to them.
Be sure to add the service times here, especially if different campuses meet at different times. This could be included in the footer or have its own page depending on how many campuses your church has. You could insert a connection card for anyone that has a prayer request or praise item.
If you have an email newsletter, you will want to provide a way for people to sign up for this. You could do this by providing a contact form to get all of their contact information so that you can get in touch with them as well. You should also include a way to contact the church by phone number or email address for anyone who may have questions or need help in any way.
Invite Them to Join You
Make sure your site openly invites visitors to come to your church. Many people now will search online about a church before ever attending it. If your church website isn’t explicitly inviting them to come, they may feel unwelcome and never even step foot in the door.
Everything we have covered so far is essential to creating a good church website. However, if you want to take it a step further, here are some more things you could include.
An Internet Forum
This is a place for people to post public prayer requests/praises and to just come together to give updates on their week. This is not a necessity, but some members may like being able to connect with other members through an online forum.
Weekly Readings
If your church is going through a weekly Bible study or reading the Bible in one year, you could include a section where the weekly reading is posted for everyone to stay updated. If someone missed a Sunday morning, they may not know which page to be on in the Bible study, so they could go to the church website to find out.
Staff Information
You may want to include pictures of your staff as well as information about them. If someone is wanting to visit and bring their children, they may like to know who to look for in childcare services upon arriving.
Social Media
If your church has a Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or even TikTok, you may want to include links to these websites. This is another way to get people connected to the church and provide more opportunities for them to see updates without visiting the website every time.
*Tip: Be sure to include some photography throughout the website. Whether they’re photos of your church building, ministries in action, or just stock photos, this will help break up the information on your site and help keep website visitors interested.
Need Some Help Creating a Church Website?
Whether your church has 20 members or 2,000, your church should invest in a website. The benefits that having a church website provides are exceptional.
The team at Eldie Inc. has extensive experience creating church websites and we’d love to build one for your church. Schedule a free discovery call with us today to discuss how we can help you get moving in the right direction.