Internet Ministry of an Association / group of churches

This section of the Internet Ministry: A Church's Glass Wall^© module is for an organization in which a group of churches unite together to work together. The name of this type of organization varies with different Christian denominations. The term could be association, dioceses, conference, synod, convention, assembly, presbytery, presbyteries, etc. For this section, the word, association, will be used to identify a group of churches. The name of the leader of each organization varies.

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THE LEADER OF THE ORGANIZATION & THE IM

The design of an association's IM and web site should be very important to the leader of the organization. Why?

The IM and the association's web site is an extension of the association.

Through the web site, a mental image of the association can be formed in the minds of the people that visit the web site.

A well-designed IM can cause people to visit the web site that do not attend association's committee meetings and activities.

The web site is a medium for educating people.

The web site is a marketing tool for the association.

The leader of the organization should be very involved in the planning of the IM and how the web site will execute the IM. Due to the time requirements placed on the organization's head, he/she does not have the time to be involved in the actual development of the web site's pages. The leader of the organization does need to review the web site's pages to make sure the IM is being executed through the web site.

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IM MISSION STATEMENT AND GOALS

The association's IM mission statement gives direction to what is to be accomplished through the IM. From the mission statement, goals will be determined that will guide the decisions that are made concerning the design and content of the web site's pages.

The mission statement will be general in design and the goals will be specific. The mission statement and goals identify the who, what, when, where, why, and how concerning the development of the web site.

The design of the web site and the content of its pages are determined by the IM's mission statement and its goals.

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WEB SITE PROMOTES AND SUPPORTS THE ASSOCIATION'S IM

The content of the web site's pages is designed to achieve the goals of the IM of the association. The content of pages in the web site should be designed as if the pages are marketing instruments that are used to advertise the association, its ministries, what the association represents, and what the association has to offer the visitor to the web site.

Make the goals measurable so it will be easy to determine what has to be done to accomplish the results and to evaluate the effectiveness of the web site.

Developing a web site is a challenge, but it can be a very exciting challenge. Realistically, an IM will be developed in stages. It may take one to two years to develop a web site that is very active and has a variety of targeted groups of people that the IM wants to visit the web site.

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POTENTIAL VISITORS TO AN ASSOCIATION'S WEB SITE

Why will a person visit the association's web site? The answer to this question will vary according to the people the developers of the web site want to visit the web site. Typically adults will be the age group that have an interest in the operation of the association.

Some associations do sponsor a few activities in a year that target children and youth. It will be a challenge to plan to get youth and children to visit the association's web site. Some people will say that there is no need to put forth the effort to get children and youth to visit the web site. Children and youth are members of the churches that belong to the association. Why not work to get children and youth to visit the association's web site so they can get a good feeling about what is an association. Developing a positive attitude in children will develop future church leaders with a positive attitude toward the association.

An association's web site can be viewed by any person in the world that has access to an internet account. Realistic audiences for an association's web site are the members of the churches that belong to the association and leaders and members of the committees and organizations of the association. Community members of the churches that belong to the association are not people to which an association normally relates. An exception is when the association sponsors ministries that its church members are not able to support by themselves.

Potential visitors to an IM web site are:

Elected associational committees' leaders and members.

Pastors, staff members, leaders, and members of the churches that belong to the association.

Former leaders of the association.

People that participate in ministries sponsored by the association.

Leaders of other associations.

Leaders of other Christian denominations.

Denomination leaders that work with the leaders of the association.

Targeted audiences.

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WEB SITE'S PAGE'S CONTENT IS COPYRIGHTED

When a web page is moved to the web site's host server, the content of the page is considered to be published just as if it is a printed book. The page is accessible by the public through the internet. All copyright laws apply to the content of each page in the web site. Care has to be taken to acknowledge the ownership of content of a page such as photograph, text, etc. Material should not be used without the owner's permission. This includes reference to Bible scripture. All versions of the Bible are copyrighted except for the King James Version which is in public domain.

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WEB SITE - IDENTIFYING THE TYPE OF CONTENT A WEB SITE CAN CONTAIN

There are many types of data that can be included in a web site. The content of an association's web site will depend on the IM goals for the web site. The web site designed for your association should be unique to the IM goals established for your association's web site.

It is a good idea to visit web sites of other associations to gain an understanding of how they use their web sites. Other associations' web sites can be used as a guide to what can be done with web site. Do not try to duplicate another association's web site, because the IM goals for the association's web site may not be the same as your association's IM goals.

BE CREATIVE as you consider the data that will be of value to people that visit the web site. Do not be overpowered by the potential things that can be included in a web site. Keep in mind that the development of a web site's content is easier when it is accomplished in phases.

The following lists are examples of data that can be included in an association's web site. Use the lists as a guide in deciding what to include in the web site. Consider the lists as a starting point for selecting data that will fulfill the IM goals for the web site.

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WEB SITE - ASSOCIATION ORIENTED MATERIAL

A1. Association's mission statement.

A2. Web site's mission statement / purpose.

A3. Internet Links of value to association's and churches' leaders and members.

A4. Association's calendar of activities & meetings.

A5. Associational newsletter.

A6. Basic beliefs of the association's churches.

A7. Location of the association's office.

A8. Responsibilities of associational staff (paid and volunteer).

A9. Association's staff and how to contact them.

A10. Description of the association's ministries.

A11. Associational documents used to conduct the association's business.

A12. Associational policies and procedures used to operate the association.

A13. Agendas and minutes of associational meetings. For meetings not open to the public, the agendas and minutes can be password protected to limit people that can access the minutes.

A14. Newspaper style articles written about an association's activities and meetings,

A15. Membership requirements for churches that belong to the association.

A16. Prayer requests. (Caution is to be exercised because placing prayer requests on a web page is different from distributing the requests to members of the association. The prayer request page can be password protected to limit access to appropriate people.)

A17. Associational activities for different age groups.

A18. History of the association.

A19. Equipment for sale or trade by churches.

A20. Online newsletter(s) for targeted groups of people.

A21. Data that will get people to daily visit the site (Thought for the day, devotion for the day, joke for the day, daily cartoon, etc.).

A22. Standings of church's and association's sports leagues/teams.

A23. Churches' web site addresses.

A24. Pictures of association's staff and volunteer leaders.

A25. Answer frequently asked questions.

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WEB SITE - SUPPORT PROVIDED BY THE ASSOCIATION

B1. Material that provides support for the Internet Ministry Support Team, Web Site Support Team, and the web site webmaster.

B2. How association leaders can use the internet to fulfill their duties.

B3. Resources available from the association's office.

B4. Services provided by the association's staff.

B5. Training available for church staff, leaders, and members.

B6. Material about church growth and planning emphasis, revitalized established churches, and new church work.

B7. Church future planning guidelines for one, two, three, and five year time periods.

B8. Evangelistic material.

B9. Activities the local churches are conducting that are of interest to people that attend other churches.

B10. List of people available for pulpit supply. The list may or may not contain biographical data.

B11. List of people that are available for interim pastor. The list may or may not contain biographical data.

B12. List of people available for leading special emphasis services for the churches. Types of people could be missionaries, evangelists, medical personnel, sport personalities, radio & TV personalities, politicians, musicians, business leaders, lawyers, law enforcement, musical groups (vocal & instrumental), solo singers, humorists, dramatists, clowns, puppets, magicians, etc.

B13. List of available positions for employment with the association's member churches.

B14. Resumes for pastors and professional staff (full time, bivocational, & part-time staff), office staff, child care staff, school staff, volunteer bi-vocational staff, etc. The resumes would be password protected to limit access to authorized people.

B15. Documents and procedures for search committees and personnel committees to use in fulfilling their duties.

B16. Example job descriptions for typical church paid positions.

B17. How to interview potential candidates for pastor and other church staff.

B18. Guidelines for leading, managing, and training volunteers.

B19. Examples of job descriptions for typical church volunteer positions.

B20. Support for a church's pastor, paid and volunteer leaders, deacons, etc.

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WEB SITE - TRAINING/EDUCATION

C1. List of people that can lead training seminars.

C2. Promote training opportunities including syllabus (when possible) of the training opportunities.

C3. Associational sponsored leadership training classes.

C4. Training opportunities by association, other associations, schools in the area, etc.

C5. Name of people with expertise in specific areas that people can call and ask questions.

C6. Resources available from the association office by topic.

C7. Suggested reference books.

C8. Articles written by association member.

C9. Encourage people with similar duties, responsibilities, and interests to meet and discuss things of mutual interest (special interest groups).

C10. Encourage people to do self study to improve their skills and knowledge.

C11. Conflict Management material.

C12. Lifeway Study Course courses.

C13. SBC Seminary Extension courses and courses at off campus sites.

C14. Distance education courses offered by seminaries.

C15. Articles that define"How To Do" specific activities for associations and church leaders.

C16. Articles that deal with spiritual growth of a Christian and the application of Jesus' teachings to his daily life.

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WEB SITE - PROMOTE/PROMOTION

D1. Promote Association programs, meetings, and activities and denominational programs.

D2. Distribute data for bulletin inserts, data about special events, education data for leaders about special events.

D3. Messages from the organization's leader.

D4. Distribute printable posters for special events.

D5. Distribute data for special events to churches for custom-made posters by church leaders.

D6. Distribute suggestions for promoting special events, sermon outlines, etc.

D7. Distribute data, message, suggestions, etc. for the association leaders of the special events.

D8. Share what churches are doing for special events.

D9. Post agendas of meetings and special events.

D10 Photographs of a previous meeting/activity to promote a future meeting /activity.

D11. Photographs to communicate what happened during the last time a meeting/activity occurred.

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WEB SITE - MISSION ORGANIZATIONS AND OPPORTUNITIES

E1. New church work.

E2. Adult, youth, and children mission organizations and their activities (Women's Missionary Union, Brotherhood, Royal Ambassadors, GAs, & Acteens).

E3. Prayer Requests.

E4. Missionary's birthday list.

E5. Associational staff and church staff's birthdays and anniversaries.

E6. Devotional material.

E7. Offerings given by churches for special offerings (List detail for each church's giving).

E8. Associational and church-sponsored mission projects, activities, and trips.

E9. Material about a concentration of people near the association's churches such as a nearby college, military base, ethnic group, large industrial or business complex, etc.

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WEB SITE - WEB SITE TECHNICAL CONTENT

F1. Graphics for emphasis.

F2. Sounds for emphasis.

F3. Generic and customized animated graphics.

F4. Obtain data about visitors and use the data for targeting e-mails, banner messages (ads), etc. by using cookies and/or visitors submitting data about themselves to the church.

F5. Message board for people to post their opinions about topics of interest to the church members and community members.

F6. Chat room for people to voice opinions online.

F7. E-commerce features for people to order books and supplies online.

F8. Audio material such as association's leaders' messages, training material, promotional message, etc.

F9. Video material such as association's leaders' messages, training material, promotional message, etc.

F10. Books & Supplies to be purchased through internet of value to association's and churches' leaders.

F11. Page background such as color, texture, etc.

F12. How to contact webmaster.

F13. Visitor counter.

F14. Guest book.

F15. Content in multiple languages. Example: Miami Baptist Association's

(http://www.miamibaptist.org/) usage of multiple languages.

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WEB SITE - ELECTRONIC MAIL (E-MAIL)

G1. Notify people that the newsletter is available on line.

G2. Set-up e-mail groups of names for special emphasis mailings.

G3. Association staff sends messages to people.

G4. DOM sends messages to people / special list of people.

G5. Association leaders send data to people they work within the churches.

G6. Association leaders can create mini-newsletters for the topics and people with which they work.

G7. Distribute material to people.

G8. Distribute prayer requests.

G9. Promote events.

G10. Send employment resumes about appropriate people to church search committees.

G11 Churches and church leaders send comments, questions, and data to association staff and leaders.

G12. Register for meetings and activities.

G13. Reserve resources provided by the association.

G14. People communicate with members of the committees on which they serve.

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THINGS TO CONTEMPLATE ABOUT AN IM

Basic goals of a religious organization's Internet Ministry.

1. Inform people.

2. Educate people.

3. Promote meetings & activities.

4. Meet needs.

5. Provide data/material.

Keep the following things in mind when developing an Internet Ministry.

1. A web site can provide people access to current versions of association's documents.

2. Dispense data to church leaders and pastors.

3. Inform people of what is going on in the association, because informed people are more likely to be involved that uninformed.

4. What will get people to visit the web site?

5. What are the target audiences for the web site?

6. How much data about individual churches and their activities should be included in association's web site?

7. Keep web page content current.

8. Develop web site in phases.

9. Approach the taking of photographs and use of photographs as if you are a photo-journalist.

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DISTRIBUTING ASSOCIATIONAL PROMOTION MATERIAL THROUGH THE WEB SITE

Printed material distributed through the United States Postal Service can be distributed through the internet using e-mail or a web site page. This can be a dollar savings. The distribution of material can be faster using the internet facilities instead of the mail. Of course this approach to distribution of material requires some person associated with a church to have an e-mail address and a good quality printer. The printed material can be copied for distribution at the church.

Material can be sent to a church's church leader's or church member's e-mail account.

Typically the document to be distributed will be an HTML document. The format of the printed document will depend on the settings of the receiver's browser.

To make sure a document looks like the document sent as an e-mail attachment or is available for downloading from a web site, a document created by Adobe Acrobat and printed by Adobe Reader will assure that the printed copy will look like the original document. The format of this type of document is PDF (portable document file). Many word processors can convert their documents to a PDF file.

To distribute documents though a web site's page or e-mail does require some coordination between the association's office and the receiver of the document.

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HOW ASSOCIATION LEADERS CAN USE THE INTERNET

It takes planning to effectively use a web site. Last minute planning will not work. To effectively use a web site requires leaders to plan two to three months ahead.

An association leader should follow the following list of activities as they work to better use a web site to achieve his goals. If a leader has more than one elected position in the association, he will perform the following list of activities for each position.

1. Identify several goals you believe God is leading you to achieve in the next three to five months.

2. For each goal, identify the targeted audience.

3. For each goal, identify how the web site can be used to help achieve the goal.

4. Plan what will be included in a web page to achieve the goal such as text, photograph, etc.

5. Identify when the content will be placed on the web site and promoted from the home page. Establish a schedule when data is to be placed on the web site and removed.

6. Do not forget to remove the material from the web site after the goal is completed. Some of the data associated with the goal can remain in the web site as historical data to give visitors to the web site a view of what happens in the association throughout the year.

7. When a goal is completed, evaluate how the web site was used and was the effort successful. Decide if the same approach should be taken in the future or how the approach should be changed in the future.

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SAMPLE ASSOCIATION IM MISSION STATEMENTS AND GOALS

The following are samples of three association's IM Mission Statement and associated goals.

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BETWEEN THE LAKES ASSOCIATION'S IM MISSION STATEMENT

The Between the Lakes Association's Internet Ministry will use its internet web site to:

1. Provide support, guidance, and encouragement to its member churches.

2. Communicate to its member churches' leaders how the association's staff can assist them.

3. Provide educational resources to assist church leaders to perform their duties.

4. Provide calendar of associational activities and data about the activities.

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BETWEEN THE LAKES ASSOCIATION'S IM GOALS

1. Include links to web sites that contain educational resources for church leaders.

2. Include articles that provide information church leaders can use to perform their duties.

3. Provide a description of each of the services provided by the association's staff and how to secure each type of service.

4. Identify the ways the association provides support and guidance to churches, and develop web pages that enhance the association's support and guidance to churches.

5. Promote the association's meetings and activities through the home page.

6. Include the association's calendar of meetings and activities.

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RED RIVER ASSOCIATION'S IM MISSION STATEMENT

The Red River Association's Internet Ministry will use its internet web site to:

1. Provide support, guidance, and encouragement to its member churches.

2. Communicate to its member churches' leaders how the association's staff can assist them.

3. Provide educational resources to assist church leaders to perform their duties.

4. Provide calendar of associational activities and data about the activities.

5. Use e-mail to quickly communicate information to member churches' leaders.

6. Highlight what the member churches are doing as they serve God in their communities.

7. Incorporate material that will be of interest to children.

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RED RIVER ASSOCIATION'S IM GOALS

1. Include links to web sites that contain educational resources for church leaders.

2. Include articles that provide information church leaders can use to perform their duties.

3. Provide a description of each of the services provided by the association's staff and how to secure each type of service.

4. Identify the ways the association provides support and guidance to churches, and develop web pages that enhance how the association supports and provides guidance to churches.

5. Promote the association's meetings and activities through the home page.

6. Include the association's calendar of meetings and activities.

7. Include data, web links, etc. that are of interest to children.

8. Keep the web site pages' content updated.

9. Use photographs to enable people to be able to experience the activity or service about which the photograph was taken.

10. Highlight activities of the member churches that are of interest to churches' leaders.

11. Use e-mail to quickly communicate between associational staff and church leaders.

12. Use e-mail to register people for conferences and activities.

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MISSISSIPPI DELTA ASSOCIATION'S IM MISSION STATEMENT

The Mississippi Delta Association's Internet Ministry will use its internet web site to:

1. Provide support, guidance, and encouragement to the association's member churches.

2. Communicate to its member churches' leaders how the association's staff can assist them.

3. Provide educational resources to assist church leaders to perform their duties.

4. Provide calendar of associational activities and data about the activities.

5. Use e-mail to quickly communicate information to member churches' leaders.

6. Highlight what the member churches are doing as they serve God in their communities.

7. Incorporate material that will be of interest to senior citizens.

8. Enable people to register for conferences on line.

9. Communicate information about local churches' ministries to students at the local universities.

10. Encourage the chairman of each committee and council to use the web site to communicate their organization's activities to the member churches' members.

11. Distribute promotion material to churches through the web site.

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MISSISSIPPI DELTA ASSOCIATION'S IM GOALS

1. Include links to web sites that contain educational resources for church leaders.

2. Include articles that provide information church leaders can use to perform their duties.

3. Provide a description of each of the services provided by the association's staff and how to secure each type of service.

4. Identify the ways the association provides support and guidance to churches, and develop web pages that enhance how the association supports and provides guidance to churches.

5. Promote the association's meetings and activities through the home page.

6. Include the association's calendar of meetings and activities.

7. Include data, web links, etc. that are of interest to senior citizens.

8. Use photographs to enable people to be able to experience the activity or service about which the photograph was taken.

9. Highlight activities of the member churches that are of interest to churches' leaders.

10. Use e-mail to quickly communicate between associational staff and church leaders.

11. Use server side database software to enable people to register for conferences and activities online.

12. In a timely manner, add new web site pages and update existing web pages' content.

13. Make the web site and its pages look professional.

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