I know, this is a little bit of a different topic than I’m usually writing about here, but it’s still relevant to the topic of “internet marketing”. Those of us “in the know” have been building websites for quite a while now using WordPress, and it’s time that some others out there started to take notice.
Specifically, those with a church or other religious organization. You need WordPress, too.
And you may need it more badly than you know.
You’ve probably been struggling for a long time to have a website that represents your ministry well. For too long, you’ve had “somebody that built a website once” designing your church website. Thank God for volunteers and people with big hearts, because they are the backbone of our local church.
But that doesn’t mean they can build a website. At least, not a website that you’d want to have your church name on.
Enter WordPress. The ultimate content management system for any website. Not just blogs, but any site.
Here’s 10 reasons why you should be using WordPress to run your church website:
- WordPress is free. Yep, you heard me right. WordPress costs you nothing. All you need is a webhost and a domain name. WordPress becomes your site. Originally designed for blogs, WordPress has evolved into arguably the greatest content managment system available. And, it’s free. Beat that, expensive web designer from 1997.
- It’s easy to use. Yeah, you used to have to have your web guy do all the updating for you. There are still some things you need a web guy for (otherwise I wouldn’t be around), but you don’t need one every time you want to add something to your site. If you can use Microsoft Word, you can use WordPress.
- Templates, templates, templates. Not ready to pay big bucks for a custom design? No problem. There are literally thousands of WordPress templates that are a cinch to install, with more being released all the time.
- Search Engines love it. Your friends, the search engines, love WordPress. Mostly because WordPress sites are updated often, but you can add some powerful tweaks to WordPress that make the search engines just eat it up.
- You’re in control. As popular as they are, the multiple template-with-hosting combo sites that are springing up all over the web are not the best use of your time or money. You host on their server, using their template. And compared to what you pay for web hosting, these sites charge astronomical fees. Like 10x what you should pay for web hosting. And they really do nothing for you. Keep control with your own site on your own hosting account.
- Video and audio integrate beautifully. OK, what church doesn’t want to use audio and video on their site. With WordPress, it can’t get any easier. Thanks to years of development and improvement, it’s as simple as clicking a button to add audio and video to your site. Just make sure that audio and video is going to drive some traffic where you want it!
- Social tools integrate easily. Want to add your site updates to Twitter? Or Facebook? Not a problem. Easy as pie.
- RSS is your friend. It’s still a mystery to most people, but having your site built on WordPress gives you automatic RSS feed creation. Easy to syndicate your content to multiple sites, and drive that most important component, traffic.
- Easy to upgrade. Before, if you wanted to upgrade your site, you basically had to rebuild it from the ground up. With WordPress, you’re just a few clicks away from having access to the latest developments and improvements.
- Last but not least…I use WordPress. For everything! Nearly every site that I build is based on WordPress. That should be enough of a recommendation, don’t ya think?
For more tips on using WordPress to run your church website, head on over to The Church Website Builder. It’s all about building better websites for churches and teaching people how to use the web to their advantage. Check it out today!
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You’re right on top of this one. WP is such an easy (and free) way to do so many things. It’s perfect for churches or any social organization, etc. So much flexibility along with a lot of simplicity.
Plus, someone could actually end up using the Revolution Church theme for a real church!
Hi Mike,
Regarding your point 5 we use one of the multiple template with hosting sites for our church. You are right they are more expensive than hosting. But I think you missed the point. We didn’t want to be in charge of all the techie bits and we didn’t want to have to be our own support. If we ever can’t do anything we just give them a bell and they tell us exactly what to do. Couldn’t be more fool proof. So yep we spend a bit more (probably 5x the price of average hosting) but hey we save that in hassle many times over. We can also do the other things you were talking about (change templates, customise templates, rss, video, audio, etc). They are always adding new features so that’s great.
Happy blogging.
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WordPress is one of the best CMS in the planet it is easy to use than other CMS. In WordPress you don't need to understand CSS and advanced HTML unlike other CMS like Joomla and Drupal.
WordPress is one of the best CMS in the planet it is easy to use than other CMS. In WordPress you don't need to understand CSS and advanced HTML unlike other CMS like Joomla and Drupal.