Share Your Church » Church Tech

Google Analytics

Rodney — Wed, 29 Oct 2008 04:14:40 +0000

We’re going to spend the next few weeks looking at google products that can help you share your church better. I know, I know Google is one of those companies that you either love or hate, and I’ll be honest with you. I love them. There’s lots of other products, companies, and services out there that may do a better job than google at certain tasks, but over all Google does a wonderful job at bringing it all together. That being said I would like to take a look at a less popular google service called google analytics.

I use google analytics on every site that I make, design, or consult on. This tool is amazing. Here’s what it gives you for free

visitor/hit/page count
unique visitor count (based on browser/IP)
browser info for all visitors
location of all visitors
keywords which brought visitors to site
avg time spent on each page

Did I mention that all of this was FREE? If you’ve read any of my other articles you know how I feel about free. Google really has put together a wonderful tool in their analytics service. Does this mean that google has access to your site? Yes, not like the google crawler wasn’t all over your site before or anything. Google also makes it very easy to implement analytics. Simply sign up for their service and copy a small piece of code into your .html or .php and voila you’re done. So, now for the big question. How does this help you Share Your Church? The information that you can gather from this tool is indispensable. Do you need multi-language support on your site? What is bringing people to your site? Maybe you need to highlight that information. Maybe add more info to the home page, or maybe just make simpler navigation. I’ve made numerous modifications to sites simply based on the information found in google analytics. Is analytics the best tool out there? Probably not, but you’d be hard pressed to find one simpler.

Phonevite

Rodney — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 20:58:56 +0000

I heard about this website shortly after bringing up the idea of a phonetree system at our church council. The phonetree system seemed a bit expensive for us at the time, so I went and explored my options. I saw lots of web services that seemed to do the trick, but all of them required a credit card or the purchase of minutes. Finally I came across Phonvite.com. This web service was awesome. For those of you who don’t know I like FREE. Phonevite knows how to do FREE very well. Phonevite allows you to make calls to 25 people completely free of charge. For small churches or youth groups this may be all that is needed. Phonevite does add very brief advertisement to the end of each recording that currently just advertises for phonevite, the paid service does not contain these ads. Phone also gives you real time reporting of who does and doesn’t answer and how long the person listens to the recording. This is all included in the free version. The paid version allows you to request RSVP and messages back to the phonevite system. This truly is a phenominal system. You simply have to see it for yourself. Quite possibly the best phone recording system out there. Try it out and let me know what you think.

EasiSlides

Rodney — Sun, 19 Oct 2008 04:23:28 +0000

Part of Sharing Your Church is making sure that when people come to your church building that you are reaching them where they are. Many churches today use digital projectors to show announcements, lyrics to songs and sermon outlines. Most of these churches use Microsoft PowerPoint to display these items on the screen. There are a few big reasons why they do this.
#1. PowerPoint comes installed on most laptops and desktop computers as part of Microsoft Office
#2. Even if they do not have Microsoft Office they could still use the same idea through Open Office or Google Docs.
#3. Most business people have the know how to run Powerpoint already. Little to no learning curve is necessary.
#4. They can’t afford the more costly presentation programs which are geared to churches and worship.

Media Shout, Easy Worship, and Live Worship are all great programs. Unfortunately with prices tags around $200+, they would take a huge chunk out of most small to medium sized churches budgets. Here’s where EasiSlides comes in. EasiSlides comes to the rescue with a free (yes I said FREE) presentation software package. It has some of the same features that the bigger presentation packages have, but with no cost.
Here’s a list taken straight from their web site of features you can find in their latest version.

Dual-Lingual Lyrics
Project lyrics in two different languages at the same time, should you have such lyrics in your database, for multi-lingual services .

Multimedia Support
Play Audio File or Video Background and Live Feed from an attached Camcorder along with the lyrics. Alternatively you can use our slide backgrounds, gradients or your own images.

Praisebook Generator
Print your own Praise and Worship Books.

Three Monitors Output
Output for Operator, Congregation and Choir/Musicians .

Html Generator
Produce all the necessary files to publish the lyrics on your church website.

Notations
Add notations, such as guitar chords to the lyrics.

Auto Rotate
Let the slides rotate automatically using timers, in step with a media file.

Alerts
Run Alerts during a live praise session, for example Nursery Alerts.

Bible
Search, Integrate and Run bible verses from the bible database. Add and Remove your own Bible Translations and Versions.

Formatting
Format your text and position your lyrics

This is quite possibly one of the best presentation programs out there. It is extremely easy to use and did I mention it was free? I know that my church has definitely found it’s new presentation software. Give it a shot and let me know what you think.

Your Church on Google Maps

Rodney — Sun, 19 Oct 2008 01:27:15 +0000

The internet has offered us unprecedented ways of finding and distributing information. We have gone past the information age straight to the information overload age. Google has set out to bring all of this information together into one place. You can ignore that fact, bemoan that fact, or use it to share your church with the world. There are lots of ways to use Google to help your church, but for now we’re going to focus on placing your church on Google Maps under the local business search.

Church Communications Pro lays out these four features you can look forward to by using Google Maps.
1. Enhance Your Listing with Photos
You can add up to 10 photos to your church’s listing. Now potential visitors searching for churches in their area on Google maps can see not only your location, but pictures of your church as well.

The other pictures will appear on a tab labeled “Photo” when the visitor clicks on the “more info” link. I’m sure you’re already thinking of all the photos that you would add to present a sneak preview of your church and ministries.

2. Custom Attributes
You now have the ability to add custom attributes to your listing. The description section of the listing is set at a maximum of 200 characters, just about enough for a couple of sentences. Now with custom attributes, you can add informations such as ministries, affiliations, or other locations.

3. Map Editing
The business owner now can change the location of the push pin on the map. Think about that, Google is letting you edit their maps. Actually, they are asking you to make their maps more accurate. Now you can drag and drop the pin to more accurately show your church’s location. Here’s a hint for this little feature. When you move the pin, switch from the default map mode to the satellite view, it’s much easier to see the exact location of the building.

4. Visitor Statistics
A very simple count of how many times the listing has been viewed in the last 30 days. You’ll need to log in to Google’s Local Business Center to see this stat.

It’s all about sharing your church and Google is here to help.
Go here to sign your church up (http://www.google.com/local/add/businessCenter).
Stay tuned for other ways Google can help you to Share Your Church