I received a mail out the other day that one of our members received from a local church. He gave it to me to see if I might find anything our church could use in future mail outs. What immediately struck me is how the new idea for church marketing is to tell people what you are not instead of what you are. Basically, if I can throw off or make fun of another church model it shows the superiority of my beliefs or model. Pay attention to the following quotes from their mail out;
“We dress for comfort (no Sunday morning fashion show here)”
“We have meaningful , moving music (no people in polyester singing sadly)”
When I read this type of advertising from churches it literally drives me crazy. Let me show you the implications. First, anyone who wears a suit or a dress on Sunday mornings is fashion conscious only. It has nothing to do with a personal conviction, cultural norm or their own comfort level. I have been in both types of churches, laid back and more traditional, and the funny thing is it has never occurred to me that it was a big deal. Does this really matter? I think it did in 1995 or 1996, but that is not relevant today. You have to be mindful that our culture is seeing a trend of people dressing up again in the workplace. Not that everyone should or anything, but there are plenty of options, just pick one and go on with living.
Secondly, is the only meaningful, moving music contemporary? Do people who sing hymns all wear polyester? What a joke. In Nashville where we live there is a resurgence of high church worship. Why, because there is a group of people that get their needs met there every week. One couple out of that group that I know are contemporary Christian artists who you would never believe attended a church like that.
When you do your mail outs, make sure they describe you. You are trying to get people to notice all the great upcoming events at your church, new sermon series, and other things that make your church great. Leave everyone else’s style alone. It just doesn’t matter.
Tags: church advertising, church mail outs, church pr, worship styles
April 8, 2008 at 3:52 pm |
Great point brother…I get several mailers like that every omth, I will have to write about one sometime. “Let’s find things to be for and not against,” someone once told me.