EP214: Mark MacDonald & Creating Your Church's Content Strategy

So, what are their biggest needs? What are their biggest concerns? What are their biggest goals? And this is not the Sunday school answer.

We know they need Jesus. What is their biggest concern? They are concerned about going to heaven. What is their biggest goal? To live a good life.

I mean, like all of those Sunday school answers, like that's not what people are waking up concerned about. Welcome to the Church Digital Podcast.

Through this podcast, we'll talk about the technological innovations within the church. But more than tech for tech itself, we'll address deeper questions. Is disciple making possible digitally?

How should we approach the digital mission field? Can a biblically grounded church operate in digital space? Oh, and where does the metaverse fit into all this?

Whether you're a big or small church, an established church or a startup church plant, the Church Digital's goal is to help churches like yours learn to be a multiplying church, digitally and physically.

Our heart that churches like yours would discover a new found focus on disciple making that will revolutionize your church. And now, here's your host, Jeff Reed.

All right. Hey, everybody. We got episode 214. My name is Jeff with the Church Digital Podcast. I'm definitely excited to have this conversation with you all today.

By the way, hey, over at Digital Church Network, we are launching networks. We're launching these micro networks where we're grouping together different churches that have the same mission and vision.

We're gathering together physical churches that are doing digital ministry. We're gathering together churches that want to be a church in digital space.

We're gathering together metaverse churches. And our hope by gathering these churches together is to help them get encouragement, to get support, to be prayed for, to get accountability.

Basically, we want to see our churches multiply through Digital Church Network and we're passionate about getting churches that are really interested in understanding digital discipleship and to really take next steps in digital and metaverse ministry.

We want to get you guys connected with some others and some people that can help you on that journey. So, hey, if you're interested in this, we'll put the link in the show notes as well.

Go to digitalchurch.network/lifeline. Digitalchurch.network/lifeline. Yeah, that's probably a long URL. Maybe we need to fix that. Maybe the comm guy we've got here is going to correct me with that here in a second.

But hey, let's do it. Let's get you connected. You know, I do a lot when it comes towards digital ministry and metaverse.

But honestly, the idea here with the networks, I think this is the best thing we can do to help your ministry, whether you're planting or working at an established church.

I think this is the best thing we can do. So, get started. Get more information. Oh, it's free. Digitalchurch.network/lifeline. Well, hey, we're looking forward to this conversation, episode 214 here.

We're diving into the idea of a content strategy. I'm going to make this just for a couple of minutes. I'm going to make this podcast about me.

Hopefully, this is okay. But my, I work at, I don't work, I volunteer at a small church in town. I am an attender.

Maybe I'm a leader. Kind of go back and forth on that. But at the heart of this, I'm at a church plant down here in Miami.

Easter, maybe we had 150, 200 people. Typically, it's about 100, 150 plus or minus. So, it's a small church. We've, I mean, in reality, we probably been open six, eight months.

There was totally a pun there if you got it. But that's another story. But we've been open maybe six, eight, maybe ten months at this point.

Relatively new. And the lead pastor comes up to me one day and says, "Hey, Jeff, I need your help.

We really, we're really excited. We want to develop a content strategy for our church." And I looked at my pastor and I was like, "Okay, maybe.

Sure. Let's take about, let's think about it. Let's talk about it. Let's figure it out." And just in the weeks since that conversation happened, a little before Easter, so it's been a little crazy.

I've really been wrestling with, "Okay, so we're a small church. We're just starting out. What would a content strategy really look like for our church?

What do I need to do?" Then I started thinking about like the massiveness of social media and a lot of the noise that's happening in this space.

And I started asking questions like, "Is content strategy even effective for like normal churches and larger churches? Like how do we manage this content?

As churches, are we really effective in getting content beyond the sermon? Do we need to do more stuff with sermon? Is there ideas?" I just had a conversation the other day with some guys that are doing a podcast that has nothing to do with the sermon for their church.

And so, it's really starting to open some eyes for what's effective and what's not in this season. And so, of course, I went to the best guy I know to have this conversation and Vince Stapley wasn't available.

So, I went to number two, also a Canadian, Mark MacDonald. So, hey, Mark, how you doing? I'm doing great. After that preamble, I just feel like I should call Ben Stapley and get him on here.

We joked before we got on to the recording how that you, Ben, and myself, I mean, we could just probably sit and banter back and forth.

Maybe that's what we need to do. We need to do a podcast with the three of us. Oh my gosh. It just a podcast with the three of us on no topic whatsoever.

Exactly. It would be interesting. Now, you're both, I don't want to make this totally about you and Ben, but you're both Canadian, right?

We are. I'm from East Coast, Canada. So, way down east. If you go all the way ten hours north of Boston and then hook a right and go east, that's New Brunswick, Canada and that's where I'm from.

Well, cool. Hey, as we're opening up here, Mark, not Ben, tell us a little bit about yourself. Well, I can't believe I get to do what I get to do.

I feel like I'm just a little kid from East Coast, Canada. I'm amazed at how many times, you know, when you look back on a journey that you've had in your life and you think, "Oh my goodness, like I can't believe I've landed in what I've landed in."

I was senior creative director for one of Eastern Canada's largest ad agencies. And through all of that, I just kept thinking, "So, why does the church not know this stuff?" And I started talking to pastors and pastors would say, "I mean, that's kind of marketing, right?" And I was like, "Yeah, kind of marketing."

And in Canada, we call it marketing communications or marcom. And when we start talking about marketing communications, every pastor way back then would kind of go, "I know, I mean, we're the church.

We don't need marketing." And they pushed back so hard that I kept thinking, "So, there's got to be something there. Why is it that the church doesn't want to do marketing?"

And then we had the opportunity to come to Winston-Salem, North Carolina and that was twenty-one years ago and we started an agency there and started working with churches, became the national marketing arm for several large pastor-led national organizations.

Through that, our agency helped a lot of churches. I started writing articles. Just wrote my eight hundredth magazine article that's been published. And then out of that, the book Be Known for Something came along.

And really all Be Known for Something is just a restatement of branding and marketing that pastors don't push back on because if I want to stop a conversation with a pastor, I ask them what they're doing for marketing.

If I want to start a conversation, I say, "So, what do you think you're known for in your community?" And every pastor says, "Ooh, that's really good.

I want to talk about that." So, out of that, once the book became an Amazon bestseller, which it just again blows my mind that it even is so popular, I was asked by the Florida Baptist to come down and work with the three thousand Baptist churches here in Florida.

And I worked with them for a couple years and I'm back doing the agency work now. Working with all denominations, a lot of churches.

And I'm also executive director for Center for Church Communication, which influences about ten thousand churches across the country. Wow, I didn't realize the Center for Church Communications.

That was that one's new to me. Very cool. So, I totally see what you did there because you're like baiting and switching branding for being known for something.

Like that's interesting, right? Like how long did it take you to come up with that one? Well, it was interesting because when I would talk to a church, it's like I always am interested in whatever I'm working on.

Like if I'm going to rebrand them, I need to know what their current perception is. And so, trying to figure out, "So, what are you known for?" We make all of our decisions in life based upon what we know about something.

If you know, if we decide, "So, what type of phone are you going to use?" then quickly you go, "I want Android because of this." Or I want iPhone because of this.

And you gravitate towards things based upon what you know, all the little things that you know about something. And so, what we know is that people are making faster and faster decisions.

So, the more you can actually state what you should be known for, the faster someone will actually make a choice towards you. So, let's dig into the example here.

For me, like I said, I'm making it about me, we can shift it away from this. I'm at a church for about one hundred. By the way, this is the best thing you can do.

Run a podcast and trick the guest into giving free advice. Write there. Write it down. Create your own podcast. Use it as an excuse to get free advice.

Watch this question right here. Hey, yes, so my church, Mark, help me here. A one hundred, one hundred fifty person, we've not been great at creating content other than the weekend services.

My pastor and the executive pastor, they want to start creating. They asked me to help them create a content strategy. Essentially.

What do I need to do? What does that need to look like? What's, uh, coach me here and let's start to coach some other audience at the same time.

So, I've been doing work with the church for twenty-one years. I've been doing marketing communications work for well, like thirty-five, thirty-six years. And what's interesting is that this whole idea of content strategy has come along with the digital side.

But ultimately, we all have a content strategy. The church, even without a website, the church has a content strategy. Over the years, every church says, "Well, we need to develop content to get people through the doors."

And what I've found is that everyone tries to make it overly complex. What does it mean to have a content strategy? I think we need to quickly state what content strategy, what that definition actually is.

And it's as simple as developing content that achieves your organizational goals. So, over the hundreds, thousands of years that the local church has been around in local communities, I mean, most times before it used to be the pastor would be the content guy.

He would create the sermon and we would get people to come through the doors. And if people like the content, like the person, like the fellowship, then the content strategy works.

But the problem is, as you know, Jeff, I mean, it's just gotten way way more complicated. Because there's so many outlets, and especially if you're talking to digital church, like you know, it's not just as simple as we're going to have sermon series anymore.

Instead, it's like, "Okay, so how do we break that content into all of the consumable things so that it actually allows the organization to achieve some goals." So, if uh so I always have little people sitting on my shoulder, the medium to large church that's saying, "I know how to do that." And then the small church, like what you're talking about, that's saying, "Uh oh my goodness, like that's just too too complicated." Well, I I guess that let's let's fall towards the smaller church because we know that the vast majority of churches in in America are under 200.

And so, if if we're looking at the smaller church, the pastor's probably going to still be the the main creator of content. But then, how do you use that to help you achieve goals?

And And I mean, it really just it comes down to four things. I mean, the first thing, I mean, you just got to set some goals.

What do you actually want to do with this content? Is it um And I And I guess I call it a relationship journey. If you think of it as a funnel, that's fine, too.

But like that whole relationship journey, you know, how do you attract somebody from your community with your content? That's totally different than uh keeping people in the pews or keeping people tuning in online.

So, you just need to set some goals. And And I don't want to get too far into the weeds, but I don't mind if that's what you want to do.

I mean, there's ultimately three goals that you need to uh to have with your content. I mean, is it awareness? Is it consideration? Or is it a decision?

And And I mean, this can all preach. I mean, anyone who's putting together a sermon, you need to bring up the the elephant in the room.

And then consideration is just "Okay, so how What are all the options that are available to deal with the elephant in the room?" And then decision, weirdly enough, oftentimes we think, "So, then you just have to make a decision.

You have to have the altar call. You have to have Anyone who wants this, put up your hand." But the problem is is that what we need to re- remember with decision-making goals is that decision-making goals is eliminating or overcoming barriers.

So, there's probably a reason why someone doesn't want to do what you want them to do. Even after saying, "Here's all the possibilities. Here's all the options.

Here's all the solutions. Which one do you want?" It's Okay, well, which one costs? Do I need to get up from my pew and walk down the aisle and repent of my sin and like, you know, whatever.

Like For I remember a an evangelist used to say, "The only thing keeping you between uh sitting there and making a decision today is to get up and get the devil off your lap." And And there it is.

There's the barrier. It's like, "How do I make a public spectacle in order to make this decision?" And so, what you need to do in the decision-making goals is just figure out what are the barriers and then how do you eliminate them.

So, so all of that, like just set some goals. Like, do you want to get people to come in from your community? How many people do you want to have come in from the community?

How many people do you want to have tune in online? How many people Like, what is the the bar that you're going to set?

And if it's just awareness, a lot of people don't even know that you exist. So, so set up a website so that you can attract people who don't know that you exist.

Or is it the consideration stage? And at the consideration stage, they're just looking for all the options. And then the decision is to eliminate the barriers.

So, that's number one. That's just set just set some goals. I'm a goal-oriented person. I I like I I I'm I'm amazed at how many people resist setting goals.

Goals doesn't mean you have to set it up to put it on your website or on social media or hang it out in front of your church.

It just means set some set some expectations that you can actually measure over time so that you know whether it's working or not. Cuz a communication strategy or a content strategy will you if you really don't know whether it's working or not.

So, let let's just pull that thread right there. What analytics? Um what what am I basing it off of? How do I know whether it's working?

Yeah. And And analytics are a godsend. I mean, I Jeff, I mean, I say this all the time and I'm sure you think this all the time.

What a time to be alive. I mean, back in the day, 30 years ago, when I started working at at the agencies, I I would create lots and lots of brochures and I would hope that people read them.

In fact, I would have people say, "Oh my goodness, we printed 10,000 of these and they're all gone." And then the the client would immediately think, "So, 10,000 people have looked at my brochure." It's kind of almost as foolish as saying, um yeah, our church prints 200 bulletins and we give them out.

And so, therefore, 200 people know everything that's in them. Like we know that's not the case. In fact, two-thirds of the people who receive a print piece of communication never even open it.

So, what we know is that analytics are wild because we can now know when we create a digital brochure or a digital website, we know how many people actually look at things and we know where they look.

We can do eye-tracking technology. We can do analytics of of demographics of who is it that's looking at certain things. What are they clicking on?

What's the next step? Do they get to one page and then bolt and bounce away from your website? Like all of that stuff, the more information you can glean, like just take it in.

I So, okay, so uh during COVID, we a lot of churches went online and they went with a a YouTube style video where they're posting a lot of those churches came to us and said, "Would you mind watching the service and tell us how you can do we can do this better?" And

I said, "I would love to do that, but I want you to go into your YouTube analytics and see where people join the conversation and where they leave the conversation and see if there's some type of a trend and what we found was most people do not stay the entire time during the

service, which tells me one thing. Uh, that our services are too long. Our sermons are too long. Our worship time is too long. A lot of times everything just feels longer when you're watching it online versus when you're in the room.

And that is a huge huge wake-up call to the church that's wants to go digital is that we've got to figure out how do we shorten those periods of time and have them so that they're somewhat optional in the sense that I only want to tune in for really great worship or I

want to tune in for just the sermon or maybe it's not a 25 minute sermon, maybe you should be doing three episodic style sermonettes that are joined together under the the the you know, the guise of a full service.

Wow, breaking up into three different sermonettes. Are we allowed to do that? I'm I'm pretty sure that's like anti-biblical, right? I mean, I I I I feel like like so many people are doing the 40-minute sermon that there's somewhere in in something it says that the sermon has to be 30 to 40

minutes all constrained together in live. If they concentrated on the intertestamental, uh, in between the Old and the New Testament, there were certain rules that were allowed to be broken and it was one of them.

You can do sermons in three rather than a one sermon. That's got to be the same place where it would talks about how all new technology comes from the devil because I've had that quoted to me a couple dozen times as well.

Uh, because that's biblical. Uh, it comes from fallen angels. Um, sorry. Chip, chip. He's You've got people, I've got chips. So, we'll we'll brush that off and and and and move on.

Nice. So, hey, you've got uh, you've got Man, you sound like you're you're really what you're talking about is is maximizing our weekend services, our the content that we're creating.

Pastor, you're putting so much energy into creating the sermon. Let's maximize that. Let's break it up into clips, put it on social media, get it on YouTube and create that that digital strategy.

You know, some some of the stats coming out of Barna. Um, if people are lost to people called to Christ, they're not connecting with with our buildings and they're not connecting with our online services.

People called to Christ, they're either asking their friends about Jesus, uh, that they think may have an answer to their spiritual questions. Um, or they're going to Google.

And so, by really utilizing our our content, but breaking it up into ways that's more searchable, um, then now we can start to maybe even have a digital strategy that's part of our evangelism strategy.

So, I'm I'm excited about that. But talk to me a little bit here because I think there's opportunities, maybe's the right word, to start to do stuff outside of the weekend service.

Like, what would I I I've got this friend that's like I said, he's starting a podcast, uh, where he's just telling stories about the church or, you know, somebody that wants to write blogs, uh, for for the church.

And And And I I feel like I've seen that be successful in some places and I feel like I've seen that be a train wreck, if I'm honest, and and and some other places.

So, how how do you coach beyond a weekend service? How how would you handle or approach some of the other content that's non-weekend based?

Well, remember, so there's there's four things I want to talk to you about. The first one is goals. What you talked about get past goals.

But you just said goals and and what I hear you leaning towards is bringing people in. So, that whole connection, that could be a goal, but ultimately, I think that we need to uh, have have maybe three or four goals and what we need to make sure that we do effective communication rises

and falls on how well you know your audience. Every single time, if I know who's listening to this podcast and I can talk directly to them, then then I will I will engage with them and they will they will want to listen to me.

So, so number two after goals is number two, do your research. And I know it sounds boring, but you really do need to know your research.

And so, that's kind of multiple, uh, paths as well, but but like and it's going to sound like this, you know, crazy marketing communications guy who harps about knowing your audience and then stereotypically describing them.

So, that's called a persona. So, just try to figure out who who uh, in your community would be attracted to this. Now, when it gets on the digital side of things, I mean, we have the world's the limit.

Talk about what a time to be alive. I mean, we get to reach anyone we want, but if you try to reach everyone, you'll reach no one.

So, you want to make sure that you create a small persona that you say, "You know what? I I can speak to that person." And and what you want to do in that stereotypical description is you need to create needs, concerns, and goals.

So, what are their biggest needs? What are their biggest concerns? What are their biggest goals? And this is not the the Sunday school answer.

We know they need Jesus. What is their biggest concern? They are concerned about going to heaven. Uh, what is their biggest goal? To live a good life.

I mean, like all of those Sunday school answers, like that's not what people are waking up concerned about. And so, we need to figure out what is it if you're going to stereotypically describe a persona and the smaller the group, the easier the reach.

So, so it like just make sure that there's enough there. Like, you don't want to have I want to target young families with 12 gerbils.

Like, I mean, you there's just not going to be enough, but if you said young families with the average two children who just moved to the area or just moved away from their support system, like immediately, as soon as you start talking about needs, concerns, and goals, you immediately think, "Okay, so I think I could probably figure out what they're looking for." But you just needed to you you need to describe that persona and you can have a primary persona and a secondary persona.

And you can even have a tertiary persona, but the more personas you have, the harder it becomes because you want to try to figure out a thread that unites those personas.

So, the tension that that I hear in this regularly with the idea of personas, and I agree with you. And even in digital contexts, digital churches, you know, I have the conversation all the time.

You try to reach everybody, you reach nobody. Um, you know, Seth Godin says, marketing guy, you're not going to reach a billion people. A billion people don't care about anything you have to say.

You want to create a message specific for someone. Get them to hear it, own it, get them to understand it, get them to tell somebody else.

And so, like the idea of of a persona is makes from a marketing standpoint, from a a be known for something standpoint, uh, from a uh, communication standpoint, makes a lot of sense.

Uh, I I've seen a lot of churches and a lot of pastors be anti that idea. Um, you know, Paul's uh, be everything to everyone so that some may know, uh, seems to be kind of like the the ideology that's kind of pushed out um, when when kind of battling against this idea of creating personas. You know, you can talk about Saddleback Sam all day long, but, you know, there there still is there's hesitancy there. How do you How do you address that hesitancy?

Yeah, and usually what I say is, "How's it working for you?" Because almost everyone almost everyone who is struggling and, you know, 80 to 85% of churches are in stagnation or decline and it's because they're just trying to reach everyone.

And and if they were to specifically target, you know, create some rails so that they know who is it that we're really trying to get through the doors and who is it and when I say through the doors, to your website as well.

But how how you keep them, it's so much easier if it's a clearly defined group. And and once you know needs, concerns, and goals, like if you think, "So, what are the greatest needs of everybody? What are the greatest concerns of everybody? What's the greatest goals of everybody?" I mean, choose one. And the problem is is that you might choose one direction that that's not the band, but the one direction that uh, 95% of the people that are listening to you will be bored and not want to listen again. And so, that's where you want to try and it sounds it sounds like a a crazy saying, but give them what they need on the backs of what they want.

And if we can figure out in that small group, what is it that they want? What is the solution to a need or a solution to the concerns or a path to the goal?

It if you know, okay, so if we go back to our our young family who has just moved away from their support system and they've just moved into a new area.

I mean, one of their biggest goals is I need to get my kids into a really good school system and I need to get them to to get friends so that they can be, you know, acclimatized to to wherever they are.

Well, if your church can come alongside of them and say, we want your kids to have good friends. Well, all of a sudden every parent goes, that's that's what I'm looking for.

And then you think, well, that's pretty soft for a church. But if you can attract them and attract the engagement from what they want, then once you have that engagement, then you give them what they need.

So, oftentimes the church just jumps right to what they need. You know what you need and they they tune out. And and it's hard to get them back.

So, tell me about number three. Yeah, and I can I just finish two just a little bit though cuz I it I I'll wake up in the middle of the night going, I should have talked about so we need to make sure you get the right keywords.

So, based upon your persona, that research cuz two, remember, is research, make sure you get the right keywords. It is, especially in the digital world, um figure out what they're looking for.

So, if a person if your persona, like if you're looking for young moms, like here's a here's a really simple, easy-to-use practical thing. So, open up a browser, go to google.com, you know, they they rule the world, and start typing in young mothers want.

And then Google will supply the language and it like you'll have that little tumble down thing. And so, what they've done is they've said, okay, so when people are searching for young mothers want or young mothers need or whatever you want to say, um they know what what young mothers are Googling.

So, they'll they'll give you the answer to what you should be known for. So, often times you can look at that and say, oh, so you know what?

They want small groups or they want groups or they want other young moms or they want tips for children or whatever those things are, look how like go down the list and say, so is there something there that we can actually use as a keyword?

And and keywords now, as you I feel like I'm I'm speaking to the choir here. So, let me just turn around and talk to the choir.

So, Jeff, you you know all about this. I mean, it's not just a keyword anymore, it's a key phrase. So, we need to we need to have a phrase that's, you know, three, four, five words that you can own, but you can own it in your digital content and it's also something that people are Googling. So, if you can get that, like that's what sets up your content strategy for for actually winning. So, it's it's really doing the keyword research.

keywordtool.io is a great free place and you can pay to get, you know, a little bit more information from that, but just going to google.com is a great way to be able to do it.

Great. We'll put links to keywordtool.io and and and Google. Evidently, young mothers want encouragement. That that just popped up number one. So, if young mothers want encouragement, um then what you do is you create that as a key phrase and then you make sure that you have either a URL that has a slash keywords or with that key phrase spelled out afterwards, so that a page is actually called that. And then you want to make sure Oh, so let's just jump to number three.

So, after research, we got to create some content and part of creating that content is to offer them solutions and you do that through all of your digital channels.

And this is where it again is not that complicated. Whatever your key phrase is, your page should be named it. Your headline should contain it.

Your first paragraph needs to have it in it. The closer to the front of the of the sentence that's the better. And then if that's so, H1 content is like your main headline.

If you're a pastor, you you understand H1 cuz H1 is the sermon title. Then you have your three points underneath. Those are your H2s.

They're supporting to your H1. And then your H3 are your subpoints to your H2. So, that's the way every page every page needs to be set up that way.

So, your H1 contains your your key phrase, your first paragraph, which is your P tag, if you're if you're following tracking along with the the whole website setup, whatever is the first P tag on like paragraph standard stuff, no one will read it except they'll look at the first of that paragraph and if you supply that key phrase, which is the solution, then people go, oh, I'm on the right page and then they'll not read the paragraph and then they'll jump down and they'll look at the outline, the H2s and the H3s, and you want to make sure that you contain your phrase two or three times on each one of those H2s, H3s. Um not on everyone, but just every so often. And then uh we also know in that scanning that again, write it in paragraph form, no one will read it.

And then you just want to just make sure everything else is scannable and that you add links so that it takes you internally, add links so it takes you externally at least one time on every page, and then you also want to add signal words, those things that everyone loves in sermons where you start by saying initially, we need to know. Initially is a signal word to say, we're at the beginning of all of this. It's what I did where I said, we have four things.

So, the first thing, that's a signal word. And then when I finally get to four and I say, finally, we'll deal with finally is a signal word.

So, all of those things Google just loves loves loves signal words because it means that you thought through the content, you edited the content, added in signal words so that people who are scanning can quickly know where they are on the page.

Okay, so signal words was new to me. I'm going to like I I thought I was was up on SEO stuff. Um very interesting.

Thank you for that. What what I would even just add to that in a lot of times being in web design, uh people look at H1 and H2 and they use H3s, they use them as design, but they don't understand that it's not about design, it's about how Google is interpreting the text.

It's about SEO. That the Google does not know the size of your H1, H2, H3 and often times the size kind of dictates, ooh, I need a little bit smaller, so you go to something else.

No, what Google does is it it extracts from that a good outline. So, if you, you know, I always say, don't set up your content on your page first, set it up in Word and don't add any other formatting or anything.

It needs to quickly say, oh, okay, so you have Remember when we were in high school when they taught us that Roman numerals are the big one and then you underneath that you go with one, two, and three and then you have A, B, and C.

Whatever structure you have, those structures then have to to uh correlate in the H1, H2, H3. That's so good. Yeah, but by the way, what's this word you speak of?

I don't I'm a Mac guy. Why would I use What's Word? I don't I don't I never use Word except for when I'm writing for magazines who always require it in Word, but I I actually write in Pages.

They're magazines. They're PC guys. They don't know. I mean, come on. I have I have a higher standard for you, my my friend. I I can't believe So, really, I mean, and and just the as a signal word, I mean, so number one is set some goals that are measurable and achievable.

Number two, research the heck out of your personas and your keywords. I would also add in there your competition. And I know that in the church world, we really don't have competition, but when you're when you're concentrating on a need, concern, and a goal or if you're thinking about a solution to a need or concern or a path to a goal, somebody else is out there offering a solution, the same type of solution that might not be on the spiritual side, but it might be on the more temporal side.

Know what other people are when they Google who else is popping up there and you really need to do it better than them. So, jump in, look at their look at their the way that they've structured their pages.

Why is it that Google gave that page over your page? And and really break it down to say, so is it SEO? Is it good content?

Is it that Oh my goodness, they have so much content that there there's no way to even catch up to it. If that's the case, you might want to back away from that solution or or you know, that pain in your persona's life.

Um and then so after research, then you just got to start creating and part of creating is what you're talking about, Jeff. Look at who you have for a team and can they really do it?

Yeah, a pastor can create a sermon. I've been in a lot of churches where the pastor can barely create a sermon, but that's like a whole other thing.

And but the thing is is that it's tough to create good content. Every pastor, I can hear them saying amen in the background.

Especially when you have all the other distractions and on digital, there is a ton of distractions of other people saying, I can give you something better, I can do this, I can do that.

And so you need to have really, really good, good content that's SEO quality that rises to the top, but does your team actually produce it?

And when we're thinking about content as a strategy, I mean, we're talking about blog posts, about ebooks, case studies, templates, infographics, and like the king of all content right now is video.

So, do you have somebody who can do good video and edit it and get it out there? Uh podcast, what we're doing, social media posts, like all of that stuff.

I know every church goes, yep, we're going to be just like Life Church or just like Seacoast. And and it's like, okay, so how many people are on your team?

Well, we have one volunteer who gives us two hours a week. Well, you ain't going to be like Life Church because Life Church has a whole bunch of people working on their team.

So, so what you need to do is put it through the filter of your team to say, what can we do extremely well so that it'll rise to the top and maybe you can't do it all.

And I know that that hurts, but it's better to do some things really well than to try to get everything done in an extremely not so well way.

Let me ask this. You said video, I mean, obviously video is king right now. I say that obviously, if you're not in the audience or if you're in the audience and you didn't know that, video is king right now.

But beyond video, I'm wondering what else is true like if there is there a hierarchy? Is is there a ranking? Like what what else is playing strong, maybe not as strong as video, but but stronger than others?

Do you have any any feel for maybe I don't have a video guy, but I should focus on this next? Yeah, so um weirdly enough, I I know that there was a research study just done about what type of content are people requesting from certain organizations and I know that by far, video was the number one. Now, they could they could actually select several. Um video, I think was like fifty-six percent said that that's what they're preferred.

So, it's I mean, it's it's the majority, but it's still not like a hundred percent cuz there's still a lot of people including myself, to to be totally honest, um when I just have a video and I sit down and I think, oh man, I need to Oh my goodness, it's like ninety minutes long. Are you kidding me? I How on earth and there's no chapters in there, there's no breakdown. Like I I look for something that I that's really scannable, which is on the blog side of things, which is actually the least preferred method.

So, we have video at the top and I know that blogs are at the bottom and I think it's because people suck at doing blogs.

Like they they just don't do good good scannable content. I think it's like seventeen percent said blogs um and then everything in the middle. I I know um emails rank about in the middle, but again, like they don't qualify.

What does it mean cuz content uh just because you say I have content doesn't mean it's good content. And so, an email that's written properly with one point and one ask uh and is like about fifty words is really good content and people would prefer it, but the problem is in the church world, our emails are are usually close to nine hundred words and they are talking about several different things and by the end of it, you're thinking, so what did they want from me?

Like seriously and and that's when you usually close it, you don't read any of it. So, is it easier or harder to write a fifty-word email than than a nine hundred?

Okay, so I taught a Sunday school class in North Carolina before we moved to to Jacksonville, Florida. And I mean, we had like one hundred sixty adults in that Sunday school class and our thread, the thing that kind of, you know, the big solution because it was forty- and fifty-year-olds, it was, okay, life is complex, this class is going to be simple and it's going to be simple but practical. So, simple and practical became our big thread. And uh I spent probably three days thinking about everything I could say and then uh when when push comes to shove and I'm trying to come up with the one point that's going to make this simple and then how do I make it practical, that editing process is the toughest thing. You know, eliminating all the unnecessary and I know that this is a long-form discussion.

Um if you were to say to me, can you just sum this up in one paragraph? It it will take me uh probably about an hour to do that.

To take a long amount of content and and get it into a small in the same way your emails that are going out, it should take you longer to write your subject line than it takes you to actually write the email because it's the subject line that will determine whether someone will open it or not. On your headlines, you the research to figure out what is the key phrase that needs to go into that headline should take you longer than writing the whole content.

Uh it it's really tough and that's where you need a good communications person. I mean, to be honest, like you you just pulled the thread for me.

I love to communicate. I hate communications. Like I and I I've played communications role several times. I'm I'm um I am I'm actually operating as a communications director right now for a for for a Christian nonprofit and um digging in to where you like, okay, I've got this idea that's one hundred fifty words.

I need to I need to slash this thing down to fifty. It's hard. It's painful. Honestly, it takes more time than I want to do than I than I want to give to it.

But the stuff that goes viral, the stuff that has the response rate to it, the stuff that isn't that I have engagement on, it's all centered around the the things that I have cared for.

Um you know, even some of the even the blogs through the Church Digital, the ones that are effective are the ones where I took the time to do the the H2 tags.

The the ones where we structured it in such a way that it that it was uh valued on the SEO and and we've seen massive results on on some of this stuff.

Uh but it's where we didn't rush it. We we took time to get it structured in such a way for it to be effective.

Well, to give you a an idea of um of just keyword research. I mean, our website, we've had our website for a long time and I was I was speaking at at some conference and and I mentioned to my team who helps me with the website and I just said, so we've done the research, right? Like we have the right key phrase that our our website's all about and they're like, oh yeah, yeah. And I said, why don't we do it again?

Well, come to find out, so we our key phrase was church branding. And and I thought, okay, well, that's that's really tough to actually, you know, if someone's looking for church branding group, there happens to be a few others out there, not as good as us, but I digress.

Uh but when we did our our research this time, the weird thing is anytime that someone's looking for church branding, they're looking for church logo branding.

And that's that three-word key phrase, so we ended up we we went from top to bottom of our website and we added logo between church and branding, we got six times the amount of people coming to our website by adding that one word in the middle of church and branding.

So, so like like just spend the time, and if you don't like the research, uh figure out somebody who will. Like find somebody who loves that that keyword searching and getting deeper, and then like just go through every one of your pages on your website, and and make sure that the content has the key phrase. What is this page all about, and make sure that it's in your headline, your first paragraph, and then your H uh two and H three tags.

Awesome. So good. By the way, that's why Okay, so we're at four. Yeah, yeah, let's do it. What's four? So, so number one, set goals.

Number two, uh research. Have I mentioned research enough? Like just it's boring, I know, but it if you do it right, it will it will really work well.

And pastors need to to do that research, too, for their sermons. Like put some keywords in there that someone in your congregation would actually want to listen to.

Uh and you'll have more people listen to it. And then three is create really good content, and four is timing. You just got to get the timing right.

What's really kind kind of crazy is that again, it goes back to to your team as well, but there's got to be a rhythm.

Imagine if if uh you discovered your new network TV show, and you say, "Oh my goodness, it's just so good." And then every week it's on at a different time.

If you don't have a DVR, it would drive you absolutely crazy. And in the same sense, if you're pushing content that people really like, they need that to know when it's coming out.

So that like what is doable? Is it one to two times a week? Is it one time a week? If if you do a you know, church service, you do it Sundays, usually.

Maybe it's a Thursday and a Sunday, but just create a rhythm that you can keep up with. And then make sure it's sustainable. Make sure that that whatever you decide to start with, that it that you can do it.

Because I think every person who decided to write a blog says, "You know what? I could probably write a blog every day." And it's like, "No, you can't write a blog every day." I I can barely write I'm doing one to two articles a week.

There's I have a hard time keeping up with that when you have to do all the research and and get everything spell checked and grammar checked, and make sure that it's the content that people are looking for.

So make sure that that the the rhythm is there, and that the sustainability is there, and then ultimately figure out what channels you want to be known on.

And and limit yourself. Like get it down to to some place that you're going to get really good success. You know, Joe Rogan, he's on Spotify.

Like he he didn't decide to go on many different platforms. People will find you and find that content, and then once you get a following, then you can add on a few other things.

But but especially for the small church, just make sure that you're you're on a channel that you know your personas are on. And then ultimately know when your personas are bored.

And so when they're bored, they're going to probably go to content and uh or needing motivation. Um if you're going with young families, do not do it early evening because they they are busy with their kids.

So figure out Most kids go down at nine o'clock nine o'clock's a great time to be posting on social media. Yeah, and even that's a that's a digital ministry tip there, too.

A lot of your online small groups, things like that, know the audience. And um six o'clock in the evening's a bad time for for most people.

Uh during business hours is a bad time as well, cuz most people have jobs during the day. And so um a a lot of that engagement, a lot of the conversation And and if you do on-demand stuff, like that's that's just a whole other bird than than doing live stuff.

Um if you do live, I would make sure that you have it on demand as well. Um and then watch the analytics to see are more people watching it when it goes uh you know, on on the demand on the archive.

And maybe you don't need to do a live performance. Maybe you need to to have more of a structured edited piece. And consistency, and you you alluded to that earlier as well, is so key.

Um stick with it, be consistent, evaluate. Don't be afraid to pivot or or shift, but um it's going to take time. Well, and and let me even ask that question.

Um so I'm trying something. How long do I really evaluate before I'm like, "Hey, that's not working."? Yeah, and a lot has to do with goals.

So I would I would at least try something for a quarter. Okay. So a quarter of the year. That's why, you know, most businesses have switched to quarterly reports.

Um take a look at the end of the quarter and say, "Was it really worth it?" And if if you think that there's a little bit of traction, and you really enjoy doing that content, then I would try it for another quarter.

But if you're in stagnation or decline, and and I mean this this we could do a whole podcast about this. But if you're in stagnation or or decline, either you're trying to get the wrong group of people in and interested in your information, or the information is wrong, or the timing's wrong.

So so you need to you need to figure out so what's broken and what's working, and and especially at the very beginning, like tweak and and fix things.

If you're in stagnation, you really are in decline. So um you know, you have two audiences. You have internal audience, your congregation, and you have your external audience, which is the community, the potential audience.

Um focus on the potential, and don't always give in to the internal. Uh because most times if you focus internally, you'll end up in decline.

So so good. All right, well let me ask this. How do I get started? Uh let I'll make make it about me for a minute.

I I got I got limited volunteer crew. I don't have time. Um it I want to experiment. What what would an experiment look like?

Um I mean is is is three months necessary? Like can it can it would a shorter span span work? How How would somebody maybe even get started doing this?

Yeah, I wouldn't go too short because there's a lot of content out there, and to break through, you need to have some track record.

Um you know, be known for something is all about discovering your thread. I find that most churches are saying far too much, and that they need to figure out what is the one thing that you can become known for.

And if that thing is relevant and needed in the minds of your persona, then then they'll start relying on you. So so what would I start with?

I would start on discovering your thread. Try to figure out what is that one thing that we can communicate over and over and over and over and over and over, so that everyone who samples any portion of your content will hear that over and over and over and over again, and say, "You know what? That's good stuff. I need to be there." And then it also gives words, so that if somebody else that they're talking to says, "You know what? All I need in life is this." And it's like, "You know what? Um who's the guy that talks about that?" And and then will will know you because you have a thread that unites all of your ministries, and that you become a branded house rather than a house of brands.

So so really try to figure out like what is that thread, that beneficial thread that everyone in your audience needs, and and it'll just work.

And it'll also calm things down, and you can say less, and people will listen more. Branded house versus house of brands. I mean, that's that's a whole other conversation unto it unto itself.

So well, hey, this has been this has been awesome. This has been a huge help. Um I'm still not exactly sure what I'm going to do, but at least I have more information as I'm I'm walking into that.

So so thank you for the free coaching I mean podcast that we did here uh for the church uh digital audience. This was great.

Hey, um I mean, you got your If you're watching on YouTube, you see the video or see you see the the book uh Be Known for Something.

As wrapping up, maybe just talk a little bit about the book, and uh we'll put links in the show notes for that, but I know that's that's been a big deal for you.

So uh maybe just share a little bit about what the book's about there, Mark. The book really just walks you through how do you discover your thread?

How do you figure out your personas? How do you figure out what their needs, concerns, are? What are the solutions to those needs or path to the goals?

And then how do you structure that tagline that becomes a thread, so that it works through all of your ministries. The cool thing about the book is that it's written as a workbook, so at the end of every chapter, there's there's lots of questions that says, "Okay, you you've been nodding along, but here are some things that you need to have written down in order to make sure that uh you can go into that next chapter.

So, it's a great team read book if you if you have a small team that you want to walk through. And the cool thing is is that if you well, Amazon has it if you want single copies.

If you want multiple copies, you can go to our website beknownforsomething.com and click on books or beknownbook.com will also take you to that page.

And and you can buy multiple packs that at a discount so so that you can team read it. Well, hey Mark. Thanks for for jumping on the time here.

We will have to do a podcast with our good friend Ben Stapley and find some topic to do that here in the near future.

He's further up the coast now up in uh Jersey. And so we miss him down here in in in in Miami. But definitely looking forward to this.

Thank you for this time. And we're going to wrap. So for audience out there for Mark, my name is Jeff obviously with the Church Digital and Digital Church Network.

Thanks for jumping on the show here and we'll see you next time the pod. You all have a good day.