Death to Church Marketing?
Tony Morgan had an interesting post on his blog tonymorganlive.com this past weekend in which he encouraged all churches to immediately stop their marketing efforts. He writes that our hearts are pure in wanting more people to be in a relationship with Jesus Christ, but that traditional marketing and advertising are not going to make this happen.
I agree with the core message that Tony is getting at here. That if we choose to rely on our marketing strategy to bring people to Christ we will fail miserably. The only true way to attract people (like flies) is by sharing the life changing love of Christ with others. Though Tony seems to be taking a pretty extreme and radical view on this subject the questions he is asking are ones I think all churches should be considering before they design and distribute their next direct mail piece. Here are a few of them:
- If we stopped marketing, what would we have to change for people to invite their friends?
- If we stopped marketing, would the environment make people want to come back?
- If we stopped marketing, would the conversation be relevant to people’s lives?
- If we stopped marketing, would the relationships keep people connected?
- If we stopped marketing, might we actually help remove some of the noise from people’s lives?
- If we stopped marketing, would we get a better response when we start using marketing tactics?
- If we stopped marketing, are we more likely to be sensitive to God’s leading?
So, what do you think? Are we just adding to the noise with church marketing at the expense of truly changing lives? Let’s here your take on this.
Filed under other |4 Responses to “Death to Church Marketing?”
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Let’s go back to the wise and foolish builders. Anything that is not built on a solid foundation of Rock will not withstand any other forces.
If I tell a friend or a stranger about my church, I am marketing it. If we remove marketing, or contemporary services, or still had sermons only in latin or german or greek, then we aren’t doing all that we can to let people know how to find their savior.
TR
Thanks for the buttons. They are awesome and they give me a chance to explain what they me to others.
ho hum… Tony’s job at his church is the marketing expert. His profile says his job is to “develops creative solutions for communications, ”
When he quits his job and stops making money as a marketing expert and starts living it, I will start listening. Like he says in the post, “stop listening to guys like me.”
Okay, I will.
Your questions are good. But lets look at them from a different perspective. If you stopped marketing and all of these things fell apart, what does that say about the fellowship?
Clearly the focus of the Church should be on all of these things, not on marketing. Look at the one at a time:
“If we stopped marketing, what would we have to change for people to invite their friends?”
We would have to change people, through the power of the Holy Spirit (the same power that raised Christ from the dead!), to bring their friends into the Kingdom of God, and unto salvation! That’s the goal right? It’s not to get people to come to your program or to your particular gathering of saints. I hope it isn’t. If that’s the goal (to get people to show up), then the church has already failed. ctrl+alt+pray for renewal.
“If we stopped marketing, would the environment make people want to come back?”
I would certainly hope the communion of saints would be an attractive place to be! If you have to sell that through secular means, get back to the drawing board and turn back to God. I don’t remember Paul distributing fliers. Not one Epistle discusses “marketing.”
“If we stopped marketing, would the conversation be relevant to people’s lives?”
If the Gospel of Peace is not sufficient enough… If the grace which passes all understanding is not enough… People are seeking after vanity.
“If we stopped marketing, would the relationships keep people connected?”
These are all pretty redundant, but perhaps marketing does get in the way of these relationships. Why would individuals need to participate in the mission of the church when you have professionals spending their week focused on doing that? Division of labor, etc.
“If we stopped marketing, might we actually help remove some of the noise from people’s lives?”
There might be a spiritual thing here. We’re bombarded with all this marketing noise constantly. The younger generation is mostly immune to traditional marketing messages because they get so many every minute. If the Church just becomes another Verizon or Chevrolet, how exactly is that relevant? The Church has also forgotten contemplation, and silent meditation. It would do us all good to seclude ourselves from the marketing noise every once in a while. When you go to fellowship on Sunday and get the same intensity of marketing … I lost my train of thought.
“If we stopped marketing, would we get a better response when we start using marketing tactics?”
I don’t even know what “response” you’re looking for.
“If we stopped marketing, are we more likely to be sensitive to God’s leading?”
I read something about leaning “not on your own understanding.”
You’re doing a good job, I think, of helping people come back and realize exactly why it is we do what we’re doing. Sometimes work overwhelms and we forget.
I don’t know what Joe Miller’s problem is. He doesn’t really have anything to say with his comment, he’s just attacking a brother in Christ for being a hypocrite. That’s petty.
Steven, maybe my post came showed a lot more of my frustration than I had anticipated. And your suggestion that I have a “problem” or am just being “petty”: is hardly constructive either…
My comment was not meant to say Mr Morgan guy is a hypocrite, but what I am suggesting is that I would rather read a story about how he has changed his life based on his own maturity rather then read a list of things telling everyone else how to change theirs first.
Tony Morgan actually says something like this in the article when he writes “stop taking advice from guys like me”. All I am saying is that I will stop taking his advice and will wait for actions.
Like you explain in your comments, there is a spiritual reality that needs to be embraced and I guess I am just bored of the same talking-heads saying the same stuff and selling the same things… I would just love to read about some real ministry changes. That, to me, would be far more compelling.