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Catalyst Denver One-Day

Catalyst Denver One-Day

March 8, 2018
$79 Tickets

Once again we have an opportunity to offer discounted tickets to the Catalyst One Day Training event in Denver.  Again this year it will be held at:

Cherry Hills Community Church
3900 Grace Boulevard
Highlands Ranch, CO 80126

It is often said that change is the only constant and we know that our world is constantly advancing, shifting, and adapting, but how do we lead in these new realities?

Join Craig Groeschel, Lysa TerKeurst, and Levi Lusko as we examine how to anticipate coming change before it arrives, create a strategy for transition, and map a compelling vision for the future.

Bring the entire team! Together you’ll learn to:

  • Foresee problems and opportunities before they arise
  • Create and communicate a strategy for change
  • Understand organizational life cycles
  • Establish a different way of thinking
  • Foster a culture that embraces change and fuels progress

REGISTER HERE!

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Cultivating Generosity

Date: January 24, 2018
Time: 10 am to 2 pm
Location:
Good News Community Church of Broomfield
5511 W 136th Ave,
Broomfield, CO 80020
Presenter: Pastor Matthew Fite
Most pastors do not see themselves as effective fund raisers.  Few enjoy talking about the financial component of ministry, let alone soliciting people to give. Yet, stewardship is a critical component of discipleship and a revealing window on the heart of those who follow Christ.
Pastor Fite will lead us in the exploration of this important topic. Some of the areas for our discussion will be:
  • Preaching on Generosity.
  • The importance of leading by example.
  • The 5 reasons people give.
  • The generosity Ladder.
  • Following up with first-time givers.
  • Electronic Giving is now a non-negotiable -the culture has already changed.
  • Quarterly Giving Letters.
  • Always say thanks.
  • Generous Givers Dessert.
  • Setting the Annual Budget.

Register For the Event

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Hurricane Harvey Relief Opportunities

Calvary Church in Longmont, Colorado, sent a group of six to Ingleside, Texas, to assist Calvary Relief in clean-up from Hurricane Harvey, for one week in November 2017.  This area between Rockport and Corpus Christi, Texas was in the center of the eye of the hurricane and sustained substantial damage and are still trying to recuperate.  Not only was there damage from the winds of the hurricane, but over 70 tornados hit the area during the hurricane.  Many homes and businesses were totally destroyed.  Some structures were so damaged that when the rains came, they were unprotected and then the interiors were damaged as well. Even now, over three months later there are still huge piles of debris to be cleaned up and many structures to be repaired.

The group from Longmont spend the week replacing a roof for Jerry, who is a disabled Vietnam veteran and his son.  Clean-up was done in his yard and several other homes to pick up debris from the hurricane.  There are many areas of service needed when responding to a disaster.  There are no unimportant jobs or unimportant people; it is a team effort.  There is always something for everyone to do.  Over the week in Texas, relationships were developed, and there was the opportunity to share the gospel and invite those who were helped to the local church on Sunday.  The community was so grateful for the work that is being done to help them.

Calvary Relief is a non-denominational ministry that responds to areas that have been hit by natural disasters.   Pastor Curt Hencye and his wife Mary Jo aim to assist the elderly and those lacking resources for repairs to their homes.  Calvary Church became connected with Calvary Relief when Curt and Mary Jo came in the area to help in the Lyons and Longmont area after the floods in the fall of 2014. This ministry stays in disaster areas for months at a time to develop long-term relationships and especially to reach unbelievers through their work.    They are always in need of volunteers and donations for their ministry.  If your church is interested in helping, please check the Calvary Relief website (www.calvaryrelief.com) for more information.

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Connecting Church to Church

In the mid-1990’s Tom and Sheri Luksha, with their two sons, acted upon a deep sense of calling to leave Charlton, MA and travel West to plant a church in rural Montana.  The Lord led them to establish a Gospel outpost, naming it Grace Community Church, in the Ruby Valley of South Central Montana. They have now served faithfully for over 20 years.

Workers from First Baptist Church of Basin, WY

Hidden amongst arguably some of the most spectacularly beautiful landscape in God’s creation are people who are fiercely independent and acutely rugged. But also, like everywhere else, they are people who are often broken in spirit, isolated relationally, and overwhelmed by a sense of hopelessness.

Tom and Sheri have given themselves to not only share the gospel through the establishment of the church, but to share their very lives with the community.  Tom is a Chaplain with the Sheriff’s department, and the Luksha’s are known throughout the Valley as a resource of care and compassion. They have come to learn that rural ministry is best expressed not only in sermons on Sundays, but in life-on-life relationships. Then again that is what real ministry should look like in a suburban and urban context also.

The Luksha’s have been working for many years to give Grace Community Church a place to call home.  For most of the church’s existence, they have been meeting in rented space at the small country school in Alder, MT.  A number of years ago they were able to purchase property with a vision for ministry opportunity.  In addition to their home, they have developed a Bed and Breakfast ministry called Elijah’s Rest and have been working to convert a barn on their property into that church home for Grace Community Church.

Work nearly completed!

Recently, some men from First Baptist Church of Basin, WY, under the leadership of RMCN Area Coach Kent Dempsey and Pastor Aaron Gesch, traveled to Sheridan, MT to do additional work on the future home of Grace Community Church.  Their goal was to finish the exterior of the building before the onset of another harsh Montana winter.  This included the installation of backing board, siding, and a window.  Additional work was done on the interior of the building.

Your support of the Rocky Mountain Church Network can help bring together resources to aid one another in Kingdom expansion and Gospel impact.

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RMCN Spring Ministry Retreat: Leadership: Being a Culture Sculptor

In an article in the magazine Executive Leadership, Dick Clark, CEO of the pharmaceutical firm Merck noted: “The fact is, culture eats strategy for lunch. You can have a good strategy in place, but if you don’t have the culture and the enabling systems, the [negative] culture of the organization will defeat the strategy.”

Samuel Chand notes the importance of organizational culture:

  • Culture is the most powerful factor in any organization.
  • Culture is usually unnoticed, unspoken, and unexamined.
  • Culture determines how people respond to vision and leadership.
  • Culture most often surfaces and is addressed in negative experiences.
  • Culture is hard to change, but change results in multiplied benefits.

Our Keynote Speaker is Mark Hanke. Mark is the Senior Pastor of Salem First Baptist Church.  He has been a pastor for 26 years serving in three churches (two of which were in the Colorado Front Range are) and has taught at Denver Seminary as an adjunct professor in Theology for 20 years.  He has a Bachelor’s Degree in Education from Oregon State, a Master of Divinity from Denver Seminary, and DMin from Gordon-Conwell Seminary.

Mark will address the role of leadership in addressing the culture of your congregation.

  • The Power of (Congregational) Culture
  • Artistic Vision – Getting Others to See the Possibilities
  • The Art of Sculpting a Missional Culture – The Pastor’s Role in Shaping Congregational Culture

Date/Time:          5pm, April 24th and 3pm, April, 25th

Location:              Y of the Rockies – Estes Park Center

Keynote Speaker:             Mark Hanke, Senior Pastor, First Baptist Church, Salem, OR

  • The cost of the retreat will be $110 per person, spouses are free.  This will include dinner, breakfast and lunch.
  • Those driving greater than 3 hours will be gifted another nights lodging, dinner and breakfast .
  • Those driving less than 3 hours can get an additional nights lodging, dinner and breakfast for $80.00.

Eventbrite - RMCN SPRING MINISTRY RETREAT: LEADERSHIP: BEING A CULTURE SCULPTOR

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PREACHING BIBLICAL NARRATIVES

God’s primary way of communicating truth is through story.  Over 50% of the Bible was written in narrative form.  Seldom however, in our Biblical and Theological training are we taught how to understand, interpret and preach stories.  The results are that often stories are used to illustrate teachings found in other passages or treated as allegories.  Much of the theological richness of the text is silent for us since we have not been trained to handle story, as story. 

I want to spend time helping us understand how to interpret stories, prepare sermons from longer passages, such as many O.T. narratives are, in the same amount of time it takes to prepare for shorter passages and demonstrate how to preach stories in a way that reflects the essence of story.

We live in a media saturated society where story is king.  If we preach stories well we will increase interest and attention.  Plus we will discover rich truths that speak to people in ways other Biblical literature does not.

Date:                        May 16, 2017

Time:                       10 am – 2 pm, – Lunch Provided

Location:               Good News Community Church – 5511 W 136th Ave, Broomfield, CO 80020

Presenter:            Paul Borden – Author, Educator, Consultant

Eventbrite - PREACHING BIBLICAL NARRATIVES

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Preaching with Authority in a Secular Age

Eventbrite - PREACHING WITH AUTHORITY IN A SECULAR AGE
How do we handle the scriptures with integrity and preach with biblical authority yet do so in a way that still connects to the culture and concerns of people who live in a modern and secular world?  How do we move from a text written over 2000 years ago to a relevant and transformational message?

Date:                        September 20 , 2017,

Time:                       10 am – 2 pm, – Lunch Provided

Location:               Good News Community Church – 5511 W 136th Ave, Broomfield, CO 80020

Presenter:            Nick Lillo, Pastor – Waterstone Community Church

Eventbrite - PREACHING WITH AUTHORITY IN A SECULAR AGE

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Kingdom Theology and the Ministry of the Church

Jesus talked about the Kingdom all the time – more than any other subject.  But, what difference does the theology of the Kingdom make in the practice of ministry and the mission of the church?  If we are to be seeking the Kingdom first what does that mean in a practical way in how and what we do in church? How does it change our strategy, mission, and re-shape even our understanding of the gospel? Does the Kingdom require a shift in our paradigm of ministry!  As Gordon Fee said “If you miss the Kingdom – you miss everything!

Date:                        March 22, 2017

Time:                       10 am – 2 pm, – Lunch Provided

Location:               Good News Community Church – 5511 W 136th Ave, Broomfield, CO 80020

Presenter:            Nick Lillo, Pastor – Waterstone Community Church

Eventbrite - Kingdom Theology and the Ministry of the Church

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Changing Your Church’s Name

Over the last few weeks, I have been asked a couple of times about churches changing their names, specifically removing “Baptist” from their name. Many churches are doing this and I believe that the trend will continue for some of the reasons that I will share. From the personal experience of having led a name change, I can tell you that a wise pastor treads these waters carefully and intentionally. Let me give you several areas to consider when it comes to processing this discussion.

Cultural Denominational Disconnect

Early American immigration history is at the heart of the vast denominational diversity in America. A denominational identity helped people connect with their cultural religious identity. Even 30 years ago many rural communities’ dominant denominational representation was reflective of the immigrant migrations of the late 1800’s and 1900’s. Northeastern Kansas, where my family settled as immigrants, was predominantly Lutheran because it was a center of the German immigrant communities. After WWII and perhaps even before that, America was losing that European nationalism with the homogenization of our culture.

Add to this the secularization of the American culture over the last 30 to 50 years. Our post-Christian culture has produced an ever increasing number of people who have no religious, let alone denominational, identity. For many past generations there was at least distant relationship with the church, if nothing else as the place where weddings and funerals took place. Even that is now waning in our culture.

In The Rise of the Nones, James Emery White notes that those who identify themselves as having no religious affiliation are increasing at a surprising rate. The Pew Research Center notes, “In the last five years alone, the unaffiliated have increased from just over 15% to just under 20% of all U.S. adults.”

Because of this ongoing disconnect from the church, a non-religious individual’s understanding of the church and denominational branding has been formed by the media rather than by experiential knowledge. We know that the media, in general, does not paint a positive picture of the church. Baptist, along with many other denominational identifiers like Assembly of God and to a lesser degree Evangelical Free Church, are defined or judged by the unchurched by this media bias. Baptists are perceived by many in the public spectrum in a very negative framework, thus at times invoking a barrier to connecting with them.

Guilt by Association

For me the impetus to CONTEMPLATE DROPPING “Baptist” from the name of the church I was pastoring was the protesting by the Westboro Baptist church at the Matthew Shepard murder trials and their protesting at the funerals of military personal who were killed in the line of duty. People in our community made it clear that they understood that since they were Baptist and we were Baptist we must have been supportive of what they were doing.

One would need to assess the community’s perception of your church’s identity, part of which is your denominational connection, if that is part of your branding. This is not an easy task as many of the people in our church are insulated from the unchurched in the community.

Again, as we continue to generationally distance ourselves from the perceived American Christian culture from years past (each generation being increasingly identified as nones), our unchurched culture has an increasing deficit of understanding of the denominational distinctions. Even more important is their lumping all “Christian” faith groups together. For the unchurched there is little or no difference between any denomination, let alone those we in the church would identify as a cult. Their only perception is that some denominations are more negative or judgmental toward those who are not part of their group. 

Missional Focus

Most new church plants do not communicate a denominational identity. Tom Rainer notes that “Newer churches are consistently using descriptors in their names other than denominational affiliation. Some are focusing on their location. Others are at least implying a distinctive doctrinal leaning. And still others are using more trendy and less common terms.”

New churches understand that evangelism and growth are essential to the life (ongoing existence) of the church. As one church planter noted, “It is really only churched people who are looking for a specific denomination’s name and researching what a church believes when deciding whether or not to visit. Our church isn’t targeting churched people at all. I can’t tell you how many of our friends came to our church because of a relationship they had with us or someone else and found out only at our membership class that we are affiliated with a denomination.”

One of the reasons that church plants avoid denominational, or even traditional terminology, is that they want to create open doors of gospel opportunity. They understand that the branding of their ministries which includes their name, social network or media presence, facilities and other things are doors of relational opportunity to fulfill their Great Commission mission.

Paul noted this missional strategy in 1 Corinthians 9:19-22, “… To the weak I became weak, to win the weak. I have become all things to all men so that by all possible means I might save some.” He understood there were individuals that were in the sphere of his missional influence and he did whatever he could to remove any barriers to his being able to communicate the gospel to them. He declared his missionary identity in the missional strategy.

In the ministry where we changed the church’s name we did so because even though we were reaching people across denominational heritages, there were still those in the community for whom the name Baptist was an insurmountable hurdle. Our people were not willing to allow a word in our name to be a stumbling stone to the people in the community knowing Jesus. It was not easy to part with their First Baptist Church name. The name was full of fond memories and had a deep rich meaning to many, but there was a greater good to be had in giving that up, removing any barrier to people coming to faith in Christ.

How do you prepare a church that is deeply vested in a name for this type of change?

First of all mission and vison should drive the conversation. Mission relates to purpose and the purpose of the church is a relationally redemptive purpose. Vision goes to painting a picture of what it will look like when we are living out our purpose in our community. A well-crafted and communicated vision of what can be will always make what is unacceptable, a motivation for change. Leverage the influence of the board as vision communicators. If they cannot be excited about the vision, how can you expect the congregation to be supportive?

Secondly, when possible, celebrate the past as the reflection of the outward focused mission and vision. In most cases you can point to times in a church’s past where they stepped out in faith to be obedient to a Great Commission, Great Commandment purpose. Point the congregation to changes that they have made in the past that have brought about good results.

Give people time. I love the quote from Resilient Ministry regarding leadership. Harvard professors Ronald Heifetz and Marty Linsky have summarized that “exercising leadership might be understood as disappointing people at a rate they can absorb.” Wise leaders will bring people along, they will have thought through an intentional strategy. Introduce it as an idea that leadership is considering. Have multiple meetings where the leadership puts it on the table to have people express their thoughts and feelings. With that validate people’s apprehensions and feelings; often times people need the opportunity to express themselves before they can consider the value of the proposed change.

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How To Build a Total Online Church Presence

total online church presenceAt DayByDay Church Marketing, we believe every local church is uniquely gifted in its ability to share the gospel and multiply disciples who make disciples. There is a distinctive audience who is waiting to hear that message as only your church can tell it.

In this context, church marketing’s purpose is to help you reach those who will best respond to how your church shares the gospel.

And one of the best ways to do that is through creation of a Total Online Presence as taught by John Jantsch, founder of Duct Tape Marketing®.

While we are always cautious about treating a church or ministry like a business, many of the strategies we implement as Duct Tape Marketing Consultants will serve your church quite effectively.

At its most powerful, marketing is a well-integrated system whose parts function as a seamless whole. As a Certified Duct Tape Marketing Consultancy, DayByDay Church Marketing exists to help you put marketing in the service of your church or ministry.

While each church is unique, there is a model that provides the most reliable way to efficiently lay a foundation from which you can grow your online presence.
Your online church presence is the linchpin of your marketing system. And while each church is unique, there is a model that provides the most reliable way to efficiently lay a foundation from which you can grow your online presence.

Over the next few weeks, we’ll outline how to build the online presence that best enables you to reach the audience most suited to your church or ministry’s unique way of fulfilling the Great Commission.

Our hope is to provide you with the big picture thinking behind the system. This “Strategy First” approach enables you to make better decisions about what online tools and tactics will best serve your church’s mission, vision, values and goals.

Today, we’re going to provide a quick overview of the various components that make up your church or ministry’s Total Online Presence™.

church online presence1 Your Content Platform:

We take a strong “Listen First” approach when it comes to producing content. Understanding the conversation the people you want to reach are having about their faith (or lack of faith), about Jesus, and about your church is the first step.

The content you produce helps you get found and begin a conversation with the audience most open to your message and story, and who you are best suited to serve.

Build a sound content platform and all your marketing efforts will be enhanced.

Start by building a “social listening station” using tools like Google Alerts, HootSuite, TweetDeck, Trackur, Social Mention or Sprout Social.

From this point you can gain insight into your audience, other churches, ministries, and important groups, such as key journalists.

You can also begin the important task of understanding what motivates your audience to find you by doing keyword research.

Think of keywords being like chapters in your total body of content plan.

Use tools such as Google Keyword Tool or Wordtracker, to help you show up when people search online for a church or ministry. Create blog posts around these chapters, and create an editorial calendar to fortify your content platform.

Once you start consistently creating content, you can produce valuable short bible studies, FAQs, and eBooks that form a pivotal element in how people come to know, like, and trust you.

organic-seo2 Organic SEO:

Having someone type a search phrase that is key to your business and finding a blog post or page from your site is the ultimate payoff and, long-term, may be the difference between the success or failure of your content initiatives.

Search Engine Optimization can be complex and time consuming, but will pay off in more website visits from people who have entered a key search phrase that lands them on your blog post or web page.

Most organizations can generate significant results by you focusing on just three elements.

Produce keyword rich, educational content – we covered this above, but search engines live on blog posts and other educational content.

Make it easy on the search engines – Make the on-page elements, such as your blog titles, URLs, ALT image attributes, subtitles and internal links, work for you.

If you use WordPress, the Yoast SEO plugin is a must-have! This plugin helps you easily optimize every post and page on your website and blog with very little effort.

It also will produce an XML sitemaps that make it easy for search engines to grab your latest news and information.

Check out Search Engine News for a great primer on writing for SEO.

Draw lots of links naturally from other sites.

Simply writing great content will start this process, but so will writing guest posts (like I’m doing here), uploading content to places like YouTube and SlideShare, making thoughtful comments on other blogs, submitting online press releases and amplifying your content in social networks.

email-marketing3 Email Marketing:

Most churches and many ministries underutilize email marketing, because they associate it with spam.

But there’s a great practice used by reputable businesses that can help you build an email list of people who are eager to hear from you, and contribute to your church or ministry.

It’s called a “double opt-in.” This is a process that asks someone who’s entered their email on your site or landing page to confirm they want to receive emails from you.

Most autoresponders, like Mailchimp, Aweber, and Constant Contact allow this option and also provide clear instructions on every email you send how the recipient may unsubscribe from your list.

An engaged email list, eager to hear from you, is the most valuable marketing asset you can build.

500 responsive email followers trumps 2,500 Twitter followers every day when it comes to actually promoting the things that engage your audience. Focus on building a list of email subscribers that want to hear from you and social media will become a tool set to help you do more of that.

social media

4 Social Media Marketing

This is certainly an area where you should consider strategy before tactics. The first step is to understand how your ideal audience uses social media and how you can use social media to somehow serve them better.

If you do that, you’ll provide immediate value to your audience.

Create Twitter lists of influencers and active social participants you want to reach and add their social profiles monitoring and add them to your church management software. Add a tool like Rapportive to your email.

Then claim and build your profiles on Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+, YouTube, Picasa, SlideShare and Pinterest.

Your plan to work and engage your audience in all of these networks may not be clear yet, but the first step is to claim the free real estate so you can start exploring.

Start by sharing and re-sharing your and other people’s content. Building connections and discover best practices in each individual network, so you can begin to amplify your content and start finding ways to drive audiences to your eBooks, study guides, and newsletter.

plan your advertising5 Online Advertising:

Many churches and ministries waste money on advertising and then conclude it doesn’t work.

Pay per click advertising can be very effective when done right. One of our favorite things about it is that a platform like Google AdWords and Facebook allow you to test your thinking a dollar at a time.

Here’s our take on how to make ads pay – Use your ads to drive content awareness instead of simply to sell.

Drive Facebook users to obtain a copy of your eBook or a free study first and then stay in touch.
The basics of PPC are this: Use lots of punchy, vivid copy, but test, revise and test.

Create tightly focused ad groups with highly relevant ad copy, work negative keywords out of your list.

Test some more.

responsive web design6 Mobile and Location:

Mobile is more of a behavior than a tool. The first step is to analyze what behaviors your audience exhibits before you dive into or dismiss Foursquare or text messaging.

Be assured your customers are reading content, searching and using reviews to make decisions on mobile devices.

Claim your location based profiles in places such as Foursquare and Yelp .

Create mobile and tablet friendly viewing options with tools such as WPTouch, Tekora or GoMobi. Or better make sure your website is responsive, no matter what the device.

Start creating mobile specific content like event promotion pages that take advantage of the growing use of mobile devices as a major part of the decision process.

website analytics7 Analytics and Conversion:

Like many stage-based processes there is a cyclical aspect as well.

For some, creating benchmarks and key performance indicators is really the first step. So, if you’re one of those folks you can start here, because no matter where you are in the process this stage will always evolve.

Many people can’t start the process of measuring success until they are measuring in real time or can’t start the process of tweaking and testing until all of the elements are in place.

As you build make certain you install tracking code from tools such as Google Analytics, Spring Metrics or KissMetrics so you can begin to build the data to test and refine from.

We suggest starting by setting up an Google Analytics account. Google is great at providing tons of free training to help you understand what you’re looking at.

Then you can start building conversion goals, funnels and events, tracking your ads and split testing your landing pages, opt-in pages and sales pages to discover ways to increase conversion.

When you start to view it as a system, marketing your church becomes much less overwhelming.

In the coming weeks, we’ll break down each of these seven essential stages to help you build a Total Online Presence that will serve your church or ministry and enable you to more effectively share the Greatest Story Ever Told with the audience you are most suited to reach.

Certified Duct Tape Marketing ConsultantView Andy Catsimanes's profile on LinkedIn

About Andy Catsimanes

Andy Catsimanes is the founder of DayByDay Marketing and DayByDay Church Marketing (coming soon!) , dedicated to helping SMBs, churches, and non-profits identify and implement workable marketing systems for predictable growth.

Andy’s a Certified Duct Tape Marketing Consultant, direct response copywriter, and experienced WordPress professional. In his spare time, he volunteers as an ally for Circles® USA. For more articles like this, subscribe to the DayByDay Marketing Blog, or connect via LinkedIn or Twitter.