Prep the turkey, belt out a few Christmas carols, the holidays are here!
Thanksgiving and Christmas offer a special opportunity to use your church website to increase giving, grow your church, and communicate effectively with your fellowship. First impressions begin before visitors step in your door—it starts from your church website and online presence (no… not presents!).
Follow these five tips to get your church website holiday-ready for both your local fellowship and new visitors.
1. Add Holiday Events to your Church Calendar
The holiday season is a natural way to reach out to your local community and invite them to holiday events and special Christmas services. Families, singles, young couples, and recently moved households are on the lookout for holiday events so add any upcoming gatherings that you have on your Church Calendar such as that Turkey Bowl, your young adult White Elephant party, or Christmas Eve candlelight service.
Social Media Tip: Add events to your church’s Facebook Page as an Event in addition to your website! Your event will appear in Facebook’s event feed when people browse for upcoming events, plus your church members can easily invite their friends on Facebook to attend.
2. Tis the Season for Giving
December is the month for warm hearts and generous gifts. In fact, 31% of charitable giving happens in December! (Neon, 2023) Is your website ready to accept online giving? With the increase of mobile use, online giving offers an easy way for your members to give throughout the week and on their own schedule.
Giving Tip: Create a ChurchSpring Giving account or dedicated page for giving! ChurchSpring offers a ready-to-go Integrated Giving Platform with a built-in admin section to manage and track donations so all you have to do is plug in your information, and you’re set! ChurchSpring’s Giving Engine also adds a Give button at the top of your site to make is easy for website visitors to donate.
3. Make a Good First Impression
Just like you would dress up for a holiday party, spice up your church website with holiday images to make visitors feel warm and welcomed. Update your home page slider with a manger scene or twinkling lights, add a background video on any Block, and upload your sermon series photos to reflect the season.
Content Tip: Browse your ChurchSpring Image Library for beautiful holiday photos or you can upload your own images. Need a Christmas video background? We recommend Pexels as a great resource for free videos.
4. Clean House and Spread the Christmas Cheer
Pull out that mop and broom and put some digital elbow grease into cleaning up your church website! Conduct an audit of your website’s main pages that visitors will land on to learn more about your church and then update the content. Is your staff accurately reflected in your Leadership page with recent photos and bios? Does your About page welcome new visitors by explaining what they can expect when they visit your church? Is your church’s contact information still up-to-date?
Communications Tip: Add your special holiday service times and dates to your middle Services bar.
5. Have Fun!
Show your church’s personality and spread the Good News of Jesus’ birth with your church website! Add a special blog article with a link or videos of your top Christmas worship songs (we love Lauren Daigle’s Silent Night)! Did you know that you can embed a Spotify playlist on your website? Here’s how. Share your Advent book recommendations, that special Christmas cookie recipe that is always a hit at your church potlucks, or top ways that your membership can bless your local community with opportunities to give financially or volunteer their time.
Holiday Tip: Save time and stress by scheduling your blog articles to post on your church’s Facebook or Twitter pages right within your church website. ChurchSpring’s Social Scheduler will have you humming Christmas carols all day long as you easily post a blog, event, or sermon on your website and quickly schedule social posts throughout the month so you can finish your holiday communications ahead of schedule!
