🚢 Don't Sink the Ship

Greetings in Christ, Reader,

And welcome back to the marketing letter for those facing down next week's tidal wave🌊 of activity.

I'm much calmer about this than when I started out 20 years ago.

Speaking of waves, this week I had a reader reach out looking for help getting the digital marketing ship sailing for a mission plant. I laid out a strategy to get the basics in place. But, you know what? Most churches probably have a few leaky holes in the hull of their digital marketing. 🚢

So, that's what I'm covering in this special edition of the Church SEO Shapeup Newsletter - how to get your digital footprint in place so that you don't sink before even setting off.

Here is everything we're going to cover in this newsletter:

Christmas landing pages riding the wave and other news
AI is like the tides - it's coming, and you can't stop it
How the doctrine of the Holy Incarnation ought to flood our hearts with joy
Plugging up holes in the hull of your digital marketing

🗞️Personal and Business News

A favor to ask 🙏

Email providers are really killing deliverability for many senders right now. I've even noticed regular emails from parishioners getting flagged.

Email newsletters like this are always right at the edge of the deliverability cliff. A big thing you can do to help me with deliverability is by replying to this email.

Will you please reply and let me know if you prefer white or colored Christmas tree lights?

Your success is what matters to me

A few weeks ago, I published a newsletter detailing how to make a Christmas landing page for your church.

It resonated, and a raft of readers built one. I know of at least five. Two readers reported back that their page has ridden the SEO wave to the top of the results for queries like "Christmas Eve services near me," and "Christmas Eve services in {locale}."

My goal has always been to give all my knowledge for free. I may (rarely) charge for convenient access to that knowledge, and I definitely charge for my own personal effort. But, at heart, I am a do-it-yourselfer. It's how I acquired my digital marketing knowledge. And, that means I love it when others learn how to do things for themselves.

Let's keep working on our churches' SEO (and other digital marketing efforts) together.

Taking Time Off

I'll be taking time off from creating content until 2026. You'll still get automated emails from me, but don't expect any special editions of the newsletter or YouTube videos over the next few weeks. I won't be relaxing on the sand and sea at the beach, but I will be spending time worshipping the Lord and connecting with my family.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year

I pray that you have a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year. In Him all things are new. May He grant you a conscience free from shame, and a bright hope for the eternal day to come.

🌐Around the Web

The bots are coming for you. They are rolling in like the tides - unstoppable.

Local SEO expert Joy Hawkins has been observing more and more AI-powered local packs replacing the traditional local packs in search results. This trend is likely the wave of the future.

That might mean fewer opportunities to pop in the traditional "All" Google results. Charles Floate notes that the AI-powered local packs are reducing the number of visible slots to 2. You gotta put yourself in a position to win in AI.

AI is penetrating local SEO not only in results, but also at the profile level. Bodhi has observed that Google has been removing Q&As from Google Business Profiles. What's replacing Q&As? An AI-powered interface that pulls information from your website. This is one artifact of a greater preinciple has become more clear over the past months: Your Google Business Profile and your website are mutually reinforcing properties. If you want to appear well in local search, both need to have great SEO.

Speaking of AI results, local packs, and traditional link (organic) results, Sterling Sky (Joy Hawkins' agency) ran some tests showing that press releases are killing it in massively improving your rankings in all three. Check out my newsletter talking about how to conduct a press release campaign for your church. Press releases are my favorite church marketing tactic.

✅ Poll

Has your church ever done a press release campaign?

Yes

🙏 God Stuff

People sometimes like to hate on "Silent Night." I've even known some pastors who won't let the congregation sing it, thinking it's just empty sentimentalism.

I disagree - it teaches the proper and pure reaction to the wonder of the Holy Incarnation.

In his book "On the Trinity," the early church father Hilary of Poitiers notes:

The errors of heretics and blasphemers force us to deal with unlawful matters, to scale perilous heights, to speak unutterable words, to trespass on forbidden ground. Faith ought in silence to fulfil the commandments, worshipping the Father, reverencing with Him the Son, abounding in the Holy Ghost, but we must strain the poor resources of our language to express thoughts too great for words. The error of others compels us to err in daring to embody in human terms truths which ought to be hidden in the silent veneration of the heart.

Hilary's point? The truth of the Trinity is far beyond the ability of the human mind to comprehend. It is, therefore, a truth that one ought to simply trust. The Trinity ought to simply flood the heart with gratitude and joy. Expounding on the Doctrine of the Trinity is therefore dangerous, though necessary to refute the errorists who would rob Christians of the comfort derived from the Trinity.

I always have trouble with Christmas and Easter sermons. How can one adequately reflect the miracles of the Holy Incarnation and the Resurrection in words? And yet, it is my calling to build up God's people in the faith, and so I speak, despite the difficulty.

But, the time will come (praise be to God!) when we will know Christ eye-to-eye, and none of His children will need to be instructed. Then, I can keep silent!

Until then, I'll keep preaching. But, I'll also keep singing Silent Night with deep joy.

🚢 Don't Sink Your Digital Marketing Before You Even Set Off

You can sink your church’s digital marketing before it ever really gets started.

And most churches do. They fail to get the right things in place, in the right order, and with the right information.

Whether you’re launching a church plant, opening a satellite campus, or leading an established congregation, this principle holds true: you can waste months and even years of digital marketing progress by messing these basics up.

Local SEO is slow by nature. It takes 6-9 months for your work to yield results. That means that mistakes don't just waste a few minutes of your time - they waste many opportunities to connect with people who could be blessed by your church.

That’s especially painful for a church plant—but it’s just as true for churches that have been around for decades and never fully set things up the right way.

The fundamentals

Before worrying about social media posts, ads, or fancy design, every church needs to get a few fundamentals right. I'll go over those fundamentals below, but If you're a video watcher, this is for you:

(Click here for the show notes on this video.)

1: Determine your primary locale.

Typically, think bigger rather than smaller. If you are in Maplewood (an inner-ring suburb of Saint Louis), target "Saint Louis."

One exception? If you're a hyper-local satellite of a regional church, go hyper-local with the name.

I have a workout specifically on this topic: workout-6-target-locales.pdf

2: Choose a "marketing name."

This will be different than your legal name and even your colloquial name. It should include the word 'church' and the primary locale you are targeting.

3: Determine a URL.

If you are or plan to be an independent congregation, get your own domain name. It should have your primary locale in it and the word "church." .church domains work really well for this. Always check for confusing or unintended spellings, and also check it on the Ahrefs free backlink checker and on the Wayback Machine to see if there's anything sketchy that shows up.

On the other hand, if you are a satellite, use a subdirectory on the main domain for the church.

4: Get an email address.

Branded (using your custom domain name) is ideal. Getting email via Google Workspace is cheap - usually free for most nonprofits like churches and less than $20/month if you don't qualify yet.

5. Secure a phone number.

But, forgo the landline unless you're a bigger operation. Virtual phones through services like Grasshopper and Openphone work well. Google the number you're considering first to make sure it hasn't been used for sketchy stuff.

6. Get a physical address.

You may not be able to do this right away if you are a mission plant. But, once you're going to be somewhere for at least six months, make sure to get an agreement in writing to make it easier to get a Google Business Profile.

7. Set up a web page.

Use my checklist to make sure it is search engine optimized. Always make sure that you have your name, address, and phone number on it. Also, link to your socials. Speaking of which,

8. Grab your socials.

Facebook and Instagram are a good start. Get some starter content on them, and update them regularly. Once a week is enough. The idea here isn't to go viral - it's to send legitimacy signals to Google (and human inquirers!)

Ensure that you have your name, address, and phone number on them, and also link to your website.

These two platforms will come in handy a little later on, for a Meta ads campaign.

9. Directory Citations

Wait until you have a physical address to build these. Shoot for about 50. That will give Google good confidence that you are a legitimate entity with a real location and phone number. Keep your name, address, and phone number completely consistent!

10. Get online mentions.

These can be from your church body, sister churches, and local businesses. Ideally, they will have your name, address, and phone number and also a link to your webpage.

11. Distribute a press release.

Use AI to quickly draft up a press release whenever something noteworthy happens. Distribute it to local outlets and also via a press release gig. As always, include your name, address, and phone number, and also link to your webpage.

This is one of the most powerful things you can do for your church!

12. Set up a Google Business Profile.

If you don't have one already, all the steps above have hopefully given enough signals to Google that you deserve a Google Business Profile. This is your most important digital asset. Make sure to follow my recommendations in my checklist!

13. Run a Meta landing page views campaign.

I'm not very bullish on social media posting for most churches. But an ad campaign? A different story. It's you working with Meta's business model, and an efficient way to run a social campaign.

It may sound like a lot, but this is not work that compounds over time. That's one of the great things about SEO: it's a cumulative rather than an iterative process.

God's blessings,