Excellence in Planning and Promotion

[What Happened?

It’s a scene that plays out all too frequently in churches across the country: ministry events other than the weekend services are poorly attended, and those with incredible potential to impact and energize a significant number of people fall flat and fail. So we ask, “Why did that happen? Why didn’t more attend? Why did such a great event go bad?”

It’s not simply because people are too busy. I learned a long time ago that people do what they want to do. If they genuinely believe that an activity or event has value, they will make time to attend—even rearranging their busy schedules.

Then, what’s the problem? More often than not, as leaders we failed either in our planning, our promotion, or both. In the case of the equipping campaign at Mark and Jane’s church, the problem was not a failure to plan; the leadership did a poor job of persuading those they were trying to reach that the event was worth attending.

When this happens in our own churches, we have forgotten a fundamental principle: Excellent ministry events need equally effective promotional campaigns for the highest impact.

You Reap What You Sow . . . .

. . . . I speak from years of experience when I say that churches are often ineffective at planning and promoting ministry events, even major ones involving significant time and resources. At best, this may be due to a lack of know-how or a lack of organization. At worst, it could be due to indifference or laziness. Perhaps we even camouflage our lack of intentionality with trendy expressions like, “we want the ministry to develop organically,” when ironically the opposite actually occurs – the ministry events we sponsor end up limping along, becoming unhealthier in terms of their results rather than actually growing and prospering. In any case, when we fail to take the necessary time and effort to “sow effectively” with respect to planning and promotion, we should not be surprised when the “harvest” is meager.

To whitewash the failure of an event with spiritual clichés like, “Well, we’re thankful for the twelve people God brought to our meeting,” or “God must be trying to teach us something,” accomplishes little more than to encourage similar results the next time around. Instead, I believe God has commissioned us to responsibly and faithfully steward the opportunities he provides for eternal, spiritual impact in the lives of others. And a key aspect of that stewardship is to plan and promote more effectively.

The principles in this book will provide guidance for how to achieve excellence in your ministry events and campaigns through effective planning and promotion. They will offer you practical help for making potentially great events better—much better—and turning so-so campaigns into win-win experiences for your people, your church . . . and for the kingdom of God.

A Place for Promotion

If the Spirit of God has led you to plan an event, it is reasonable to assume that he wants you to promote the activity. The concept of promotion itself is neutral—it can be done in either a healthy or unhealthy way, and thereby in a spiritual or unspiritual manner. Yet the fact that it is sometimes implemented inappropriately does not mean it shouldn’t be done. This would be like saying that because social media is occasionally abused, it should never be used as a means of connecting with people.

The word promotion simply means “the activity that supports or encourages something.” This definition certainly was not crafted with ministry events in mind. Yet why would a Christian take issue with a process that seeks to encourage and attract people to an event for which there is genuine spiritual and eternal value? Why wouldn’t we want to increase the possibility for people to respond positively to a church-sponsored function? If the activity is worth having, and God has led us to do it, wouldn’t we want to make it known and attempt to draw the most people we could?

Let’s say we take the attitude of “Well, whoever God chooses to bring, that’s okay.” Then to be consistent, we should never say or do anything publicly that might attract someone to any significant occasion on the calendar, including Christmas and Easter services as well as special children’s ministry events. A person, however, would be hard-pressed to say in effect, “Well, we don’t want anyone really knowing about these opportunities for changed lives.” Obviously, if we take this approach, we miss out on prime moments for impact, both within the church and in the community. Effective promotion, on the other hand, will result in a greater outcome.

What I am really saying is: if God has led you to put on an event, it is poor stewardship to plan it and then fail to promote it effectively.

“To Be Attractional or Not to Be Attractional” – That is Not the Question

The steps presented throughout these pages can be implemented irrespective of your church’s philosophy of ministry. Whether your strategy is focused principally on attracting crowds of unchurched people to the weekend “gathering” or is more tailored to equipping believers who are then sent out to share the gospel in the marketplace and beyond, the principles proposed are effective in either context. In short, this book is more about “process” than “philosophy.” The latter might influence the “types” of events you plan while the former will affect “how” you implement them.]