WEBVTT 00:00:00.000 --> 00:00:08.920 All right. Hey, we got the beta show episode. It's episode 20 here with the church digital 00:00:08.920 --> 00:00:15.280 podcast powered by Stadia Church Planning. Jeff here. It's been a minute since we've been here 00:00:15.280 --> 00:00:20.940 on the beta show broadcasting through the wonderful StreamYard platform. We've been 00:00:20.940 --> 00:00:27.080 hanging out in Clubhouse maybe a little too much and having a lot of fun over in Clubhouse. We're 00:00:27.080 --> 00:00:32.760 there. Thursdays at five o'clock, you can check out thechurch.digital slash Clubhouse to find some 00:00:32.760 --> 00:00:38.560 of those conversations that are coming up. We're doing a deep dive on how has physical 00:00:38.560 --> 00:00:44.320 changed? How has physical church services changed as a result of COVID? If the answer you come up with 00:00:44.320 --> 00:00:49.480 is, yeah, our people wear masks and we're socially distant, that's just scratching the surface of what 00:00:49.480 --> 00:00:55.060 our physical really should be and how we're keeping up with that culture. Phenomenal conversation next 00:00:55.060 --> 00:01:00.480 Thursday. But now with the beta show, hey, remember we are answering your online ministry 00:01:00.480 --> 00:01:07.140 questions, digital discipleship, digital, physical, all the fun complications that come up with 2021 00:01:07.140 --> 00:01:16.520 mid post COVID. We want to answer those questions. Text us 484-324-8724. And of course, given a shout 00:01:16.520 --> 00:01:21.660 out, hey, we are doing digital learning communities through Stadia. This has been a phenomenal experience. 00:01:21.660 --> 00:01:27.360 We've taken over 200 churches through this framework, through this process of helping them learn to 00:01:27.360 --> 00:01:32.800 thrive, grow, and multiply. Digital is the combination. I like making up words. Deal with it. It's the 00:01:32.800 --> 00:01:37.880 combination of physical and digital, getting the physical and the digital work together. Hint, hint, 00:01:37.960 --> 00:01:43.360 it's really good. Digital is at disciple making, which is kind of weak in the physical space. And so if you 00:01:43.360 --> 00:01:48.220 want to learn practical steps on how to make this happen and learn from other churches that are doing it, 00:01:48.220 --> 00:01:55.580 swing over to stadiachurchplanning.org slash digital. And let's start talking there and let's you get 00:01:55.580 --> 00:02:00.980 connected in one of these digital learning communities. So hey, here with episode 20, 00:02:01.380 --> 00:02:06.820 we are going to do a beta show episode 20. We're going to do a deep dive here talking specifically 00:02:06.820 --> 00:02:14.100 about Easter follow-up. Easter is a thing, right? And so we've got this major event. Maybe it's physical, 00:02:14.100 --> 00:02:21.340 maybe it's digital, maybe it's both, but Easter is oftentimes a great opportunity to on-ramp into more 00:02:21.340 --> 00:02:27.660 ministry, more follow-up, able to get people connected in. And so I wanted to have a conversation about that 00:02:27.660 --> 00:02:32.460 because there's plenty of things that we can do better with follow-up in physical and in digital space. 00:02:32.540 --> 00:02:38.680 And so we're bringing in a co-host here with the Church Digital Podcast, Ray DeArmas. Ray, broadcasting from 00:02:38.680 --> 00:02:41.660 Miami with myself as well. Ray, you want to say anything to the audience? 00:02:42.240 --> 00:02:48.520 Happy Easter, everybody. It's that time of the year again. Every year we come up to Easter season, 00:02:48.520 --> 00:02:54.600 and this year is no different. We seem surprised. And Jeff, this year brings more surprises than many 00:02:54.600 --> 00:02:58.840 because many of our churches are already reopened. We're reopening. You already talked about bringing 00:02:58.840 --> 00:03:04.720 figural to Easter and what we need to do moving forward. And so I can't wait to talk to today's guests 00:03:04.720 --> 00:03:09.440 because we've got so much in store for what's going to come this Easter season and a lot of different ideas 00:03:09.440 --> 00:03:09.900 for churches. 00:03:11.080 --> 00:03:16.380 Awesome. Yeah, this is going to be a great conversation. And we're bringing in Text in Churches. Let me click 00:03:16.380 --> 00:03:21.640 the mouse again. Text in Churches, Jeanette Yates. Now, Jeanette is a great follow on social media. 00:03:22.420 --> 00:03:30.320 Incredible Twitter engagement. She's in this pocket of people. Jeanette, I think we met once. Maybe it was 00:03:30.320 --> 00:03:37.540 pre-COVID before the world came to an end in Orlando something. Yeah, exponential. And so this is a Florida 00:03:37.540 --> 00:03:46.420 beta episode here. Jeanette's in Jacksonville or Pensacola? Jacksonville. Okay. Somewhere north of us. 00:03:46.620 --> 00:03:52.160 Yes. Awesome. And so listen, if you're talking about follow-up in some of the things, I've loved 00:03:52.160 --> 00:03:56.780 seeing some of the stuff that Jeanette's been talking about in follow-up in general, 00:03:56.780 --> 00:04:01.860 but specifically coming out of Easter, of course, this is a huge opportunity that we, the church, 00:04:02.000 --> 00:04:08.760 we want to capitalize to reach out and connect with some of the holiday-only attenders. I don't know 00:04:08.760 --> 00:04:14.240 how to say this graciously without... There are people that only come to your service, your church 00:04:14.240 --> 00:04:19.900 services, two to three times a year maybe. Or maybe even there's attenders that used to attend in 00:04:19.900 --> 00:04:25.220 physical space, but aren't, but may come back maybe for a holiday. And so there's an opportunity for us 00:04:25.220 --> 00:04:30.400 to re-engage, reconnect with. And this is really what I wanted to throw the softball to Jeanette and 00:04:30.400 --> 00:04:35.800 say, hey, which is what I'm literally going to do right now. Hey, Jeanette, what can we learn? How can 00:04:35.800 --> 00:04:40.040 we be effective in reaching out and connecting here? Can you give us some tips? 00:04:41.040 --> 00:04:46.780 Well, I think, like you said, Jeff, one of the things to consider this year, as opposed to 00:04:46.780 --> 00:04:54.580 any other Easter year, is that in addition to having our typical, yay, this is going to be a big 00:04:54.580 --> 00:05:03.800 Sunday, everybody shows up, families come into town, it's a big deal. We're also in this circumstance 00:05:03.800 --> 00:05:10.520 of having people just haven't been connecting in the same way with their churches, people that normally 00:05:10.520 --> 00:05:17.340 would. So even, you know, regular attendees, you know, and we've talked, I'm sure y'all talked about 00:05:17.340 --> 00:05:21.620 this before too, that like when we say regular attendees now, it means like once a month you're 00:05:21.620 --> 00:05:26.200 attending, you know, it's not even really that much. But, and then, and then of course, with all of the 00:05:26.200 --> 00:05:32.100 stuff that's been going on, that's, you know, they're maybe only attending once a month and it's only 00:05:32.100 --> 00:05:39.460 online and they're not connecting in other ways. And so this year, as places begin to open up, or as 00:05:39.460 --> 00:05:47.000 people are rethinking, you know, their hybrid or fidgetal worship, or if they're still online, there is an 00:05:47.000 --> 00:05:57.180 extreme and important opportunity to grab, grab these people and, you know, love them and connect with 00:05:57.180 --> 00:06:02.860 them and, and, and build relationship with them. So I think that's one thing that has to be said. 00:06:03.820 --> 00:06:11.220 You know, at text and church, we really focus a lot on guest follow up for every Sunday. But especially 00:06:11.220 --> 00:06:17.400 when we are talking about Easter Sunday, we really want to make sure that, you know, because these 00:06:17.400 --> 00:06:22.080 people, you're, you're reaching out to them and changing a habit. It's not just like, oh, they've 00:06:22.080 --> 00:06:25.200 shown up to church. Now you can get them, you know, they're going to come back the next Sunday, 00:06:25.200 --> 00:06:31.540 the next Sunday, the next Sunday. That's not necessarily the case. And it's not really practical 00:06:31.540 --> 00:06:36.840 for everybody because their habit isn't to come to church every Sunday. They're making a special 00:06:36.840 --> 00:06:43.340 thing. They got the Easter outfit. They're going to do pictures. That's why they're, that is part of 00:06:43.340 --> 00:06:48.800 the tradition, but they may not have necessarily planned on the next Sunday or the next Sunday. So 00:06:48.800 --> 00:06:53.440 when we talk about following up with our Easter guests specifically, we want to think about 00:06:53.440 --> 00:07:01.600 what, what is going to be relevant to them for getting them back for another time, even if it's 00:07:01.600 --> 00:07:07.360 not the very next Sunday. So I think that's something to think about. That's really good, 00:07:07.460 --> 00:07:13.760 Jeanette. And so what do you think for some churches would be that first hook to bring them back to start 00:07:13.760 --> 00:07:22.240 making this hopefully a bit of a routine? So some, uh, some people say, you know, and this is my church 00:07:22.240 --> 00:07:31.140 has done this before where we started a new series on Easter Sunday. And then that was fairly practical 00:07:31.140 --> 00:07:38.780 in nature. Um, it was around, you know, relationships with your family or something that, 00:07:38.780 --> 00:07:45.920 you know, everybody can relate to. And then, um, you know, the next week that was, you know, 00:07:45.920 --> 00:07:53.060 come back for week two. So you can do that, come back for the very next week thing. Another time we did 00:07:53.060 --> 00:08:00.320 something where we just had an open house the next week where we just, and of course I know things are 00:08:00.320 --> 00:08:04.540 different. I'm just giving you the ideas that we've had in the past. And then I'll talk about 00:08:04.540 --> 00:08:10.720 now, but, um, you know, we had where we just had a brunch in the garden. Um, so we had an outdoor 00:08:10.720 --> 00:08:15.880 space. We, you know, we live in Florida, so it's the weather's fine. And we did that. So it wasn't 00:08:15.880 --> 00:08:21.240 even like come back to, you know, sign up, you know, to be baptized. It was like, come back and just 00:08:21.240 --> 00:08:29.440 get to know who we are. Um, some people, um, some churches focus on mother's day, um, which is a little bit 00:08:29.500 --> 00:08:33.080 down the road, but all things considered, we're talking about April 4th is Easter. 00:08:33.720 --> 00:08:38.500 You know, mother's day is going to be basically the middle of the beginning of, is it terrible? 00:08:38.600 --> 00:08:41.120 I don't know exactly what mother's day is. Um, but 00:08:41.120 --> 00:08:50.700 I know it wasn't the first. It's a second Sunday in May. So really, if we're talking about regular 00:08:50.700 --> 00:08:56.740 attendees showing up once a month, that's not really that much different, you know, and you then have 00:08:56.740 --> 00:09:04.620 that four weeks to follow up with them, which I guess is my second point is follow-up doesn't happen 00:09:04.620 --> 00:09:15.060 with one email with one text, with one letter from the pastor. Like that's not, that's a start, 00:09:15.060 --> 00:09:22.820 but that's not the end of it. And so we're changing, you know, we're, we're trying to change a habit or 00:09:22.820 --> 00:09:31.380 start a new good habit in these people. We want that to, um, we want to provide them with reasons and, 00:09:31.380 --> 00:09:36.140 and information about what to expect. Cause a lot of people don't want to come because they don't 00:09:36.140 --> 00:09:42.240 know what's happening. So by having an extended follow-up for what weeks, we recommend six weeks 00:09:42.240 --> 00:09:46.980 of follow-up. But if you're talking about that mother's day, you're, you know, a little bit over 00:09:46.980 --> 00:09:53.000 four weeks, you're, you have the time to message them and give them information that's useful for 00:09:53.000 --> 00:09:59.500 them. Um, connect with them in other ways with phone calls or sending a handwritten note. Like I said, 00:09:59.500 --> 00:10:03.160 it's not bad to send a note, but that's not the only thing you can do. So I think that's another 00:10:03.160 --> 00:10:07.900 reason to give yourself a little bit of time to do the follow-up, you know? 00:10:08.320 --> 00:10:13.960 Let me, I want to ask a question because that actually surprised me six weeks. Um, I've, I've, 00:10:13.960 --> 00:10:18.960 I've never really thought of it that long. So why, why six weeks? What are, what are you? And I'm 00:10:18.960 --> 00:10:24.400 humbly here, like I'm not a communications guy, so don't, don't, no judgment allowed in this zone, 00:10:24.400 --> 00:10:31.280 but why, why six weeks? What, what are we trying to achieve at like week five or six that you couldn't 00:10:31.280 --> 00:10:36.640 get to in, in week two? Kind of help me understand that. Well, with the understanding that everyone's 00:10:36.640 --> 00:10:40.360 an individual and there are some people that come to your church for the first time any Sunday and 00:10:40.360 --> 00:10:45.080 they're like the next week they're singing in a praise band, right? Like we've had the, that happens. 00:10:45.460 --> 00:10:49.840 But when we're talking about people who don't have a habit of coming to church 00:10:49.840 --> 00:10:55.480 and trying to then come to church, and this is relevant for Easter, but anytime, again, 00:10:55.480 --> 00:11:00.960 we're talking about changing a habit. Well, what we all know the habit studies, how long does it take 00:11:00.960 --> 00:11:10.840 to change a habit? Longer than two weeks, right? So, um, now the reason our, uh, workflows that, 00:11:10.840 --> 00:11:15.840 that walk through this follow-up process are six weeks is because we've, we've used and tested this 00:11:15.840 --> 00:11:22.040 with thousands of churches and six weeks seems to be about right. Now, some people do some people, 00:11:22.100 --> 00:11:26.360 we have some people that do eight to 12 weeks because of the nature, you know, they live in an 00:11:26.360 --> 00:11:31.160 area where people are, um, in and out back and forth, maybe military, things like that. And so 00:11:31.160 --> 00:11:39.140 they have to reach out longer. They have to follow up longer. But the idea being that for six weeks, 00:11:39.140 --> 00:11:47.180 you're sending a text and, or an email, um, so not a ton, you're not messaging them every single day, 00:11:47.180 --> 00:11:54.400 one text, one email that tells them something different, um, or engages them in conversation, 00:11:54.400 --> 00:11:59.600 ask them a question so they can respond to you. It's building that relationship. And then our follow 00:11:59.600 --> 00:12:05.660 up also includes not only our automated, automatic messages that are going to go out when you set up 00:12:05.660 --> 00:12:13.640 our workflow. Um, but also they're going to send reminders to you, uh, to you as your staff, your, 00:12:13.640 --> 00:12:18.280 or your volunteers. Hey, we've already started. It'll say, it's really cool. It'll be like, Hey, 00:12:18.680 --> 00:12:25.760 we Ray visited on Easter Sunday and we've already sent him, uh, uh, uh, an email and a text, 00:12:25.760 --> 00:12:30.820 but we would love it if you Jeff would give him a phone call or write him a handwritten note. And 00:12:30.820 --> 00:12:35.080 here's the information you need to do that. And here's the script about what to say. You know, 00:12:35.080 --> 00:12:41.680 if you're nervous, if you don't know what to say. So our workflow process, not only kind of, 00:12:41.680 --> 00:12:45.200 instead of you having to think what, Oh, I got to send an email to the guests this week. Oh, 00:12:45.200 --> 00:12:49.900 I've got to send a text to the guest. What is it going to be? You, we line that out for you, 00:12:49.900 --> 00:12:56.400 um, in a workflow, and then you customize the messages accordingly. And then we also have those 00:12:56.400 --> 00:13:03.160 reminder steps that are still going to have you engage in real time, in real life, not an automated 00:13:03.160 --> 00:13:09.220 message, um, with your guests. And so, you know, what that looks like for each church is different, 00:13:09.220 --> 00:13:15.080 but that's, that tends to be why we spread it over six weeks. We have a variety of communication 00:13:15.080 --> 00:13:21.180 because we want it to be sufficient. So we, we need more than two weeks, six weeks seems to be what 00:13:21.180 --> 00:13:25.740 are, uh, as we've worked with, you know, thousands of churches over the past six years, 00:13:25.740 --> 00:13:33.360 that's what tends to work the best. So sufficient, uh, relevant, we're sending multiple types of, 00:13:33.360 --> 00:13:38.860 you know, so we're phone calls, we're texting, we're sending email, we're doing a handwritten note, 00:13:39.000 --> 00:13:44.480 maybe we're dropping off a gift, you know, all these different kinds of things. And then we're making 00:13:44.480 --> 00:13:49.520 sure that it's relevant in the sense that I'm not going to send, I'm not going to tell somebody 00:13:49.520 --> 00:13:56.660 information about the children's ministry unless I know they need it. Hmm. Right. Or so like that. 00:13:56.800 --> 00:14:02.660 So, so you're tailoring the data to the person or you're tailoring, tailoring the follow-up to the 00:14:02.660 --> 00:14:07.100 person, which I think is great. Um, and I think that's needed. Obviously we don't want to push 00:14:07.100 --> 00:14:10.820 certain services that we have to offer if they're not relevant to it. That's, that's wonderful. But 00:14:10.820 --> 00:14:16.040 they also bring up an interesting question for me, Jeanette, is there such a thing as too much? 00:14:16.740 --> 00:14:24.480 Yeah. So, so there is something to be said. And when I, um, you know, I coach, uh, churches every 00:14:24.480 --> 00:14:30.940 week, we do live, um, live coaching calls with our members every week. And we talk about this a lot, 00:14:31.000 --> 00:14:37.160 especially people that are brand new. They're like six weeks. Cause it does sound like a lot at first. 00:14:37.160 --> 00:14:40.140 And so we talk a little bit about, you know, changing the habit and all that kind of stuff, 00:14:40.140 --> 00:14:49.140 but then ultimately you have to know your demographic and know, you know, if most of the 00:14:49.140 --> 00:14:55.000 people that are coming to your church, really, they do get involved fairly quickly, or, you know, 00:14:56.160 --> 00:15:02.180 you know, it seems like maybe four weeks is better. Our workflows that we use are customizable. So you can 00:15:02.180 --> 00:15:06.900 just get rid of the steps you don't need, you know, maybe you don't use every single one, maybe it's 00:15:06.900 --> 00:15:14.200 still six weeks, but you skip a week, you know, and kind of, you know, make it different or do 00:15:14.200 --> 00:15:19.620 something like that. You can, you can tailor it. Now, one thing I also say is you can also take 00:15:19.620 --> 00:15:26.080 someone out of the workflow. So let's say, you know, we've said maybe one, one or two weeks, 00:15:26.080 --> 00:15:31.240 isn't going to cut it, but let's say after week four, they've signed up for a small group or they've 00:15:31.240 --> 00:15:36.520 expressed interest in going to your next steps class and you're able to put them in, you know, 00:15:36.560 --> 00:15:42.900 another group or, or have another way to have a connection with them. Then you just go into the 00:15:42.900 --> 00:15:46.960 workflow and pull them out of that and maybe put them in a group where you're communicating about 00:15:46.960 --> 00:15:51.760 your next steps class. Does that make sense? And so they don't have to stay in there if it's not 00:15:51.760 --> 00:15:56.620 relevant to them anymore. And typically what I tell people is, listen, they're either going to be in 00:15:56.620 --> 00:16:03.160 there by the end of the six weeks, still, you know, engaging. They're going to tell you to unsubscribe 00:16:03.160 --> 00:16:08.420 them. You know, they're going to get out of there or you're going to move them out because they've, 00:16:08.420 --> 00:16:14.840 they've engaged, you know? And so typically it's one of those three things that happens. They're like, 00:16:14.960 --> 00:16:20.360 seriously, we were just there. We're from out of town. We, you know, like we're not coming back 00:16:20.360 --> 00:16:25.460 anytime soon. Or, you know, you do have a way to engage with them differently. 00:16:25.720 --> 00:16:30.080 Or if you've got that, that out of town or, Hey, instead of being the physical drip campaign, 00:16:30.160 --> 00:16:36.020 maybe create an online drip campaign, get, keep your digital pastor busy and give them an opportunity 00:16:36.020 --> 00:16:43.040 to kind of take lead in that, which would, would, would take me to, is, is it wise to have like a, 00:16:43.040 --> 00:16:47.300 in this post COVID world, right? You know, is it wise to have a physical and a digital? 00:16:47.920 --> 00:16:52.560 Is it wise to have like a, cause you were even talking about like having the campaign smart 00:16:52.560 --> 00:16:56.720 enough to know whether you have kids or not? Like how much are you shaping this? 00:16:57.280 --> 00:17:03.240 Well, I did want to clarify. Cause when he said that, I was like, well, not kind of. So what our 00:17:03.240 --> 00:17:09.500 workflow does organically, you know, like the way it is set up, it is not going to extract every bit 00:17:09.500 --> 00:17:14.100 of information from someone on a connection card. Cause I don't know if you guys know, but when I grew 00:17:14.100 --> 00:17:18.960 up, when I was growing up, going to my church, that connection card that I filled out on paper, 00:17:18.960 --> 00:17:24.800 it asked all the information in the world, right? Like we knew everything. It was double-sided, 00:17:25.180 --> 00:17:30.480 right? You know, how many kids, you know, how old are you, all your whole entire family, 00:17:30.740 --> 00:17:35.280 all the things. What we want to do is gather enough information to get the conversation started. 00:17:35.920 --> 00:17:42.340 So our digital connection card will ask for name, cell phone, email. And then if you add the extended, 00:17:42.640 --> 00:17:46.100 it'll ask for mailing address. If you need it, you're going to do that handwritten note, 00:17:46.320 --> 00:17:50.860 but then where we find out whether or not we need to get them information about children. 00:17:51.980 --> 00:17:57.540 Can y'all hear me? Uh-oh. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Good. Where we find out if we need information about 00:17:57.540 --> 00:18:05.680 children or youth or, you know, whatever is when we make those phone calls. Right. And then maybe 00:18:05.680 --> 00:18:10.600 they go into another, maybe we put them in the children's follow-up, you know, where the, or we 00:18:10.600 --> 00:18:15.440 just let the children's director know, Hey, I just spoke to this new, this visitor. They have kids. I told 00:18:15.440 --> 00:18:20.400 them you'd give them a call. That's how the relationship starts building. And that's ultimately 00:18:20.400 --> 00:18:29.100 the goal. Um, is it, the goal is not to have the computer do it for you. The goal is to move all of 00:18:29.100 --> 00:18:40.820 that technical stuff out of the way so that you can do your ministry. Yeah. And so, um, now in reference 00:18:40.820 --> 00:18:47.580 to your physical versus, um, online worship, we do recommend two different workflows because this, 00:18:47.700 --> 00:18:52.400 the language is different. Uh, you know, somebody that's at your physical service is going to be 00:18:52.400 --> 00:19:00.820 sitting there on sun Easter Sunday, watching it, but you know, on, you know, if it's online, 00:19:00.820 --> 00:19:05.400 maybe they're watching it Sunday night, maybe they're watching it Monday morning. So you don't 00:19:05.400 --> 00:19:09.100 want that first message to go out. If they decide to connect, you don't want it to say, 00:19:09.240 --> 00:19:14.820 thanks for, thanks for watching today. Or thanks for participating online with us today. Um, when 00:19:14.820 --> 00:19:20.520 it's really, you know, it was tonight or the day after. So, you know, it kind of, we changed the 00:19:20.520 --> 00:19:25.860 language a little bit. It's a little bit different, but it's still a long, you know, a longer follow-up. 00:19:25.860 --> 00:19:32.380 Um, but again, you know, you can tailor that as well. So we do recommend the two different for the 00:19:32.380 --> 00:19:37.120 two different services. That's awesome. We get, we got to keep guys like Ray busy as digital pastors, 00:19:37.120 --> 00:19:42.520 getting them reaching out into the inner spheres and connecting and meeting people. 00:19:42.860 --> 00:19:46.940 2020 was a real slack year for us. So we need, oh yeah, you guys are bored. You don't have anything 00:19:46.940 --> 00:19:51.720 else to do. Like you got to, got to get going. Um, Hey, uh, confession hour. I hate the connection 00:19:51.720 --> 00:19:59.020 card. Uh, like I just, I'm, I've not, I've seen Easter 2020, a church told me, Jeff, I had half a 00:19:59.020 --> 00:20:04.580 million viewers. Um, and we only had, we only collected 11 connection cards. So like the percentage 00:20:04.580 --> 00:20:09.820 of people, maybe what, what are some ideas? What are some things that are different? Um, you know, 00:20:09.820 --> 00:20:14.720 I've seen a lot of, and I'm sure text in church, you guys offer this, the, the short code text in the 00:20:14.720 --> 00:20:19.660 words, blah, blah, blah, and get, you know, that get this resource or this thing. Um, you know, 00:20:19.660 --> 00:20:24.160 is that effective? What are some other ways that maybe we could start to meet and, and connect 00:20:24.160 --> 00:20:28.960 with, with people, uh, to, for follow-up. So, well, first of all, one of the things that 00:20:28.960 --> 00:20:34.020 text in church does is the text, a keyword and receive a digital connection card feature. So 00:20:34.020 --> 00:20:40.260 one thing is it's not such a, you know, like a form that again is just as long as the paper 00:20:40.260 --> 00:20:47.040 form was, you know, I don't want to tell you my kid's birthdays in a web form. It's none of your 00:20:47.040 --> 00:20:52.640 business. Right. Exactly. Slow your role. So, so there's, there is that, there is this idea of 00:20:52.640 --> 00:20:57.800 like, just, you know, we just want to, and, but to your point, people still aren't going to text 00:20:57.800 --> 00:21:03.200 whether they're sitting in person or online, if they don't trust you or know what you're going to 00:21:03.200 --> 00:21:10.180 do with their information. So it's really important to make sure that you're clear about why you want 00:21:10.180 --> 00:21:16.640 them, you know, or why it's not even, you want them, why they should want to give you that 00:21:16.640 --> 00:21:23.280 information. Like what, you know, what's in it for them. Um, and, uh, I think if it's, if you're 00:21:23.280 --> 00:21:28.000 clear with, you know, like when we were talking about, like, what do you, what's that thing that 00:21:28.000 --> 00:21:32.820 you're going to be, you know, what's their call to action? What are you going to be asking them to do? 00:21:33.320 --> 00:21:38.980 If you're saying, Hey, we've got something really awesome planned for mother's day. And if you're 00:21:38.980 --> 00:21:43.600 new and want to get connected to make sure that you know about that, you know, that's the kind of 00:21:43.600 --> 00:21:51.720 thing that you want to be clear with what you're going to be, um, giving them, you know, what's in 00:21:51.720 --> 00:21:56.840 it for them? How will it benefit them? Um, and then I also, another thing that churches do in this 00:21:56.840 --> 00:22:02.100 again is in person online and especially on Easter Sunday, when your jam, your service, your order of 00:22:02.100 --> 00:22:09.520 service is like, like jammed packed in there. One of the things that you really need to do is give 00:22:09.520 --> 00:22:15.520 yourself time to give multiple invitations for people to text the keyword, to fill out the digital 00:22:15.520 --> 00:22:18.520 connection card. And of course, if you're doing it online, you can have that like lower third, 00:22:18.520 --> 00:22:24.060 that's got the information kind of just scroll on there anytime. But, um, you know, you want to do 00:22:24.060 --> 00:22:30.000 it at the beginning, but also in the middle and maybe even one more time at the end. Um, and I 00:22:30.000 --> 00:22:33.740 know, I know we're running low on time, but I did want to tell you like one of the things that my 00:22:33.740 --> 00:22:37.660 church did it. I think, I don't know if we're doing it this year because we don't know what our 00:22:37.660 --> 00:22:41.360 vacation Bible school is going to look like. We know we're going to do something, but we don't know 00:22:41.360 --> 00:22:49.280 yet what it is, but our vacation Bible school is like the thing in our area. And so we usually 00:22:49.280 --> 00:22:59.200 launch registration the week after Easter. So if you want to get the link to register your children 00:22:59.200 --> 00:23:05.480 for the coolest VBS and down, then, you know, we'll follow up with it, you know, and said like 00:23:05.480 --> 00:23:10.060 that kind of thing. Now, my, the demographic for my church, most of the people have children. So it 00:23:10.060 --> 00:23:13.580 made sense for us to do that other churches. That's not going to make any sense because they 00:23:13.580 --> 00:23:17.860 don't even have any kids and you know, they never do VBS or whatever. So you have to decide like, 00:23:18.160 --> 00:23:22.460 what's the thing, what makes sense for your demographic and, and do that accordingly. 00:23:23.180 --> 00:23:25.060 Right. Love it. Go ahead, Ray. 00:23:25.580 --> 00:23:31.480 Jeanette, the first time guest gift, is it still relevant in a mid post COVID era? Is that still a 00:23:31.480 --> 00:23:32.740 thing that we can and should do? 00:23:33.480 --> 00:23:41.300 Well, a lot of churches still do a guest gift. A lot of churches do it. 00:23:44.300 --> 00:23:49.180 There's different ways. Like if you show up and you text, you know, like some people are like, 00:23:49.520 --> 00:23:53.860 text the keyword, then I'm going to get a notification as a greeter. You're what your 00:23:53.860 --> 00:23:58.680 name is because, you know, the system can notify me. And then you can say, just go, go check, 00:23:58.800 --> 00:24:03.200 you know, stop by and pick up your gift. I can write that name on a, one of our gifts, 00:24:03.380 --> 00:24:08.960 stick it on there. And then I have a personalized gift. So again, how that works now, not, you know, 00:24:08.960 --> 00:24:16.800 it depends. Everything depends. But that's one way other people just do the drop something off. 00:24:17.180 --> 00:24:23.660 Other people are doing local gift cards to the local coffee shop or the local bakery to kind of, 00:24:23.660 --> 00:24:29.300 you know, help their local business people. So there's still ways to do it. I think you have to 00:24:29.300 --> 00:24:33.560 shift it. And I, you definitely don't want to do like, here's all of the stuff that's branded with 00:24:33.560 --> 00:24:39.420 our church name. Cause nobody wants to walk around with your tote bag, with your church name on it, 00:24:39.420 --> 00:24:43.560 if they don't even go to your church. But my church name is awesome. I don't understand. 00:24:44.220 --> 00:24:49.180 All that stuff should be given to your volunteers. That should be in their swag. 00:24:49.760 --> 00:24:54.960 That should be their swag. True story. And to our, I don't know if it's to our detriment or to our 00:24:54.960 --> 00:25:00.240 wind. I've walked into two Goodwills and seen some CF swag that I know that we gave away as first 00:25:00.240 --> 00:25:04.320 time guest stuff. And I was like, I guess the mug just, here it is. 00:25:04.320 --> 00:25:08.160 Well, at least they're giving it away instead of selling it for profit. So, you know, at least 00:25:08.160 --> 00:25:13.860 there's some value there. Hey, let me segue wrap up. We had a question coming from the outside 00:25:13.860 --> 00:25:19.040 Facebook user nameless out there. Awesome. No worries. So back to separate digital and physical 00:25:19.040 --> 00:25:24.700 flows. Do you give different short code to online audience versus in-person folks? Or is there 00:25:24.700 --> 00:25:31.100 a different way to sort them into two different flows, you know, text and church? How would you 00:25:31.100 --> 00:25:32.200 handle something like that? 00:25:32.620 --> 00:25:36.860 So there's a couple of different ways that you can do that. So we use a keyword system. So you're 00:25:36.860 --> 00:25:41.740 going to be telling people to text a keyword. So if you're just broadcasting, like some people 00:25:41.740 --> 00:25:47.340 actually have two different services they're recording, in which case you could, you know. 00:25:47.620 --> 00:25:52.340 Yeah, like a live versus a prerecorded. Right. In this situation, it sounds like they're probably 00:25:52.340 --> 00:26:00.740 right. It's one service. So you would tell, you know, you would say, you know, if you're here with 00:26:00.740 --> 00:26:05.400 us today on campus, and you'd like to, you know, whatever you say, like to get connected, I've got a 00:26:05.400 --> 00:26:10.820 whole welcome talk thing I could go into. We could do that later. But you know, you text the word 00:26:10.820 --> 00:26:17.980 welcome. And then at the same time, there's the lower third that's going to say, and if you're 00:26:17.980 --> 00:26:25.160 online, text this. So that's one thing you can do. You can also have your if you have a period of time 00:26:25.160 --> 00:26:30.860 where you can segue away from what the on campus pastor is saying, and the online pastor comes on 00:26:30.860 --> 00:26:38.040 during that welcome talk time and does his own welcome talk for online. You could do it that way. 00:26:38.040 --> 00:26:40.940 And so that way, they're not even hearing the other keyword. They're just hearing 00:26:40.940 --> 00:26:48.020 the keyword hello for online. There's that and then the online your online moderators, your online 00:26:48.020 --> 00:26:53.580 hosts could post the link to the digital connection card, you can do that as well. 00:26:54.240 --> 00:26:59.760 In the comment and the first comment and pin it. There's a there's a few different options there. 00:27:00.300 --> 00:27:03.900 And then that gets them to the two different workflows to answer that person's question. 00:27:04.380 --> 00:27:09.340 And ultimately, it sounds like you've got some sort of a system that that's able to manage different 00:27:09.340 --> 00:27:14.880 phrases like with within one of the churches I work with here in Miami Christ Journey, where I've been 00:27:14.880 --> 00:27:19.940 attending lately, they I mean, they've got I don't know, five or six different like there's pray, there's 00:27:19.940 --> 00:27:26.500 give, there's connect, there's like, and all of them are different workflows. And so for them, it's they 00:27:26.500 --> 00:27:33.260 just they just they beat in that that short code that text number, I can say it right now on the thing like 00:27:33.260 --> 00:27:36.100 it's just as is in brand and brained in my head. 00:27:36.100 --> 00:27:44.360 Yeah, so we also use so people will be texting the keyword into a local 10 digit number. So they would be 00:27:44.360 --> 00:27:53.940 texting a local number. That is that there's many reasons, again, a whole different episode. But the main 00:27:53.940 --> 00:28:04.280 reason is because 10 digit numbers are not seen as spammy. And, you know, salesy. And they also are better 00:28:04.280 --> 00:28:08.740 for conversation back and forth. Because another thing is somebody if you actually text somebody at the 00:28:08.740 --> 00:28:15.140 workflow, text somebody, how did you enjoy your visit, and somebody replies back, you can as a as a staff 00:28:15.140 --> 00:28:22.160 member, go in there on your app on your phone, and text them back and engage in conversation. And so we 00:28:22.160 --> 00:28:27.740 really like having that 10 digit number that provides more of that two way conversation ability. 00:28:28.520 --> 00:28:33.660 Love it. Hey, if somebody's got more questions on text in church, or wants to continue this this 00:28:33.660 --> 00:28:37.460 conversation with you, Jeanette, how are they doing that? What's a good next step? 00:28:38.100 --> 00:28:44.880 Oh, my goodness, I have so many ways. But I do want to share with you guys, I do have a couple things 00:28:44.880 --> 00:28:49.560 that I was going to share with you guys. One of the things that you know, one of the things that 00:28:49.560 --> 00:28:54.880 we're talking about today is, you know, following up for Easter. So I have a link, I'm going to 00:28:54.880 --> 00:28:58.640 actually paste it, I guess, in the comments. I'm here. Do you want me to do that? 00:28:58.900 --> 00:29:03.240 Yeah, click on the comments tab. And so you can do that. Or if you want to tell me, I'll type it. 00:29:03.240 --> 00:29:09.680 I'll type it in. And now I can't see where to paste my stuff. Okay, it's not all the way down at the 00:29:09.680 --> 00:29:14.800 bottom. It's not down there. Tell it to me. I'll type it in. What's the link? I'm just going to put 00:29:14.800 --> 00:29:21.960 it in the private chat. And you can copy it. Sounds good. Okay, so I'm actually giving you a copy of our 00:29:21.960 --> 00:29:28.720 ultimate Easter follow up plan. So you can you can do that. And then I also my boss, let me have this 00:29:28.720 --> 00:29:40.480 link to where we have a link for you to use if you want to try out Texan Church for 60 days for free, 00:29:40.480 --> 00:29:47.520 you can do that. And 60 days, get your way past Easter people maybe even does it get you all the 00:29:47.520 --> 00:29:51.400 way to Mother's Day? I'd have to do that. It does. It gets you all the way through Mother's Day, 00:29:51.460 --> 00:29:53.760 which is a big deal. I mean, that's a worthwhile thing. 00:29:54.040 --> 00:30:00.820 Anyway, feel free to hop on any of those. Of course, you can find us everywhere on the Twitter, 00:30:01.400 --> 00:30:07.940 on the Facebook, on the Instagram at Texan Church. We'd love to see you there. Come say hi. 00:30:08.960 --> 00:30:09.180 I can. 00:30:09.340 --> 00:30:14.760 The beta show, the church digital just gave you 60 days free of Texan Church. Write that down. 00:30:14.760 --> 00:30:19.200 Remember that. Thank you, Texan Church for that. Thank you, Stadia Church Planting for that as 00:30:19.200 --> 00:30:24.500 well. This is awesome. You literally get software for 60 days. This is great. Jeanette, thank your 00:30:24.500 --> 00:30:27.200 boss. What's your boss's name? We need to give the boss credit right here on the air. 00:30:27.400 --> 00:30:31.680 Well, Tyler Smith is the co-founder of Texan Church and he is awesome. 00:30:32.160 --> 00:30:32.360 Yeah. 00:30:33.460 --> 00:30:39.060 Another great follow on the social interweb. So you can Google that and try to figure out which of the 00:30:39.060 --> 00:30:42.740 Tyler Smiths we're talking about. There are multiple out there. 00:30:42.860 --> 00:30:45.880 Just call it Texan Church. It's the place to be. 00:30:47.700 --> 00:30:51.520 Awesome. Hey, as we're landing the plane, Ray, any closing thoughts? 00:30:52.600 --> 00:30:57.260 Yes. If you are thinking through Easter and you're not thinking through follow-up, you're missing out 00:30:57.260 --> 00:31:01.900 on what could be a huge percentage of what we're trying to do. Folks are going to show up. Guests are 00:31:01.900 --> 00:31:05.740 going to show up. But what are we going to do with them afterwards? Jeanette, you gave us a pretty clear 00:31:05.740 --> 00:31:09.960 road map. Thank you so much for helping answering these questions. And then you gave us a way to 00:31:09.960 --> 00:31:15.520 enact this by giving us 60 free days in Texan Church. So any church that's out there, if you don't have 00:31:15.520 --> 00:31:19.600 a digital strategy for taking up some of this information, especially in an era where more 00:31:19.600 --> 00:31:23.540 people probably aren't going to feel as comfortable with picking up that pen and writing things down 00:31:23.540 --> 00:31:27.880 because they don't want to trade germs, this is a pretty good way to start. So thank you. 00:31:28.340 --> 00:31:28.960 You're welcome. 00:31:29.180 --> 00:31:29.320 Love it. 00:31:29.480 --> 00:31:31.980 It was my pleasure. Thanks for having me. This was so fun, you guys. 00:31:32.580 --> 00:31:32.900 Yeah. 00:31:33.160 --> 00:31:33.880 It was for us too. 00:31:33.880 --> 00:31:38.080 You got it. You're one of the fun people. Like you bring some people on and they're just, 00:31:38.240 --> 00:31:41.060 honestly, they're not fun. They think they're fun, but they're really not. You, 00:31:41.580 --> 00:31:45.640 you're fun. So Jeanette, as we're landing the plane and anything on your side? 00:31:46.360 --> 00:31:51.300 Well, of course, in addition to following Texan Church everywhere, I would love for people to 00:31:51.300 --> 00:31:57.880 find me on Twitter at Jeanette Yates. Long story about why I abbreviate my name, but anyway, 00:31:57.880 --> 00:32:02.320 I'm always on Twitter hanging out. I'm always on Instagram hanging out and I love chatting with 00:32:02.320 --> 00:32:06.300 people and I love helping people out. You know, I'm the unofficial cheerleader for church 00:32:06.300 --> 00:32:12.980 communications, for Texan Church, for, for digital church, all the things. Um, and so if you need 00:32:12.980 --> 00:32:14.600 some hype, I got it for you. 00:32:15.960 --> 00:32:21.680 She is the perennial hype lady. So we'll, we'll, we'll give her that. Hey, Jeanette, thanks for, 00:32:21.820 --> 00:32:25.780 thanks for jumping on here. Thanks for the 60 days. Thanks for some of the advice. Hey guys, 00:32:25.780 --> 00:32:30.400 let's make this Easter awesome. As, as we build into what's ahead for Jeanette, for Ray, this is Jeff 00:32:30.400 --> 00:32:34.200 at the church, digital stadium church planting, uh, get back to work. See y'all later.