Our Church Web Site
March 28th, 2008 | by Scott |Growing up with MTV will resume next Friday.
In the meantime, I need your insight, advice and input. I have been working on our church website and would love some feedback.
Take a look at it and give me your thoughts.
18 Responses to “Our Church Web Site”
By len on Mar 28, 2008 | Reply
I like the looks so far. What type of hosting, etc are you using?
By greg on Mar 28, 2008 | Reply
where’s the “5 steps” page? did I miss it?
By Scott on Mar 28, 2008 | Reply
Len, I’m using wordpress and the blog is hosted by hostmonster.
Greg, You have to click through the page that has the list of congregation we do and do not fellowship.
By Matt on Mar 28, 2008 | Reply
Looks good, Scott. I was asked some time ago to work on our congregation’s website and, after a few misfires and once completely wiping it out, we are back up and running again. This time around we went the easy way, though, and purchased a template. It is not complete yet, but you can see it here:
http://www.holmesroadchurch.com
By Joe on Mar 28, 2008 | Reply
Having a blog as the front page of your website is an interesting concept. I haven’t ever seen that or thought of that. I had several reactions but I’ll stick with the top two: 1) If I’m a potential first-time visitor and I want to find out a bit more about the church, all the text might scare me away. One rarely likes to read a lot of text on websites unless it’s a site we frequent. Which leads me to my second reaction. 2) If I’m a member of the church, then I bookmark the page (or make it my homepage) and look forward to what new info I might find there.
So the question becomes, Who is the site for?
And like Greg, I searched high and low for your beliefs statements where I was sure that I would find a statement on the infallibility and inspiration of the Bible.
By Scott on Mar 28, 2008 | Reply
Matt, I like the look of yours. Great work.
Joe, so you think a start page ahead of the blog page is a good way to go? I like that the links to visitor specific info is available at the top. But I hear what you are saying.
By Phil Wilson on Mar 28, 2008 | Reply
I like the look of it and the colors work well too.
I agree with Joe though, I’m not sure a blog format is the way to go on the front page of it.
By Scott on Mar 28, 2008 | Reply
I’m not sure how to add a flash page or anything like that in front of it.
By Phil Wilson on Mar 28, 2008 | Reply
I would also add that I think the image at the top takes up too much room, but that might be an effect of being at a Web Application conference all week.
By Sunny on Mar 28, 2008 | Reply
It looks great! I can’t wait to get back to it and listen to your sermon. I’ll have to wait until the kiddies are in bed!
By Jonathan on Mar 28, 2008 | Reply
I agree that the image is too big.
I don’t think the blog front page is inherently bad. A collection of updates about what’s happening, etc. seems like a good use of space to me. I’d recommend that each item be more of a teaser paragraph though with a “read more” link to the full item so that it’s still a fairly compact front page.
Here is ours:
http://wheelerroad.org/
I set it up in drupal but someone else manages the public content.
Phil, have you checked out your’s lately? Seems like a lot of text to me:
http://www.ottercreek.org/
By R-Liz on Mar 28, 2008 | Reply
Scott– I like it. And I also like the blog on the front because if I’m really and truly interested in your church I don’t just want to know location and time, I want to know substance. It’s after I get a good feel for the substance that I’m then checking for location and time.
I think you’ve done a good job. A couple more questions as we hope to get a website going: Are there any fees with wordpress or hostmonster? And who’s job is it to keep it updated?
By Scott on Mar 28, 2008 | Reply
R-Liz, thanks. That was the vibe I was originally going for as well. I like the more personal feel of the blog.
Hostmonster charges a monthly hosting fee. I paid two years in advance and got it for about 5 bucks a month. Of course you have to buy your domain first.
At the moment I am keeping it updated. At some point that will be handed off to someone else.
By Scott on Mar 28, 2008 | Reply
Sunny, thanks for reminding me that I need to upload this past Sunday’s sermon.
Jonathan, I’m not really sure what to do about the size. I’m hoping our logo can go there at some point. The “read more” is a good idea.
By Doug Freeman on Mar 28, 2008 | Reply
Scott, have you looked at our web sight?
By Jonathan on Mar 28, 2008 | Reply
Scott,
You mean the size of that image area is set by the Wordpress theme so you can’t really re-size it?
It’s just that, before scrolling down, about half the page is kind of taken up by “nothing”…just prompts the question about of whether the space could be better used. Even once it’s the home of the logo, if it’s still that size it’s quite a bit of real estate.
By Greg Brooks on Mar 28, 2008 | Reply
I know I’m mentioning something you probably don’t have any influence over, but. . .
agape(p): with the mouth wide open as in wonder or awe; “the gaping audience”; “we stood there agape with wonder”; “with mouth agape”
I know what agape means but I’ve heard the “4 Loves” sermons. This reminds me of a recent Tony Jones interview, when he referred to Christianity as a ‘corporate’ religion and the interviewer was totally confused; he had to rephrase it ‘communal.’ What does a non-believer think we mean when we say the stuff we say?
By Scott on Mar 29, 2008 | Reply
Greg,
You are right. That is a problem that we face. The name is not user friendly and I have had several encounters already with people who didn’t know how to pronounce it.
It has great meaning but we will have to be readily aware of the disconnect between us and people who aren’t tuned in to our language.