There are some real disagreements in the church over the whole question of marketing and advertising. On the one hand, you have the folks who are firm believers in marketing the church just like any other business, who are completely comfortable in talking about the church in terms of “product,” and “customers,” and “market share”; on the other, you have the skeptics and those who don’t believe the real work of the church is advanced by marketing.In a lot of ways, you can put me down with the skeptics; in particular, as Tyler Wigg-Stevenson recently articulated well in Christianity Today, I think there’s a real and significant theological danger to our understanding of the church in treating “church” as just another product to be marketed to consumers. This is a road we go down at our peril. On the other hand, though, we have the responsibility to communicate the gospel message—and in this day and age, with so many competing voices, if we don’t use the media for that purpose, we’ll probably find ourselves drowned out by all the noise. In a sense, then, we have to use the tools of marketing and advertising just to make ourselves heard.The question is, then, how do we do that without allowing the medium to distort our message? There are a lot of bright people thinking about that question these days, and I can’t claim to be an expert on the subject; but I recently ran across this post by a fellow named Seth Godin that I think sheds some light on this. He’s writing about the Super Bowl ads, but I think this applies to the church, too; in particular, I think it helps us understand marketing in a way that’s actually constructive for the mission of the church.
Putting on a show is expensive, time-consuming and quite fun. And it rarely works. . . .Marketing is telling a story that sticks, that spreads and that changes the way people act. The story you tell is far more important than the way you tell it. Don’t worry so much about being cool, and worry a lot more about resonating your story with my worldview. If you don’t have a story, then a great show isn’t going to help much.(And yes, every successful organization has a story, even if they’ve never considered running an ad, during the Super Bowl or anywhere else.)
Certainly, the church does; we have the greatest story of all. Telling that story, by whatever means are available, is what we’re supposed to be on about.
I understand people’s hesitation with “marketing the gospel”. What people often forget though, is that churches are marketing even if they think they are not. Marketing is telling your story and it is all about the first impressions we make with people (whether good or bad). Sadly, for many churches, the first impressions people have are not good.
As you mention, we have the most important message to communicate to a world that desperately needs to hear it. We must start by purposefully crafting our message so that it is clear, concise, and is directed to the needs people in our communities have. This does not mean we have to be “slick marketers”, we just need to be genuine and sincere. If we try to inject excellence in the way we communicate that message we will better fulfill the great commission!
Agreed. The hard thing, I think, is to separate marketing from the consumer mentality, when in our culture those two things are pretty much fused.
Oh, and I should say–thanks very much for the comment.