Having a web strategy for your church is really a part of having a communications strategy for you church - your website is just one aspect of all your communications media. Even your web strategy will be broken into several components - a website, possibly a Facebook page and a Twitter account, maybe other online channels like YouTube and MySpace.

There are many pieces to your web strategy, but just having all the pieces doesn't mean they all fit together - yet!

Just like shaking the box won't assemble the jigsaw puzzle for you, you need to have a picture of how it will all fit together and then take steps to make it all happen. Today, we'll look at the pieces and the steps in the context of an overall strategy.

What do you know about Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Orkut, MyChurch and other social networking sites? Do you know how to leverage these sites in your ministry? We'll take a quick look at what they are, why they are significant to your church web presence and how to connect with others using these Internet applications.

Search engines and users rely on you to provide information about your site's content - leverage your XOOPS meta tags and begin to improve your position on search engine results page (SERPs)

If you don't know where you're going, you'll never get lost. And, you'll see a lot of new places!

Setting goals is all about knowing where you're going and knowing when you arrive. We all have heard about S.M.A.R.T. goals - now is the time to put them work. Goals need to be specific, measurable, achievable, realistic and time bound. Let's see how that applies to our church website and the strategy you are developing.

This addition to Church Websites 101 will step away from the technology for a bit, because this is actually more difficult to master than the technology.

Point. Click, Type, Click. Drag, Drop. Share. Take a fresh look at your website - it might be easy, but it ain't simple! The number of easy-to-use site building and publishing tools is climbing, but the task of building and maintaining a good website is not getting any simpler. Until now.

The concepts are easily learned and, with proper discipline, you can have an effective, enjoyable website for your church.

How much of an impact does the look of your site have on the messages you convey with it? Do you think it matters?

It certainly does! Here's a little example of how the media shapes the message. Write a note and hand it to someone - you have just delivered your message to the person it was intended for. Now, take the same note, wrap it around a rock and throw it through the same person's window. The message hasn't changed, the sender hasn't changed, the recipient hasn't changed, but the method of delivery (or, the 'media') has changed. Do you think the recipient would regard the content the same in both instances?

Now - let's talk about your church website design and learn the right questions to ask before you use, buy, or hire a designer to design a custom theme for your church web site.

People long for meaningful connections and will pursue them in a multitude of ways. This is at the core of all the social networks - Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, Instagram, LinkedIn, eHarmony, Match.com, et al. Who do I know? And, just as importantly, who knows me?

People are communal beings - we need each other. We also look for meaning in our lives. As these 2 things merge, local churches play a significant role - if they are prepared for it.

Applications and search results are becoming very localized - providing different results for the searcher, depending on their place and time. All organizations need to center their online (searchable) content around their location and their website.

Has your church prepared itself to be a place of community for people seeking meaning in your area? We'll give you an overview of the local search landscape and how you can become a better online neighbor.

3rd in a series introduced in Church Websites 101: Easy. Not Simple. Last time, we fixed the easy stuff - now you'll need a little tech savvy to take care of some of these things. If you've selected a good CMS, most of this will be easy. If you're having to edit the pages or configuration directly - not so easy.

If you've gotten this far, you are well ahead of the majority of non-profit organizations. You have overcome the hurdle of publishing online and have developed a discipline for regular updates. Now, you're getting into some of the finer details of effectively sharing content online. You may also find your choice of tools is helping or maybe it is limiting your efforts.

Introduced in Church Websites 101: Easy. Not Simple, we're now going to dig deeper into the strategies you can employ to build and maintain a more effective website for your church or ministry.

The easy fixes are things you have, or should have, direct control over - the content is yours. This is all about what you post online. Examine your topics, your schedule for posting and updating, the language you use and your presentation. Do it now and keep doing it - establish a discipline (be a disciple) for your ministry.

This isn't a Top 10 list, or about comparing your site to another church website, or even to any kind of website. It's about applying some basic principles to your web presence to best represent your ministry online and connect with people. Point-and-click and drag-and-drop web publishing systems make make things seem easier, but that doesn't always (in fact, almost never) make those websites better. In this article, I survey the sites listed in our site showcase and share the results with you.