Once you make the decision to move ahead and build or update your church website, you need to choose the platform you will build it with. What are your choices and how will you make the decisions you are faced with? Here's a look at a baker's dozen of top content management systems and how they compare for church websites and how should you evaluate them.

As someone making an entry to the web for your church or ministry, you might think it rather simple, given the number of easily available tools. Or, you might find it too complex, given the myriad of choices and options you face. In either case, having somewhere to turn for guidance makes your job less challenging.

A logical place to turn is someone who has already done what you are hoping to do and has a similar mission. Larger churches and denominations certainly fit this role and are good starting places. However, they vary greatly in the resources they use and make available on their websites.

Here's an overview of several large denominations and the resources they offer, along with some of their own practices.

Creating and maintaining a personal website is far simpler than doing the same tasks for a church or ministry, or any organization, for that matter. Even when you acknowledge this, the reality is often times harsher that you expect or imagine. When you start to feel overburdened, take some time to gather yourself and gain some new perspectives for your situation. Then, work together with your leaders for a sustainable ministry solution.

Photo credits: I found the image for this article on Flickr and it was made available under a Creative Commons license - CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

FAQs - Frequently Asked Questions - we've become accustomed to looking for them on web sites we visit. But, should we? If everyone is asking, why didn't we anticipate the questions? Here's a look at answering and anticipating the questions your visitors are probably asking.

FAQ sections are good signs your original content is bad.

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.

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.

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.

People lead busy lives and calendars are seemingly easy ways to help keep you on track. The problem is, many people tend to put everything on their calendar and then try to manage what's there. What impact would adding an events calendar to your site have?

Calendars, especially online calendars, create a high expectation for timeliness and accuracy. They also provide a nice overview of your organization's activities and opportunities to connect. But, they can also be high maintenance items. We'll examine a few options for modules and an approach that may work for you.

The Web is a great place to find something to read. But, with so many choices placed in front of Internet users - what do they decide to read and how to they find it? The Internet is used to expand one's social, intellectual and even spiritual experiences. Just as your church buildings do not serve only as a tribute to the craftsmanship of the builders, your web site's primary function is not to highlight the skill of the programmer, but to reach people. How can you reach people online?

Groups are always challenged with keeping everyone informed of changes to upcoming events and notifying them of new events that have been added. Using features built into XOOPS and ImpressCMS, your task just got a lot simpler.