7 Ways to Promote Your Church Outreach Event Online

Do you and your church want to reach people in your community with the gospel?

One of the best church outreach strategies is to host an event that would be fun, appealing, or valuable to the people in your community.

Some church outreach event ideas include:

• Bring in a well known speaker
• Host a fun family event like a fall festival or Easter egg hunt
• Offer a seminar to help people with their finances, marriage, or parenting
• Serve in the community

The challenge is…

Just because you organize a church outreach event doesn’t mean people will show up.

If you want people to show up at your event, one of the best ways to get the word out is to promote your church outreach event online.  So, we want to share with you…

7 Ways to Promote Your Church Outreach Event Online

1) Create a page on your website.

Create a dedicated “landing page” on your church website that provides all the details of your event. Include a form that allows people to register or RSVP. Having a dedicated page (instead of text or a graphic on an existing page), enables you to link to it on other pages, social media, signs, mailers, etc.

2) Promote the event on your homepage.

Use a eye-catching promotional graphic with a teaser and link to the full page that has all the info about the event.

3) Create a “Facebook Event” for the event. 

Encourage your members to click the “Going” or “Interested” option on the event and share it on their timeline. People can also invite specific friends to the event by @mentioning them when sharing the event.

4) Do an online ad campaign for the event.

Facebook, Google and Instagram all have advertising options that include geo-targeting so you can share info about the event specifically with the people in your geographic area.

5) Reach out to other churches or organizations in your community.

It’s time to stop acting as if other churches are the competition and start working together to reach people in our communities with the gospel.

What other churches or organizations in your community might be willing to partner with you on the event and help promote it? Perhaps they would email their list about it, allow you to write a guest blog post about it, or share your Facebook Event on their Facebook page.

6) Send a press release to your local media.

Local news organizations are always looking for good news to share (to counter all the bad news they have to report on.) When you do this, be sure to emphasize why your event is unique and news-worthy (not just another church event). And be sure to send it out several weeks in advance so people have time to plan how they want to cover it.

7) Create a blog/social media campaign for the event.

The “Rule of Seven” says a person needs to see or hear something 7 times before they take action. Consider posting 2-3 things a week for the 3 weeks leading up to an event.

Additionally, get your whole church on-board with promoting the event by liking, commenting, and sharing the church’s social media posts. Start with a virtual street team. Your church’s social media will probably only reach your church members, but when your members share the posts, they’ll reach their friends outside the church!

Bonus: Create a QR code for the event

When you have a dedicated web page for your event, it’s a good idea to create a QR code that makes it easy for people to get to that page on their phones. For more on this, see our guide to QR codes for churches.

SEO Benefits of Online Church Outreach

One additional benefit from these online communications tactics is they all have the potential to improve your search rankings.

• When you partner with other organizations, they are more likely to post a link to your event on their website.
• When you send out a press release, a local media outlet could do a story with a link to your site.
• When you do a blog/social media campaign, you’re creating fresh content that Google likes and other people can share.

And like we’ve said before, SEO is one of the best church marketing strategies going! 

Be Bold with Your Church Outreach

One final thought… We live in a busy, noisy world.  If you host a fall festival that sounds just like the fall festival you and half the churches in town do every year, it’s probably not going to get a lot of attention or engagement.  So…

Be bold!

Be creative!

Try something no church in your area has ever done!

For the Spirit God gave us does not make us timid, but gives us power, love and self-discipline. -2 Timothy 1:7

Our team can help you make your church outreach more effective

There’s a lot that goes into church outreach. Wouldn’t you like a hand from someone who has experience, expertise and can save you time? We’d love to talk more with you about how our church website design and church SEO can make your outreach more effective

Complete the form below (mobile) or to the right (desktop) to schedule a call!

Comment and Discuss

• What’s the next church outreach event you have planned?
• Which of the online tactics above are you going to use to in your outreach?

Read more articles in our Church Outreach blog series and Church Outreach Ideas & Events for Every Season.