Steve Fogg: Clear and Simple.

my blog has moved to www.stevefogg.com

(In a answering phone type voice) "Hi, I'm not here right now, infact I won't ever be back on this blog platform. Please leave your name and no. and the time you called"

... ahem...

Hey there dear reader, I'm moving! Yes the good times are moving on from here at Typepad to Wordpress and a new and improved name www.stevefogg.com.

(Marketing spiel) My new site is newer, 25% improved flavour, gives the whitest whites, has a new makeover, where you can buy one get one free, and other intangible benefits.

To cut a long story short: THIS BLOG HAS MOVED.

You can keep up with current stuff and find all the oldies but goodies, too. (Remember kids, always update your RSS feeds or you'll miss out.)

That's all for here. There will be no more.

Remember www.stevefogg.com

 

 

Twitter Chat with James Leggott

 
#cmsucks Twitter chat is where we can collectively get together on Twitter and talk about communications, creativity and anything else that you can think of! James Leggott is a web designer from Hillsong and is our special guest this week.

Who is it for?: Pastors, Not for profit leaders, communications peeps, designers, creatives, web designers

Date: THIS Friday in Australia, THIS Thursday everywhere else!

Time: 
Australia
Melbourne: Friday 11am; 

USA
Los Angeles: Thursday 6pm; 
New York: Thursday 9pm, 

Europe
London: Thursday 2am (sorry!)

The conversation will be 1/2 hour in length, feel free to hang out afterwards.

Topic: All things web. James will be fielding your questions and we'll talk about anything else you want to cover. Comment below! Once I get the feeback I'll host the chat and the questions. 

Hashtag: #cmsucks

Got questions? Comment below

 

 

 

What I Learnt From The First Church Marketing Twitter Chat

I had a great time this morning (Australian time) hosting the first Church Marketing Sucks Twitter Chat. We had a group of around 12 people commenting, more probably watching the stream. 

Here are just a few of the highlights, feel free to add your comments below:

@ChrisWardYoung: :Context , content, knowing your market and being clear are what works for any comms - church or not" #cmsucks

Measuring radio ROI is nearly impossible IMO, but you can gauge increased web traffic or inquiries #cmsucks

@burks:  in a media saturated society, and advertising by a church needs to have a ton of thought behind it #cmsucks

@brittneydanne: we empower & enable by not making it a mission but a way of life. Give them tools & knowledge of what u stand for & they will... ..spread the mission/vision/values in a way that is PERSONAL to them & their story of faith. It's all about owning it! #cmsucks

On the practical side of holding a Twitter chat, here are some of my takeaways:

• The Twitter chat is a perfect place to meet new people (not in an awkward speed dating kind of way).

• I'm not sure if the time works globally, we may change this so that we don't hit dinner time in the US and midnight in the UK. How would Aussies/NZ'ers feel about a night time chat to include those other groups?

• Twitter chat is a great place to ask questions and get some informed group think going.

• The hastag feed can feel a bit disjointed at times as various conversations move at different pace

• It's a very easy way to connect globally with people who are passionately engaged in their respective roles in churches and not for profits. 

Here is an idea I have:

1) Move to a Google hangout. The 1st twelve can participate and the rest can ask questions via Twitter or Google hangouts if it lets you. I need to check this out to see if its a viable option.

What do you think? Comment below!

You're Invited To Twitter Chat

This idea has been brewing around for a while now in my head. I'd like to start a twitter chat where we can collectively get together on Twitter and talk about communications, creativity and anything else that you can think of!

Who is it for?: Pastors, Not for profit leaders, communications peeps, designers, creatives, web designers

Date: THIS Friday in Australia, THIS Thursday everywhere else!

Time:

Australia
Melbourne: Friday 9am; 

USA
Los Angeles: Thursday 4pm;
New York: Thursday 7pm,

Europe
London: Thursday 12am (sorry!)

The conversation will be 1/2 hour in length, feel free to hang out afterwards.

Topic: I want to know what you would like us all to talk about, comment below! Once I get the feeback I'll host the chat and the questions. 

Hashtag: #cmsucks

Got topics you think we should cover? Comment below

 

 

Outspoken: Conversations on Church Communication

When I started this blogging journey a year or so ago, I never thought in my wildest dreams that I would of contributing to a book about church communications. Today is launch day for Outspoken: Conversations on Church Communication.

The book was Tim Schraeder's idea and he has done a marvelous job along with many others pitching in to help edit and write contributions.

The church has the greatest story ever told: The message of the gospel. Unfortunately, most churches aren’t doing a great job of communicating it. Buy it here at Amazon for your leaders. It is a priceless leadership resource and available for Kindle or print. 

Psssttt If you look REAAAALLLY hard in the picture at the top you can see yours truly in a where's wally ;-)

I'm GIVING ONE COPY away. Here's how you can win

1) Retweet this message or post it to your Facebook wall: It's @Stevefogg is giving an @outspokenbook away on his blog http://bit.ly/qKlCtW

2) Leave a comment below on how it will help you. Include your Twitter handle or Facebook link, email address so I can contact you if you are the winner. (It would be great to hear from you on how it could help you in what you do. But not essential)

***************** CONGRATULATIONS Karen Davis***************** 

Your name was picked by the http://www.random.org/ 

Ban All Religion - The Pitch

No, I'm not advocating banning all religion. I wanted to share with you a segment from a television show here in Australia called The Gruen Transfer. The show is about the inner workings of advertising mixed with a bit of comedy from the host. The panelists are usually agency staff who comment about advertising campaigns and genre's of advertising.

The video you'll watch is from a segment is called 'The Pitch' where two agencies are challenged to sell the unsellable. The shows producers think that banning all religion is unsellable. I had a very interesting interaction with them and others on the show's Facebook page (It is a very popular page so you will need to scroll down quite a bit).

Many agencies turned this particular pitch down which is a first for the show because it is extremely popular here in Australia. They turned it down because of the controversial nature of the segment.

Here is the challenge for every Christian denomination and churches. Can we create compelling advertising the promotes Christianity? Is Christianity 'sellable' in the 21st Century? Should we?

Check out the pitch segment. For some of you this segment will challenge you and even be offensive. After you watch it let me know what you think about the video and my question, is Christianity 'sellable'?

 

Note: This segment even got featured on Richard Dawkins site.

6 lessons I've learnt from media work this week

The last two weeks have been very focused on time intensive media issues that our church has been taking a lead in. Public relations (PR) isn't my strongest point, but I love engaging with the press.

My role has been setting up the various media and preparing our message to ensure we stay on message.

Here are some of the media outlets Crossway has had coverage on:

MTR 1377 Radio with two high profile Melbourne radio presenters, Steve Price and Andrew Bolt

Top of the TV news on SBS (my favourite)

ABC AM program - Radio

Herald Sun - online

Perth Now - online

The West Australian - online

Sky News - online

Pro Bono News - online

Eternity Magazine - online

Leap News - online

Here are a few lessons this public relations novice has learnt:

1) Talking and doing preparation for media is time intensive. It literally has taken a lot of my working day which has meant I have had to delegate work out.  

2) Be prepared to operate outside 9am to 5pm. I set some media up for a Monday release which meant that I worked on Sunday to refine the media release and send it out. I also took calls from journalists on Sunday night.

3) Plan out where you want your spokesperson to be interviewed. Carefully choose the location of where you want your spokesperson to be. It helps shape your message.

4) Plan out any cut away shots of your spokesperson in advance to set the right tone you want for the interview. I got this partly wrong and chose cutaways for the family I had set up for the interview but didn't think to choose the right one for my spokesperson. Hence a slightly awkward cutaway.

5) Not everyone is going to agree with your position. Even inside your church.

6) Online news is hungry for content and is much more likely to fold your story into their news cycle.

Do you deal with the media? Are you a media guru? What could you teach us? Comment below

 

Mobile Web vs Mobile Apps - Should your church invest?

There is no doubt that mobile web and app development is a communications strategy that churches should be considering. Engagement on mobile and smartphones is explosive. Here are just a few of the statistics: 

• 70% of the world's population have a mobile phone. In the U.S. its 9 out of 10. Yes, that stat includes children.

• Apple's iPhone has sold over 60 million phones to date, Google's Android platform has grown 886% in the last year and is expected to outgrow the iPhone in this calendar year.

• 53% of companies are expected already to have deployed iPhones.

• In the next 5 years more people will access the internet via mobile instead of a PC (video) 

• In 2011 smart-phone and tablet sales have surpassed desktop sales. (Read that again)

The question no longer is should your church or not-for-profit be on these mediums, but where should you start if you haven't started already. 

Should it be mobile web or an App? Nathan Deselm gives some insight and say's that an organisation should determine this by measuring new or returning visitors to their website (You can do this through Google Analytics).

Complimenting Nathan's thinking Richard Kang at Cultivate Conference 2011 dropped a insightful statement "Mobile is good for outsiders Apps are good for insiders" People are far more likely first time around to go to your website via their smart-phone rather than download an app.

Here are my recommendations. If budget is an issue, go mobile web first. If you have the budget, do both. They are both valid communications channels. Your internal and external audiences matter. 

How about you, what do you think? 

(Thanks to Kem Myer for the link)

 

Church and Google+

I've been away on a six week holiday and in that time Google had the audacity to release a new social media product without telling me.They obviously made a mistake and didn't realise I was on holiday.

I feel like I'm late to the ball game on this one and while I've signed up yesterday, I'm yet to figure out IF it will be a useful social media tool for my church. I feel like I've well and truely got my L plates on.

I need your help. Do you think Google+ can help churches?(I've found Mashable's complete guide to google+)

Drop a comment below share your opinion about how google+ can help churches communicate.

 

6 Simple Ways To Build Your Volunteer Communications Team

One of the perennial challenges I've been told of working in a church is working with volunteers and raising up new volunteers. Here's the thing. I've never had any major problems building my communications volunteer team. Here are some of the principles I've followed over the last few years.

Get specific

Create a job description. Describe what the volunteer will be doing, how long it should take, how often it the job is needed to be done.

Don't be shy - Ask

If you don't ask you certainly won't get anyone to volunteer, so keep your eyes and ears open to appropriately skilled people and ask them to serve.

Find the right fit

Every volunteer opportunity takes a different amount of time and energy. Your success rate in developing volunteers will rise if you can put the right volunteer with the right task in respects to their talent and their available time.

Be clear about what you expect 

Just because someone is volunteering it doesn't mean that they can turn up when they like or do what they like. Be clear on their roles and responsibilities and tell them what you expect. It sets you both up for a win on essential communication routines.

Create systems and processes

Every communications team should develop and document their communications systems and processes. If you do this then you open up the process to more people because anyone can follow a well written system if coached well. We create a weekly email bulletin. We've developed a written system teach a new volunteer how create the e-bulletin each time they come in. It means that when a new volunteer comes on board it is easy for them to become familiar on how to do what they need to do.

Love them

No, not some kind of crazy stalker kind of love. Show them that you appreciate their time, energy and service. Tell them why what they do matters. I love coffee and I build into my communications budget to pay for my volunteers coffee when they come in. It's one way I can connect with them and to thank them for their service.

How about you? What do you do with your volunteer team? Comment below.

(P.S. I'm off on holiday for 6 weeks so it will be quiet on this blog for a while.)