Effectively Promoting Your Sermon Player Part 2 - Electronic Media

Website:

Let’s start with your website. Is your Sermon Player easy to find? Many times a website can become cluttered or disorganized making it difficult to navigate. It is important to remember that you need clear cut menus that successfully convey page content. Statistics show that most spend very little time on a page before leaving your site. Therefore, it is very important that they quickly find what it is they are looking for. Create a clear link from the home page to your Sermon Player and name the page something that makes for easy navigation (Sermons, Sermon Player, Media, Listen online, Video, etc…). One thing I see when I scan through pages of current ministry partners is many players are buried under multiple levels of menus. One popular page title I am seeing is resources, while the Sermon Player is clearly a resource how many visitors are going to click on a page with that title. The very title “resources” makes me think that you have something to sell rather than free messages from God’s Word. Remember that we want the gospel to be easy to find. If you make your messages hard to find many will give up without finding the answers they need.

Once you have properly titled your page and provided a clear visible link to that page you need to look at the page itself. Although the Sermon Player is an intuitive tool there are some that will not take the time to learn to use it. I have seen many churches putting simple instructions on the page above or below the player to assist their audience. Make sure the podcast feed is visible on the page somewhere as well. You can put a clickable link to your podcast on your website by replacing the http at the beginning with itpc (example: http://sermonfeed.com/mychurch would be itpc://sermonfeed.com/mychurch/rss). Once your visitor has clicked this link iTunes will open and they will have the option to subscribe to your podcast.

Email:

Many ministries send out regular emails with announcements to their church membership. There are several things you can do with these emails to highlight your Sermon Player. There is no reason not to mention the Sermon Player in every email you send. Put the Sermon Player URL in the signature of the email, include the podcast feed in the email, or send a link to a featured sermon or sermon series. These emails don’t have to highlight the Sermon Player but they should always include at least a reminder link to the player page on your website.

Presentation System:

Many churches today have a projection system where they display upcoming events and announcements. Take advantage of this resource by including a slide with Sermon Player information. Let your congregation know they can listen to the message again and provide them with the player page URL and podcast feed.

Media Advertising:

If you are running television or radio advertising include a mention of the Sermon Player giving your web address. Add this reference to ads you are currently running.

iTunes:

Submit you’re feed to iTunes so that your podcast will be included in the searchable iTunes directory. Submitting to iTunes is a very simple process, all you need to do is enter your feed address and click submit. After a 48 hour wait you will be able to find your church podcast in the iTunes directory.

These are just a few suggestions that should help you reach a larger segment of your target audience. Remember to continue checking your stats to see just how effectively you are promoting the Sermon Player. I have been amazed at the number of pastors who have told me that their Sermon Player, strategically located on a website, brought visitors to the church because they liked what they heard. Please don’t hesitate to contact us with any suggestions you have found to be useful.