Tech for the Local Church
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Online Giving & Landing Pages
Jun 24th
Landing pages allow you to customize the content to the reader who has just clicked through from an ad or special offer kind of click. These pages don’t have to show up in your regular website menus/navigation.
If you have an online giving option on your website (you do have that, right?), have you thought about what the donor sees after successfully sending money to your church?
Enter the ‘Thank You’ page.
Here are some best practices based on Hubspot’s blog article Thank You, Come Again!: Best Practices for Thank You Pages:
- Thank Them. Well, duh! Put yourself in their shoes and ask yourself what you’d like to see if you had just given money. Be sincere but not cheesy.
- Set Great Expectations. Will you send them a tax receipt? A written thank you? What are you going to do with their money? Let them know what happens next.
- Suggest They Follow You. Are you on FaceBook or Twitter? Invite them to be more involved in your ministry/cause by joining your circle of friends
- Better Yet: Suggest They Tell Their Friends. They’ve already given you a vote of confidence by their donation. Suggest they invite you into their circle of friends. Get the word out!
Don’t miss the opportunity to involve your donors in the mission & ministry of your church. People love to be a part of something bigger than themselves, and especially love being part of a ‘winning team’.
What good ideas could you add to this?
"Virtual Community"
Mar 19th
Free Copyright Legal Music
Sep 4th
Check out…

Does anyone out there have any other copyright free music?
Animoto
Aug 22nd
Check out Animoto. It’s as easy as 1,2,3…
A N I M O T O via kwout
Facebook Upgrade
Aug 9th
Mark Zuckerberg recently announced some upgrades to Facebook. Let us know what you think about the new upgrades?
Anything that may be used to better organize, communicate, etc. in churches?
FREE TICKET and GAS!
Jul 18th

Hop over to thesticks.tv and register to win a free ticket!
Also check out how you can win free gas!
the sticks
Jul 15th
It’s called ‘the sticks’ [www.thesticks.tv]
You won’t want to miss it. There are only 400 seats available so register soon to get the discount pricing!
C2.0 WorkForce: Nic Scott
Feb 27th
Nicholas Scott has just been added to the C2.o WorkForce.
Nic comes to us with a back ground in graphic and print design. His real job is “Mac IT Support for Corporate Advertising” for a national grocery store chain. He says his title sounds more impressive than it really is. Nic also have experience in prepress and production art environments. When time permits he picks up freelance design jobs. Nic is a mac user, heavy user of free-ware, for media editing, audio editing, image editing, and productivity.
Nic believes every church should be using technology to their advantage, and he is excited to give you some ideas about how to do just that.
Google Privacy
Dec 20th
Google has released a series of videos on their YouTube Privacy Channel. The videos do a good job describing how to use the various sharing features built into Google’s products – features you might not be aware of – like how to limit the sharing or sharing subfeatures of your Blogger blog or Picasa Web photos. The site also addresses more common issues of privacy regarding your interaction with Google.
If you’ve even been curious about what information is collected when you search on Google, you’ll want to check out the “Google Search Privacy: Plain and Simple“. Trying to help someone understand what all those “cookie” files are on their machine? See the Cookie Crumbles Finalists videos.
If you’re using any of these Google tools, many of which we’ve recommended before, is nice to know some of the tweaks for sharing information in limited circles (e.g., sharing the candid photos from the missions trip with only the folks on the trip) and it’s always a good idea to understand the privacy aspects associated with various services.
Image citation: Today Is A Good Day, “Not Something You See Everyday….” Today Is a Good Day’s Photostream. 7 Dec 2005. 20 Dec 2007 .
Browser Access to BibleGateway Search Results
Dec 4th
For a long time, the handy search box found in the top right corner of Firefox and now Internet Explorer 7 was my favorite way to look up just about everything – except scripture. That’s simply because it took me three years – I’m embarrassed to say – to ask the question: Could BibleGateway be one of my search options?
The answer is yes!
BibleGateway can be added to both Firefox and IE 7′s toolbar search utilities. Here’s how:
In Firefox:
1. Choose “Manage Search Engines”
2. Choose “Get More Search Engines…”
3. Scroll down the page and find the “Browse through more search engines” link.
4. Type “biblegateway.com” in the search field.
5. Choose your favorite version from the list, and click “Add”
You’re ready to search BibleGateway directly from Firefox’s search box.
To do the same thing in Internet Explorer 7:
1. Choose “Find More Providers…” from the search drop down options
2. Follow the directions to “Create Your Own” – The all-capital spelling of “TEST” is important.
(BTW: http://www.biblegateway.com/quicksearch/?quicksearch=TEST&x=13&y=11 should suffice for the requested URL.)
3. Click “Install” and then “Add Provider” to complete the process.
Next time you need to search for biblical text or scripture, simply choose BibleGateway from the list of search providers, enter your search information, and hit enter.
ZIPskinny
Sep 25th
No, this is not a post about an amazingly effective new girdle. Wrong blog.
Rather, it’s a quick note about a tool called ZIPskinny that lets you pull up demographic information about a given zip code based on census data and even compare that to other communities around you. As the folks at churchrelevance.com point out, “it is a great resource for learning more about your church’s community.”
Any tool that helps a church learn a little bit more about their community and, in turn, be better able to get out and meet needs of that community is a good thing.
[via Mister Nifty via churchrelevance.com]
Congratulations!
Sep 25th
Rush Family 2.0 – Parenthood. Congratulations Sondra and Kevin!
Join me in congratulating the Rush family. Drop by Kevin’s blog and leave them a note in the comments.
Photo credit: techno_chic’s photostream, http://flickr.com/photos/techno_chic/
FireFox Add-on: Snap Shots
Sep 14th
Ever wonder where a link goes before actually having to click on it. With the Firefox add-on by Snap you can preview the site before visiting it. It’s simple install the extension by going to SnapShot website and follow the installation directions. Then wallah!
As you hover over a web link, a preview pane appears [pictured above]. That’s it, another great little browser add-on.
Also available for IE v6 and 7 & Safari 2.0.1 and above.
Firefox Add-on: SpeakIt
Sep 13th
If you are like me, you get tired of reading things off the internet. Luckily with Speak It, you can have it read it to you. It’s easy! Just install the Firefox extension.
Once it is installed, highlight the text you want read to you on any website.* Then right click and find “Say It” (pictured to the right). As soon as you left click “Say it” a computerized voice will begin to read to you. It’s great for people who get tired of reading everything off of the internet. Like me.
* needs to be html code. Don’t worry over 90% of all websites are html code.










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