The Ultimate Church Website Checklist

What you'll learn

• The 5 must-have pages every church website needs
• How to evaluate your current site against a proven checklist
• Quick wins you can implement this week to improve your site
• Common church website mistakes and how to fix them
• How to make your site welcoming to first-time visitors

Notes

• Start by picking your number one goal for the website, then use a 10 item checklist for launching or improving it.
• Get a short, memorable domain name, preferably a .com, and own it yourself instead of buying it through your website provider.
• Choose a reliable host with fast servers, since site speed affects how you show up in Google search.
• Use responsive design so one site fits every screen, because a lot of traffic comes from phones.
• Pick an easy content management system that matches your skill level, ideally one with inline editing.
• Set up Start Here, Contact Us and leadership pages for first time visitors; write bios warmly, not like a resume.
• Integrate social media, but remember you do not own Facebook; your website is your digital home base.
• Set goals and measure them, and add sermon audio and video, a blog and live streaming to minister beyond Sunday.
• How-to: build a contact form page and a prayer request page, with form recipients and subject lines set per page.
• How-to: create a short URL redirect so a long page address becomes something easy to say or put on a slide.

Companion article

Notes and resources that go with this session