This month I’m giving churches a number of easy ways to “kick start” the new year . . . this week we’re talking about how to add video announcements to your weekend services.

In 2011 we made a solid commitment to video announcements being a regular part of our game at Liquid Church.  Two out of three Sundays this form of communication was a critical part of our services.  [Click here to see some of ours.]

I gotta be honest . . . I’m a bit of a convert to video announcements . . . I originally didn’t like these at all.  I thought the return on investment on this sort of thing was really low.  If you’ve had anything to do with video production you know that turning out a 2 minute video that looks great and is compelling takes a bunch of time . . . the thought of making a video that we would show just once didn’t make any sense to me.  But we kicked off last year saying that we would move it out of the “every once and while” to our default every week . . . we would only opt out of it for a good reason.

After having lived with video announcements for the last year . . . here are the benefits I can see for churches.

1. Incredible Focus for MultiSite Churches – When I put on my communications hat . . . I know that one of the challenges that a multisite church like ours faces is consistency of messaging in all of our locations.  The video announcements allow us to centrally communicate a message to all of our services and locations.  If you are multisite church . . . you need to decide against doing video announcements in my mind . . . it’s been that effective in getting the data out.
2. Allows Our Service Hosts to Focus on Relationship – I really don’t want our Campus Pastors’ communicating dates, times and locations of events.  Often announcements can degenerate to just the facts and figures.  Paring a video announcement that does the “detail work” of communicating allows our Campus Pastors to communicate the passion and purpose behind what we do.  The video host announces a new series . . . when it starts and such . . . the Campus Pastor gets to talk about their next door neighbor they are inviting.
3. Showing is Better Than Telling – We live in an increasingly visual culture.  [Read this blog post on the church in a post-literate culture.] By adding videos announcements as a platform for communication we are able to regularly “show not just tell” what is happening at the church.  We use lots of “b-roll” and “cut aways” to make sure that people can see what we’re talking about.
4. Extends Communication into the Week – We repost the video announcements through facebook, twitter and our weekly email blast.  This allows us to help catch up people who weren’t with us on the weekend to what is happening at the church.  Interesting factoid . . . when we post our video announcements and snippets of the messages on facebook . . . people click on the announcements more.  People want to know what is going on.

Does your church do some form of video announcements?  I’d love to see samples of what you do.  [Post a link to them in the comment section!]

Looking for more help with your announcements? This FREE 3-part video series is for you.

Are you looking to improve the hosting of your weekend services?

Have you already tried improving this area but aren’t sure what to do next?

Are you ready to take the next steps to increase engagement in your announcements and ultimately your church? I’m releasing a FREE three-part video series designed to help your church with better weekend hosting. The lessons in this series come from my practical experience of hosting hundreds of services in multiple contexts and coaching many other leaders in this area. The three videos are:

• Video #1: 5 Reasons People Aren’t Listening to Your Hosting. Your first video will clearly define for you why people aren’t paying attention to the announcements in your services.
• Video #2: The One Best Practice to Ensure Higher Engagement with Your Announcements. In this video, you will understand what the single most important practice thriving churches change about their announcements to improve engagement.
• Video #3: 3 Church Hosting Myths Debunked. Finally, you will dive into three misunderstood myths about hosting announcements that move people to action.

[Click here to learn more and enroll for FREE today.]