Inter-Congregational Marketing

Last Updated: June 1, 2018 Contact: Derek Nicol

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In general, we default to having all events, announcements, and opportunities marketed to people from all congregations. However, there are important reasons why certain events and opportunities may not be marketed and available to the broader church.

3 Reasons Why We Limit or Exclude Opportunities to Other Congregations

SPACE LIMITATIONS

If space is limited, then it makes sense that an opportunity would be only made available to the hosting congregation or whatever target group makes sense. In situations where space is not a limitation, it seems right to open the opportunity to people from other congregations.

LEADERSHIP LIMITATIONS

Events and ministries scale differently. Some scale easily, increased attenders without additional leadership necessary (usually one-time events like conferences). Other events and ministries don’t scale well unless we grow leadership capacity as well (usually discipleship-based events and ministries). In situations where increased attenders doesn’t affect the leaders’ capacity, it seems right to open the opportunity to people from other congregations.

REDUNDANCY & DISTRACTION

Sometimes we don’t market and make available certain opportunities across congregations because it’s the kind of initiative that is happening in similar form at another congregation. For example, if West were to appoint a leader to reach Bantu Somali teenagers in the hilltop, we probably wouldn’t market that opportunity to people living in Upper Arlington if they were simultaneously calling the Tri-City congregation to reach Iraqi or Nepali people living in Northwest Columbus. It would feel redundant and confusing to people from both congregations, and the cross-congregational opportunity could distract people from the calling they have in their own neighborhood. If an opportunity were neither redundant nor distracting, then it seems right to open the opportunity to people from other congregations.

A Rubric for Determining Degree of Inter-Congregational Marketing

Certainly, there are still many inter-congregational opportunities to collaborate. Usually they meet the following criteria:

• No space limitations
• No leadership limitations
• No redundancy
• No distraction
• Meets a shared need from another congregation

Certainly, there are events and opportunities that are scalable; but not everything is; and so when I market events, I pay a lot of attention to the things listed above. To help balance this idea, some opportunities are scalable and can be marketed and available to people from other congregations. Here are some scalable opportunities that can and have been marketed across congregations to some degree.