The Ultimate Church Website Red Flag

Hey, it’s Brady,

THIS is the cardinal sin of church websites.

Avoid it at all costs:

Stock photos of people that don’t attend your church.

The Church IS the people.

Meaning, it’s a betrayal of trust to put paid models on your site and try to pass them off as your congregation.

Want to use stock photos that don’t include people?

Sure. Go for it.

But could I offer an even better option? Consider the following reports:

• Researchers from University College London found that adding happy photos of people to low-trust websites increased trust.

• Researchers from the University of Bradford found that initial trust was boosted on websites that have photos of human faces.

• Canadian researchers found that websites with photos of human faces were more positively received by users than websites with photos lacking human faces or websites lacking photos of humans whatsoever.

Bottom line?

Trust in institutions (churches included) is at a 50-year low. Meaning, by default people are skeptical when they visit your church online.

The best way to start building trust?

Big photo containers on your site of your church’s vibrant community.

The Worst Church Website Design Trends

I made a list of 15 items that everyone thinks a church website needs.

The truth is, a bunch of them, don't matter at all!

So we'll be putting these items into categories:

• Necessary

• Nice To Have

• or…

• Nonsense

Get the answers here.

Thanks as always for your time, attention, and trust. Talk to you next Thursday. - Brady Shearer