Archive for April, 2008
3 Ways To Provoke A Response Without Endangering Your Soul
April 29th, 2008 Categories: Christian Blogging Tips
What’s the extent that you’re willing to go to in order to provoke your readers to respond to your Christian blog articles? Are you willing to say something outrageous? Are you going to do something crazy on video? I’m not necessarily against any of these tactics, provided that what you’re doing on your blog glorifies Christ.
Here are three cool ideas for something you can do that will get readers involved without getting yourself struck by lightning in the process:
1) Write an outrageous headline. If you still haven’t learned lesson numeral uno, it’s easily summarized by saying, “The headline is king.” If you’re still not sure about what is and what is not a good healine, click here. Now that we’ve got that hammered out, stretch yourself and write something outrageous that will evoke a response. A good example would be “Three Reasons Why You’re Not As Smart As You Think.” Everybody and their brother is going to read that article, and you still haven’t allowed old Screwtape to gain any ground.
2) Use an outrageous photo. Here’s a good example. Don’t get carried away with this. Keep it sanctified.
3) Challenge somebody. I love a good, old-fashioned double-dog-dare. And, from my blogging experience, it’s a pretty effective way to solicit a response from your readers. A good example might be if I said something like, “I double-dog-dare you to click on this link and watch an outrageous video about the best church in the entire world.” See how easy that was?
Seriously, we have to be careful with the “shock and awe” type of blog in our genre. We must glorify Christ in all we do, but we still have to be interesting enough to build readership. Why? Cuz my baby-mamma needs some cash. Just kidding. The Lord has given us all the opportunity to influence others on the internet. Creating some buzz could be your way of stewarding that opportunity.
We Build Blogs
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3 Secret Weapons of the Christian Blogger
April 27th, 2008 Categories: Christian Blogging Tips
A blog is a blog, right? Unless, of course, the Holy Spirit gets involved and boosts you to a new level of performance and exposure. Then what is a blog? A blog can be a Kingdom tool for advancing the agenda of God.
Some secular bloggers are going to read this post and have no idea what I’m talking about. These three items that I’m about to share with you are intangible to them, foolishness in fact. Of course, we know that God uses the foolish to confound the wise. It’s kind of His thing. Here are three supernatural weapons that the Christian blogger can use to grow readership, disciple readers, and advance the Kingdom:
1) Prayer. What? Pray about a blog? Yep. The Lord instructs us in the book of James chapter 4 verse 2 that “you have not because you do not ask.” Want more readers? Pray. Want to increase the impact of your writing? Pray. Want to turn readers into disciples? Pray. The world will never understand the power of simple prayer, but I believe that it’s an important tool for the Christian blogger.
2) Fasting. Wait, wait….you want me to fast over a blog. Yep. I hear so many Christian bloggers complaining of “writers block,” which to me sounds symptomatic of an anemic relationship with the Lord. If you will pray and fast over the content that you’re preparing for your Christian blog, you can be sure that your content will not only be stellar and on-time, but that it will reach its intended mark and have a lasting effect on the Kingdom.
3) The Word. Using scripture in a blog post is the equivalent of “firing for effect” for an artillery officer. You can’t state the purposes of the Lord more concisely than the Word of God, so just use the good stuff as often as possible. If you scare people off from your blog, at least you will have done so while sharing with them the truth of Jesus Christ.
Those are three secret weapons that every Christian blogger has in their employ to reach the masses via blog and online media. Are you using them? If not, why not?
There is a simple truth that pertains to both the spiritual and the natural: If you want to get something you’ve never had, you’ve got to do something you’ve never done. Prayer, fasting, and the application of the Word should be the norms in our life, not the exception.
We Build Blogs| Discussion: 10 Comments »
3 Reasons to Diversify Your Blogging Portfolio
April 26th, 2008 Categories: Christian Blogging Tips
I conducted a little self survey of my favorite blogs today and came to a somewhat startling conclusion: All of my favorite blogs employ multiple writers. Not one of my top 10 reads is a single blogger writing every day, but all of them have at least two or three contributers who regularly publish content.
Think of your Christian blog as an investment. In order for your investment to perform as well as possible, to survive “market downturns,” and to cover all of your bases, you need to have a diversified portfolio. The same is true with your Christian blog. If you want to reach the widest possible audience, cover an appealing range of topics, and maximize your subscriber count, you need to have multiple voices.
Take, as an example, my Pastor. He’s a brilliant writer. He’s an anointed teacher. He’s quite the theologian, in fact. And, there is a segment of word nerds that love to read everything that he writes. I, on the other hand, am better at writing with a humorous voice, appealing to twenty-somethings, and blogging about blogging. If we were smart, we’d be posting guest articles on one another’s blogs once in a while in order to reach the widest possible audience for the cause of Christ. Here are three reasons why it’s best to have multiple writers on your blog:
1) People grow weary of the same voice. Mix it up a little, offer something different, and you’ll not only use new keywords that you never though of and increase your traffic organically through google, but you’ll stand a better chance of retaining those readers and turning them into church members. Whether or not you want to admit it, your congregation is grateful for the occasional Sunday when they don’t have to hear only your voice. A guest speaker is nice once in a while. The same is true with bloggers.
2) You might learn something. Sometimes bloggers like to pretend like they know everything there is to know about their subject matter. The truth is that when you invite somebody to write a guest post on your blog, you’re opening up your audience to the experience and revelation of a new person, and you’re more likely than not to learn something that might educate you or change your perspective. It’s good for business, and good for the spirit.
3) You get a day off from blogging. I know. I know. You’re hard core, right? You can write multiple blog posts in a single sitting. You can mull concepts and formulate bullet points in your sleep. You’re the king of the numbered list. I got it. Still, it’s nice to have a day once in a while to go to the beach or play with the kids, right? Now, loosen the reigns on that blog and let somebody else take a crack at it. You’ve worked hard on your blog. Now, take a day off.
We Build Blogs| Discussion: No Comments »
Another Kingdom 2.0 Christian Blog
April 26th, 2008 Categories: Positive Press
We’ve upgraded our skin over at The Revolution Brigade site, and we’d moved from wordpress.com to wordpress.org this morning. The Revolution Brigade site is a prime example of how we can take an existing wordpress theme and modify it to suit your needs. This is going to end up being a much more affordable solution than a complete custom theme designed from the ground up by our designers. The Kingdom Horizons blog is another example of this type of modified template.
Hey, we’re trying to advance the Kingdom here. We can make it work for you on just about any budget. Why not check us out and see what we can do for your church or ministry.
About the Revolution Brigade: This is my youth ministry blog. I’m a youth minister at Grace Community Fellowship in Starke, FL. We have a radical group of young people dedicated to “turning the world upside down,” and they’re serious about reaching their generation for Christ. I encourage you to check it out.
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3 Reasons Why Wordpress Makes A Great Church Website
April 24th, 2008 Categories: Church Marketing
Wordpress is awesome. It’s one of the most customizable, widely accepted blogging platforms on the planet. And, for the most part, if you can check your email and compose a message you are already equipped to be a wordpress blogger. If you’re toiling away at some time consuming church content management software, or worse yet, paying somebody else to upload content for you, this blog is for you.
Here are three cool reasons why a Wordpress blog makes a great church website:
1) You can do practically anything in wordpress you can do on a static web page: By “static” web page, I mean one that doesn’t update automatically the way that wordpress does when you publish new content. And, by “practically anything,” I mean anything. For instance, you can create both posts and pages in wordpress, so you can still have an “About” page, an “Upcoming Events” page, and whatever else you like. But, the added benefit is that you can also have fresh, daily updates on your front page. It’s cool like that.
2) You get the added google mojo of a blog: Listen, I’m no computer scientist. I just know that blogging works for SEO purposes. For some reason it just happens. You write cool church articles and plug them into awesome categories, and all of a sudden you’re number one in google for this and that search term. It’s cool like that.
3) Build and Blog and get people involved: Warning. If you put your new church website on a Wordpress blog, you just might encourage people to *gasp* participate. I know. It’s a weird concept. But your congregation has something to share. Give them the opportunity by putting your old website to death and getting on with the business of blogging.
If you want a wordpress blog custom designed with everything that your little heart desires, made to order, chopped to perfection, and built to suit….click here. You’ll be taken to a page where you can contact Jonathan Greene of the Kingdom 2.0. He’ll call you. He will be wearing a blue shirt. He has a pleasant voice. He’ll ask you exactly what you want out of your website, and you’ll tell him. He’ll release his team of Church Blog Design Ninjas and they will create the perfect blog for your church. You’ll pay him for this service, but it will seem like nothing compared to the joy you get from your new blog. How’s that for a call to action?
We Build Blogs| Discussion: 3 Comments »
