When Thomas Davenport and John Beck wrote the book The Attention Economy, they brought a very important message to church leaders. The book argues that information and talent are no longer your most important resource but rather attention itself. People cannot hear the vision unless we cut through the clutter.
The principle of attention requires church leaders to be bold and relevant as they integrate vision into the internal communication of the church. According to Davenport and Beck, these are the most important characteristics to get attention:
- The communication is personalized.
- The communication comes from a trustworthy source.
- The communication is brief.
- The communication is emotional.
In other words, your communication should be telling stories.
And your stories start with knowing your thread.
THE QUICK SUMMARY – Be Known for Something by Mark MacDonald
Pastor, communicator, ministry leader… listen to your community!
— 80% of evangelical churches are in decline or stagnation.
— A third of our communities have no perceived need for a local church.
— Many churches aren’t known for anything relevant in their communities.
The solution: Be known for something that will reconnect you to your community. Embark on an eye-opening journey to revitalize your church’s reputation, control your message, and create a communication strategy for reaching the lost for Jesus Christ.
Your church needs to reconnect with community. This book will help you to discover how.
Mark MacDonald, a leading voice in effective church communication, shares fascinating stories to help you discover your unique thread that will…
- Revitalize your church’s reputation
- Simplify your church’s messaging
- Tear down your ministry silos
- Attract people to your church
Be Known For Something is the answer to engaging your congregation while encouraging church growth from your community.
Discover your thread in this easy-to-read and easy-to-lead book. Learn how to control it, communicate it, and live it.
A SIMPLE SOLUTION
The sitcom “Cheers,” a hit for 11 seasons, may be best remembered for the refrain of its theme song: “where everybody knows your name.”
What about your church? Does your community “know your name?” Not the literal name of your church, but the “who” and “what” and “why” of your church.
Maybe that question needs to be preceded with another, more telling one: Do your members “know your name?”
According to “Be Known for Something” author Mark MacDonald, if your members and regular attenders don’t know what their church was known for, the community certainly won’t hear about it.
And if your community doesn’t hear about you, or “know your name,” are you really being effective in reaching them?
Why do thousands of churches fail annually while our communities have lost interest in our ministries? Perhaps, there’s a thread we can discover so that we can reconnect with our local community where God planted us…a thread that God will use to grow His Church and your ministry.
Do you know what your thread is? Here are the criteria to weigh your ideas and create a successful communication thread:
It needs to be simple.
This short statement (1-5 words) needs to be a simple concept that people will embrace and remember.
It needs to be somewhat “open” in thought.
The more specific the statement is, the harder it will be to “roll it out” across your ministry.
It needs to be emotionally charged.
Consider the emotion someone will have when he or she experiences the benefit. Make sure this emotion is the feeling you or your church exudes.
It needs to be benefit-driven.
The statement should refer to a solution and, therefore, a prominent pain or a path to a goal.
It needs to feel like your congregation.
Be biblical, genuine, authentic, and real.
It needs to be unique.
The more unique you are in the communication thread, the easier it will be for you to break through with it.
Your DNA scarlet thread is woven within everything you’re doing. Get your thread embedded into people’s long-term memory.
Mark MacDonald, Be Known for Something
A NEXT STEP
Use the following discussion questions by author Mark MacDonald in your next leadership team meeting to focus on discovering your church’s “thread.”
- If our people were to go and live our mission statement, how would their lives attract non-churched people in our community?
- If we are “being” our mission statement, what benefit would speak directly to someone in our community?
- What’s the biggest benefit for attending our church? What would the average regular attender say it is?
- If there’s more than one thing, do we think we could decide on the thing? The answer we want to hear regularly to this question, “so why do you attend this church?”. Would the answer encourage someone else who doesn’t attend a church now to attend?
Excerpt taken from SUMS Remix 118-2, released May 2019.
Part of a weekly series on 27gen, entitled Wednesday Weekly Reader
Regular daily reading of books is an important part of my life. It even extends to my vocation, where as Vision Room Curator for Auxano I am responsible for publishing SUMS Remix, a biweekly book “excerpt” for church leaders. Each Wednesday on 27gen I will be taking a look back at previous issues of SUMS Remix and publishing an excerpt.
>> Purchase prior issues of SUMS Remix here<<
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