Think

Like it or not, social networking has taken over the internet. Just about any major site you visit will have RSS feeds, "share" links, and social pages allowing users to reach their content across the web as well as allow users to share any given content through social networks. Social sites such as Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, Virb, YouTube, Vimeo as well as Digg, StumbleUpon, Reddit, etc. There are literally thousands upon thousands of these sites and hundreds of millions of people using them every day. Find out more after the break…

Let me begin by saying that a large majority of my time in the web development world has been wrapped up in the Joomla! Content Management System. Sure, it felt like a steep learning curve when I first picked it up, but soon I began to know Joomla, even if I couldn’t really understand Joomla. That system caused me hundreds of hours of frustration and anger before I finally started to develop any sort of work flow for the sites assigned to me. It may be this very fact that made me cringe when I heard the first murmurs of dissent around the office.

It’s amazing to watch the impact that forward-thinking pastors have had on whole congregations, even whole cities. Their mission is always to communicate the gospel in new ways. They approach things from a new perspective, they take risks, they think different, like an Apple ad from the 80’s. They have new approaches, like painting public school buildings just because they can, or remodeling a house for a family in need. This kind of communication is the most powerful…even the loudest. The whole community notices, the marketplace sits up and sees the impact.

Its been pretty amazing over the years to watch the church in America move into its new, creative, edgy approach to communication. Church marketing has indeed come a long way. It’s moved into a new era of impact, creating new paths and growing every step of the way. Sometimes it starts to look the same and kind of blur together, but doesn’t every niche?