Tag Archive for: marketing

700 – Celebrating 700!

For the 700th time, welcome to WELSTech, a show about technology and ministry and where those two intersect! Martin and Sallie look way back to 2008 when the show started and explore the changing landscape of tech-in-ministry which they’ve observed through the years. Church texting platforms, fancy social media posts, and AI-generated text are some of the 2023 tech-in-ministry topics discussed on this episode as well.

The discussion

A big milestone – Martin and Sallie suited up to celebrate this 700th episode of WELSTech with a look back at where and why it started, tech-in-ministry topics then and now, retro WELSTech images, and book reviews through the years. Plus, the WELSTech “ace in the hole” is revealed!

Ministry resource

Top 28 Church Texting Platforms – Comparison chart in the PDF

Picks of the week

Community news & feedback

Next time

Amanda Klemp from WELS Communication Services shares tips for great e-newsletters

Get involved

652 – A Is For Amazing

This week’s WELSTech focus is missions as Marissa Krogmann from WELS Missions Promotion office shares details about an upcoming virtual event and more. Martin’s got just the ticket to take your OneNote use to the next level, and we’ll talk through 7 pages which should be on your church website. Ready, set, play!

The interview

Amazing Missions – Marissa Krogmann, Missions Promotions Manager for WELS, shares her excitement about the work of WELS Home and World Missions with Martin and Sallie. In particular, learn about the upcoming Taste of Missions virtual event, happening July 11-17, 2021.

Picks of the week

Ministry resource

7 Best Pages to Include on Your Church Website

Community feedback

WELS now

Get involved

651 – Let’s Grow

This week on WELSTech we take a deep dive into the topic of school marketing with a great interview and discussion on the topic. Guest hosts Rachel and Jason have the perfect tools for designing your next social media post. Crisis planning resources and a call for presenters round out the episode.

The interview and discussion

Dana Kirchoff joins Martin and Sallie to discuss the roots of school marketing – knowing your community and their needs so schools can strategically design programs and communication to meet the needs.

WELSTech’s edtech gurus, Prof. Rachel Feld from Martin Luther College and Jason Schmidt from the Oconto Falls School District, also share their perspective on school and church marketing and social media.

Picks of the week

Ministry resource

One By One Bible Study

Community feedback

WELS now

WELS National Education Conference

  • Happening June 20-22, 2022 at the Ingleside Hotel in Pewaukee, WI
  • Call for Presenters – deadline May 31, 2021

Get involved

649 – Great City Network

This week’s WELSTech includes a look at the offerings of Great City Network and the wrap up of The Post-Quarantine Church book discussion. There’s also chat about a Lenten podcast, texting in church, online giving, and capturing parent’s attention as they search online for school options.

The interview

Outside-the-box urban ministry – Pastor Kent Reeder from Illume Church, Seattle, WA and Dan Jaspersen, curator, join us to discuss the formation and three-fold vision of Great City Network – collaborating, training, and skill sharing.

The book discussion

From challenges to opportunities – Martin and Sallie finish their discussion of The Post-Quarantine Church  by Thom Rainer.

Picks of the week

Ministry resource

Heart to heart: parent conversations series – Audio and video

WELS now

Jesus’ Passion – 40 days of Bible readings with commentary by Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary Professor Stephen Geiger, available in audio podcast and video formats. Here’s a sample:

Community feedback

Next time

WELS has a new Contact Us form and perhaps your church or school needs something similar.

Get involved

Ripl – A Marketing Team in Your Pocket

Avery Design & Print

Let’s face it – ministry isn’t always glamorous! At times it even requires us to roll up our sleeves and get dirty in the church and school office. Eeek!!

Even though that introduction is intended to make you smile, it is true that many ministry initiatives include a component which starts in the church or school office with design and printing of resources such as bulletin and newsletter inserts, and decorations for special services, events, or celebrations. Often it is the desire to print multiple copies of a design on the same page. The most common need which comes to mind is mailing labels. While labels are often creating in Word processing software, those mail merge features can be intimidating and time consuming.

That’s why I like to use the Avery Design & Print Online site for mailing labels and much more. The creation tools are very easy to master, and there are advanced features as well, such as the ability to …

  • control font selection, size and color
  • add curved text
  • import files for mail merge
  • add a generated QR code
  • upload your own graphics

Don’t feel you’ll be limited simply to “grandma’s” old mailing labels, however! Avery has label templates of all shapes and sizes. Design one item in the desired dimensions, and it is automatically replicated on the entire page. Want to customize each one? Switch from the “Edit all” mode to the “Edit one” mode, and customize to your heart’s desire.

Application/audience

This tool would be helpful to anyone tasked with creating print resources for a church or school. You may use it with or without the actual label sheets selected. Avery doesn’t know whether those labels are in your printer when you print your work at the end of the process. Printing on plain paper is just file. You may even download your final design in PDF format, and skip printing all together.

To get started, visit Avery Design & Print Online. When prompted create a free account and save your credentials for use each time you visit the site. An added benefit of setting up an account is you may save your creations to your Avery account for free.

Related resources

If browser-based software is not your pleasure, check out these additional software options for Avery Print & Design.

In addition, Avery offers to professionally print your designs for you with their WePrint service. To encourage you to try it out, they’ll give you $10 off your first order with coupon code Print10.

This overview video will get you up-to-speed with Avery Design & Print Online in under 3 minutes!

See All Ministry Resources

474 – Promotion Time

On WELSTech this week, Professor Bill Pekrul from Martin Luther College joins the show to talk about ways to promote your church and school through social media and other digital channels. Sallie shares a list of favorite digital tools, while Martin drops his cell phone…on purpose.

The interview and discussion:

Promotion planning – Martin and Sallie talk with Professor Bill Pekrul, Director of Public Relations at Martin Luther College, about promoting church and school. Bill stresses the key to great promotions is adopting realistic, effective, and sustainable plans.

News in tech:

Netflix Adds Offline Viewing

WELS now:

Tune in for the Wisconsin Lutheran Seminary Christmas Concert live stream on Sunday, December 11 at 3 and 7 pm Central

Picks of the week:

Ministry resources:

Check out the 30-day free trial of Proclaim 2.0

Featured video:

Replay the Martin Luther College live streamed Christmas Concert.

mlcchristmas600x342

Coming up on WELSTech:

Episode 475 – Martin and Sallie share listener feedback! Release date: Wednesday, December 14

Get involved:

309 – C13: Mission Important

This week’s WELSTech has a special events focus as we discuss ways to plan for events and interview Pastor Jon Hein about promotional resources for this Christmas season available through WELS’ C13 program. Sallie shares her Pinterest-inspired PVC laptop stand and Martin reviews a new Android phone.

The discussion:

Special Events – Martin and Sallie discuss the important stages of planning for special events at church and school including the role of a communication committee, tips for tracking the planning process and special promotional ideas.

The interview:

(15:57) C13 – Pastor Jon Hein from Beautiful Savior in Summerville, SC and newly-minted Director of the synod’s Congregational Counseling Committee (CCC) joins Martin and Sallie to discuss the work of his committee over the next two years as well as the specific resources available to assist congregations as they plan for Christmas 2013 (C13) worship and outreach.

Ministry resources:

(30:47) Multi-media church resource sites:

Listener reviews:

(32:52) Martin reviews the Moto X smartphone

Tech tips:

Picks of the week:

Of interest:

(53:40) MLC Ladies Auxiliary – October 5, 2013

Community feedback:

Coming up on WELSTech:

(1:01:44) Episode 310 – Hit the books next week with WELSTech. We’ll discuss chapter 2 of The Shallows by Nicholas Carr and find out if Martin’s head is made of concrete. (Release date – 10/08/13)

The featured artist:

(1:02:15) We close today’s WELSTech with the instrumental music of In His Service (www.adagioconcepts.com) – Jesus Lover of My Soul

Get involved:

080 – WELS.net Goes Web 2.0

This week on the WELSTech podcast we look at the strategic use of Web 2.0 tools on both WELS.net and the Camp Phillip web site.

The discussion:

Leveraging the read/write web – As WELS.net migrates from a custom Content Management System (CMS) to the more mainstream, open-source CMS, Drupal, several WELS.net resources are also migrating to Web 2.0 sites.  Martin and Sallie discuss the logic behind going public with WELS resources versus hosting them locally in a “walled garden” and how congregations and schools might take advantage of a similar strategy.

The interview:

Aaron Wakeman and family(19:26) Sending the stories home – Camp Phillip Development Director, Aaron Wakeman, joins Martin and Sallie to share some creative ways they use technology to share the stories of camp near and far.

New Technology Showcase:

(36:00) Acrobat.com – Adobe’s slick answer to Google Docs

Picks of the week:

Of interest:

(49:50) Follow the National Educational Computing Conference (NECC) – Even if you aren’t in attendance, you can take advantage of all of the great online resources which are available

Community feedback:

  • (53:36) Following up on our BWTG: Google Calendar episode, we heard from Pastor Brian Hackmann from Peace in Eagle River, AK with several questions related to the calendar embed options, and also Jason Petoskey, a member of Holy Trinity in Wyoming, MI, tweeted his success of embedding a Google Calendar into his FinalWeb church web site
  • Jason Schmidt from Gethsemane in Omaha, NE sent us a link to YouMail.com which can receive and transcribe your voice mail and even has a few interesting twists for customizing voice mail.  Martin shared that he has used Jott.com in the past for voice transcribed reminder messages but is now using Reqall.com as a free alternative.
  • David Schumann, webmaster from Peace in Janesville, WI, raised concerns about posting children’s photos online.  We’ll dedicate a future podcast to this topic.
  • And lastly we heard from Gail Potratz from Emanuel in New London, WI with follow up comments about her picks (ShareThis and GroupTweet) on last week’s show. We’d also love to hear from you!! Leave us a voice mail @ 414-375-2334.

Coming up on WELSTech:

(1:04:01) Tune in for a double scoop of WELSTech summer audio next week:

  • Episode 081 – We’ll share a little “Bonus WELSTech Goodness” (BWTG) on how-to create a Facebook fan page for your organization (Release date 07/06/09)
  • Episode 082 – The “normal” WELSTech episode will look at tech tools for the small world in which we live, a discussion based on Chapter 9 of Clay Shirky’s book, Here Comes Everybody.  Also included will be an interview with someone from ProCare Software, an information management system for daycares. (Release date 07/08/09)

The featured artist:

(1:05:36) The music of WELS artist Michael Schroeder (www.michaelschroeder.com) closes this week’s podcast – We hear John 3:16 from his CD titled “A Witness”

Get involved: