The new web-site obviously needs to be useful to a number of audiences.
Continuing discussion/reflection on the Toongabbie Anglican Church web-site… part 1 is here
Current Audience
The way the site is built will really depend on what audience(s) we are trying to meet. I think we have three different audiences, and below I explain how I think we are currently providing for those audiences (intentionally or not).
Members
Our church community is probably the most regular, although not necessarily the largest, audience of the current web-site. The site (and associated technologies – think email lists) have contributed to the life and administration of our church.
Some of the ways the current site has targetted members are:
- Opinionated (which I think can now be declared closed) – you can read about the focus of Opinionated.
- The Online Features was an attempt to get members regularly visiting the site, and being directed to other good stuff on the web. I’ve never really known if people have used or found helpful the Online Features.
- The calendar seemed like a natural inclusion for members, but I don’t think anyone uses it.
- Resources:
- There’s the online Bible and One Year Tract
- Sermons Online
- The prayer page that never really went anywhere
- The rosters page, at least for SNC people
- The PowerPoint slides are used by service leaders
- The Mission Blog certainly has a purpose, but probably poor implementation
Local community
A church not looking outwards is just a bunch of people, not a church. TAC has its moments when it comes to community evangelism. We have some staple activities like scripture, some focussed activities like LifeWorks and a key annual event, Christmas. In 2004 we even had a follow-up web-site from the Christmas Impossible series.
Currently our site will tell a visitor about us as a church (allbeit with jargon) and to some extent explains our beliefs, but does neither very well.
World-wide visitors
Non-Christians will stumble across our site, because Google suggests we have something of interest to them. Some good examples: ““elephants wallpaper”:http://www.google.com/search?q=elephants+wallpaper&hl=en&lr=&start=60&sa=N”, “brainwashing drug” and “hueys cooking”.
Christians will find us (and stay with us) for our Sermons Online.
Future audience
For the future, I think the audience/content focus should basically be:
Local community
To quickly “meet” our church, and get a feel for who we are and what we do. I don’t think we need to go into extensive detail of our ministries, but we should present a brief picture of our meetings (people and content) and activities of our church that are specifically for bringing. I don’t think our site should have extensive evangelistic content, but there should be a jargon-free and simple explanation of Christianity.
The front page should be mainly focussed on visitors, but should include regularly updated content to show that we are an active community.
Members
For the rest of the site, the content should be purposeful. So, the site would move away from the brochure style we have at the moment, where there is a page for everything. Rather, I suspect the content will boil down to two streams: 1. sermons and 2. a “blog” of engaging and thought provoking content – well categorised and searchable.
From an administration point of view, there have been some functionality ideas expressed that would come under a Phase II.
World-wide visitors
No particular focus.
Your thoughts
So, what are your thoughts? Are the local community and members the two key audiences to focus on? Should the local community focus be more than an initial engagement? Are the members looking for engaging content or an information portal? (And feel free to disagree with my viewpoint above)
Have you asked anyone from these groups how they use the site now or what they’d like to see? Or are you speculating/guessing?
I’m certainly not criticizing either way. It’s really hard to get good feedback on a site, particularly the kind that can help you make real design decisions on the focus of your site going forward.