Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: One of the best things you can do as a church, if you want to see more firsttime visitors, is to get more reviews online. We're going to break down six tips that'll help your church to get more reviews in the easiest possible way. Let's do this.
You're listening to the reach, right? Podcast, the show dedicated to helping your church reach more people and grow.
Hey, guys, I'm Thomas.
[00:00:26] Speaker B: And I'm Ian.
[00:00:28] Speaker A: And today we're talking about effective ways for you to get more online reviews for your church. We're going to go through six ideas that we came up with, but before we get into those, we probably ought to talk a little bit about why you want online reviews for your church in the first place. This is something that until recently, I think most people just kind of ignored and didn't think it really mattered. And honestly, I think a lot of churches don't really consider this much anymore. But I think if you do ignore this, you're missing an enormous opportunity that can lead to more visitors to your church. So a couple of reasons why I was kind of hit the highlights on this. Number one is that people do look at online reviews like it or know. I know that when it comes to buying anything on Amazon, I always look at the number of stars. I read a review or two, any kind of service that we ever purchase. If I'm looking for a plumber or an HVAC person or a pool person or whoever it would be, you take a look at reviews and see what they say about them on Yelp. And that's something that people, and we'd be foolish to think that people don't look at reviews when they're looking for a church. When they're, for the first time, just kind of looking at a place to land or a place to bring their family, they want to hear what people say about a church. So it's important from that aspect and on top of that, and this is something that a lot of people miss, is it's really important when it comes to local SEO, or just SEO in general for your church. So here's what that means, is that the more reviews you have in a world where everything is the same, the more reviews you have online, especially the more positive reviews you have, the higher you'll appear when people search for terms like churches near me or churches in my city or any other host of searches they may do on Google and other platforms. So having more online reviews leads to more people seeing your church and more people willing to go to your church if they read good things about it. So in the end, it's a total win win. It's something you want to do. Now, I think that there's some reluctance for this because it feels weird, right? Like, to get a review for my church. But I think we need to do a little shift in how we think about it. The way we should think about reviews is not so much as reviews, because that's, like, weird to review a spiritual sermon or something like that. That's not how we think, but we can think of them as. I'd encourage you to think of them as testimonies. It's what people say about your church and the impact that it's had on their lives and what you've done in your community. That's what a review really is. It's talking about the benefits of what your church has done for people. So that's the way we think about it. I don't know. What do you have to add to that, Ian? Yeah, not much.
[00:03:13] Speaker B: You covered a think, you know, SEO, reaching more visitors, a testimony is the way to think about it. And I think one of the things. Things. Well, I know one of the things we hear because we do help with this for churches. We help churches with SEO here. We talk to pastors Day in and day out about this. And a lot of pastors and ministry leaders, they kind of have the notion that reviews are really only for businesses. But what I would submit is saying they could be even more important for churches. Because if you think about it, do people have more apprehension in visiting a church for the first time or buying a hairbrush?
[00:03:49] Speaker A: I think they're going to have going to a restaurant. Right.
[00:03:52] Speaker B: They're going to have more apprehension because of the spiritual part of it, because of the. There's so many factors we can get into when it comes to why someone is uneasy or they want to check out a church, but not sure. So I think this could be a big apprehension reducer, like you said, if it's looked at as more of a form of a testimony of this is what God's doing here at our church.
[00:04:13] Speaker A: Right. Here's something else that we've learned, is that if you want to have reviews of your church or testimonies in this case, you cannot just trust that they're going to happen organically and naturally. They will. You will get occasional people that say nice things about your church online or bad. You'll also get occasional people that say really bad things that I'm sure that I know my church has had that I know your church, I'm sure, has had people that say really terrible things on there.
I think that that's going to happen naturally, but every business and churches should do the same. But every business that is growing on these social platforms and on reviews, they're actually soliciting reviews.
You're not allowed to, in most cases, pay people for reviews, and I don't recommend any church does that. Don't pay people to leave reviews of your church, but they are asking people, hey, if you had a good experience, would you mind leaving a review for us here? And some platforms are more open to it than others, like Yelp, they kind of encourage you to not do that. Some people tried to, like at restaurants, they'd give a free dessert if you left a five star review or something like that. You don't want to do those.
You know, Google, they're totally open that you should be asking for reviews and they want more reviews. And so in the end, you cannot make the mistake to think that, well, if people want to review it, they will and just allow that to happen. You're going to be much better off if you actually find ways to ask people to give you reviews. And that's what we want to talk about here in this episode, is that we'll talk about the ways that we've uncovered and seen churches actually succeed at asking for and getting more reviEws. So that's what we hope to cover.
[00:05:51] Speaker B: Absolutely. Do you want to kick off the first one here, Thomas?
[00:05:54] Speaker A: We'll do. So the first one is to encourage reviews in your newsletters and emails. So things that you put out on a regular basis as a church, don't be afraid to add a request in there for people to leave a review.
And you might want to explain it once or twice. Or maybe you'll do that from up front at some point because it will strike people a little bit OD, like they've never considered that. I leave a review for my church.
It's not a business. Why would I do that? So explain a little bit about the heart behind it, but then make it easy for them. Write on an email. If you're doing a weekly email, have a blurb in there, or maybe you put it in your signature, it says, hey, leave a review for us on Google or on Facebook, and leave a five star review there and give them a link right to it. And it helps them to kind of set that up. But I want to focus again on making sure you explain the why behind it. Take a second to explain that. Hey, people actually put a lot of weight in what other people in the church are saying about what they like about our church. So it would mean a lot to us if you would leave us a review. So talk about that in the messaging. But I think your email newsletter that you're putting out every week, that's a really great spot for it. You could put it as a part of the footer or maybe every six weeks or so you just include a blurb about asking people to do that.
[00:07:08] Speaker B: Yeah, those are good avenues. And this next one here is to make it easy to leave reviews. We just kind of talked a little bit. That's one way to make it easier that you just mentioned there. But also, is it in your bulletins? Is it on your website? One of the things I like, you mentioned it in what you were just describing there, Thomas, is during announcements. That's actually something that I feel our pastor at my church does a very good job of. Makes it very natural. Hey, has God encouraged you here today? Like when we're talking about announcements or whatever things to come. Oh, and by the way, if you were encouraged today, hey, give us a review online. Give us a shout out. Did God touch you a certain way today? Did you get one step closer in your faith? And that, to me, is natural from across the pulpit. It's personal because, and it doesn't always have to be the pastor, but it's personal from someone.
[00:08:00] Speaker A: It's not something you want to do every week, right? You don't want to ask reviews every week. It's like people dedicating a minute of your every service into asking for reviews. But it is something I think. Well, we'll talk more about that. That's one of our other points, I guess, about announcements and those things, but I think that's a good place to introduce it. But, yeah, just making it easy for people. I think you're exactly right. The easier you can make it and not having to have them go out and search it.
If you always offer links, I think that's a really big idea. There is that. Make it really easy to do something like that. Have a link on your website that says leave a review.
That makes it easy. And I think you'll get more that way. Next one, leverage social media. So ask people on social media to leave you reviews. Again, you don't want to be doing this all the time, but I think maybe once a quarter, maybe every six months, something like that, asking for a specific opportunity to leave a review. And it could be for a specific area of the church, a specific ministry, but just asking people to do that and give a testimony, actually write something that goes with it, but inviting people to do that and then on that you want to, again, make it easy. So give them a link in the social media post to do something like that. Maybe it's something that you have in your link tree when you have that kind of link in bio thing on your Instagram page. Maybe if you go there, it'll be one of your opportunities to leave links. The ones I would focus on the most would be Google reviews. That'd be the first and foremost. Facebook leaving reviews on there. And then, believe it or not, actually Yelp would be third place for me. I think that, again, Yelp is so service and restaurant oriented. That's what I think about when I think of Yelp is I use it for restaurants and sometimes services. But I think that for churches, I've actually seen surprising results for churches that get a handful of reviews on Yelp, that it really helps with the SEO side of things the most. But giving direct links on social media posts to those channels so people can easily leave a review, I think that's just a super easy way to get more.
[00:10:06] Speaker B: Agreed. So, yeah, and one last thing I'll add to that. You covered the bulk of that. But keep in mind too, social media is social, right? It's interactive and engaging. So this could be really effective because again, people are already interacting. And this could cause, when you asked, there could cause someone else to come out and give you a review right then and there on your social media profile. Hey.
[00:10:27] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:10:28] Speaker B: This church has been a blessing to me and my family. And then you have someone else comment on theirs and this could generate, we've seen it generate a lot more reviews from social media just because the nature of social media, that's good stuff. So ask for reviews after events. That's our next one here. This one to me is very natural.
Let's just say you had a youth retreat, you had a ladies ministry event.
After these events, obviously you would hope that people are inspired. They had a great time. It's in conclusion of their great experience. So they're more likely often at this time to get online and give you that easy review.
[00:11:11] Speaker A: Yeah, I think you're right. I think certain kinds of events that make more sense than others. So I think especially if you do more like seminar type events or you have speakers come in for something that feels almost like a conference in some ways, or a marriage seminar or something like that, those are really great opportunities for that. At the end of that, you should make it part of it. Usually at these things yOu'll do some kind of a feedback, know where you ask people for their feedback and what we're going to do for next time. Some ideas about that. Incorporate reviews into part of that where you're asking them to let people know online and what you thought and if it impacted you positively, would you let somebody else know? Again, it's just a testimony and a great way to do that. So. Yeah, good idea. Ian, fifth one. We kind of touched on this a little bit.
[00:11:54] Speaker B: I jumped ahead on this one.
[00:11:56] Speaker A: No, it's okay. We can incorporate reviews into sermons and announcements. And I want to pause, I guess, more on the sermons part. As someone who has preached many sermons before, I've never done that. So I've never personally, I haven't regularly preached in four years now. I've been doing a lot of guest speaking, and it's a little bit strange to incorporate asking for reviews into when you're visiting a church and speaking as a guest speaker. But I'm not opposed to it.
But I think if I'm pastoring in my home church, it is something that I probably would want to mention. Maybe once a year I'd incorporate this into a sermon. You wind up talking about testimonies and telling your story and those things in sermons because the Bible talks about it. I'm an expository preacher, and so when the Bible talks about sharing a reason for the hope that you have, what a great launching pad to be able to talk about why people can tell the reason for the hope they had and what your church, how it has played a part in that online where a lot of people are going to be able to see it and read it, and it actually makes a really big impact. So I think incorporating into your sermons is great announcements. It's something you maybe can do every once a quarter or something, I think that goes a long way. But again, give people a way to do that easily. And I think actually maybe, Ian, you can tackle number six. Probably. I think it's one of the best ideas for making things really easy. So why don't you hit number six?
[00:13:18] Speaker B: What I was going to say with it, that's utilize QR codes on your church bulletins. My church does this. A ton of churches do this. I talk to churches daily that are doing this and that's easy because people are used to doing it already. It's on the bulletin if you have that in the seat back. People are used to QR codes at restaurants now. They're used to QR codes everywhere. And it's just one click away.
[00:13:41] Speaker A: Right.
[00:13:41] Speaker B: So it's just one click away. Opens it up right there. And you'll have other options there, I'm sure, as well for newer people or members alike that have been long standing. But this one to me, is a no brainer these days. It just, like you said, makes it easy for someone to do it instantly.
[00:14:00] Speaker A: Are you saying your church does QR codes for reviews? On your bulletin? You're saying, oh, no, I.
[00:14:05] Speaker B: Not given that example. I just mean when we're talking about it, we do have them on our bulletins, and yes, we do have a way for them now that.
[00:14:12] Speaker A: But they're for reviews. Or you're saying you use QR codes in general?
[00:14:16] Speaker B: We use QR codes in general. And that's just one of many things they can do through going to the QR code.
[00:14:22] Speaker A: Yeah. I haven't seen many churches do this on the review side. Yes, I've seen churches utilizing QR codes more, especially for things like giving or event sign up, that kind of stuff, where you can just scan it there, or sometimes you'll see it up on the projection screen. You'll have a QR code there. People can hold it up and snap a QR code that way. I think that for reviews is one of the best opportunities for this. Maybe it's just something on your bulletin that's there every week. It's right underneath your logo. Want to leave a review? You have a place people can scan. And again, talk about making it easy. You scan it with there, it automatically opens up your Google profile, and you can leave a review for your church right there. So I love this idea. I think it's something that every church should incorporate, and it would be nice to see. I think the good thing about this is it'll help reviews trickle in. One of the things that starts to be a Red flag for some of the channels is when they have one review for four years, and then the next day, eleven reviews come in, right. So it makes them say, well, something must be happening here. Either they're paying for these or something's fishy with this. So having them on your bulletins, what it'll do is that people will notice it and you don't even really need to talk about it, and they'll start to trickle in over time that way, so. Love that idea. I think it's a really good one.
[00:15:38] Speaker B: Yeah. And maybe I misspoke there. What I was trying to say was that I talked to a ton of churches and a lot of churches now are using QR codes already as links.
[00:15:47] Speaker A: Absolutely.
[00:15:48] Speaker B: As links already. But you're right, not a ton of churches have caught onto this idea yet. Yeah, right.
[00:15:56] Speaker A: I think it's a big one. I think it's a really good one and I think I'd incorporate it right away.
Well, that's it. I hope this has been helpful to you. Go out there and get reviews. I think this is something that will make a difference. It's part of something that we do at reach. Right here is every one of our clients that does local SEO with us here.
We give them strategies like this to go out and get reviews because we can do what we can do for local SEO. There's lots of things we do on our part, but one of the biggest factors in your ranking is what people are saying about you online, and reviews are what they use to measure that. So this is something that, it is really important. It's something we encourage all of our clients and now we encourage all of you that are in our podcast family here. Go out there and get them. It will lead to more visitors in the long run and those visitors will be stickier because they already have some kind of a connection with other people that they felt relatable to when they read those reviews online. So it's a huge win win, I think, for churches. If this has been helpful to you, we would love it if you would leave a review for us. Tell us what you think about this. You can hop on to any of those channels on our Google BusinESs profile would be the easiest way to do something like that. That would mean a lot to us, but we would love it if you would comment, subscribe, do all those kinds of things too. Thanks so much guys, for being a part of the Reachwright family. And we'll see you next week.
[00:17:19] Speaker B: See ya.
