Building a Small-Church Website

Many small churches are starting to see the benefit of having a website. Today it is easier than ever to get a sharp-looking website up with little effort, little to no knowledge of code (like HTML or PHP), and little impact on your bank account.

Here are some very basic suggestions and resources that you might find helpful as you get started.

Web Hosting

There are some great web hosting packages that offer you more than you could ever use for under $10 per month. I use HostMonster, which has one of the best packages for the price: only $6 per month. It comes with a free domain name—not just for the first year, but for as long as you use their web hosting service. If you sign up for web hosting with HostMonster through Rebate Heaven, you can get it all for free for the first year after an $84 rebate. I was pleasantly surprised when I did actually get my rebate from them, even though I did have to contact them a few times. There are many other good and inexpensive options out there. Ask other churches whom they use.

If you don’t have someone at your church who is skilled at working with websites, be sure to look for web hosting that will include Fantastico. It’s a great application that will install any of a number of free open source programs with the click of a couple buttons—no knowledge of code necessary. The average computer-literate pastor could handle it with no problems.

Software

There are several great open source options that would be great for church websites. Many churches are using Joomla!, which would be more than sufficient for a small church.

My personal preference is WordPress, which is one of the most powerful blogging tools. But it’s far more than just for blogging; it can also function quite nicely as a church website—with or without a blog. If you start out without a blog, adding one down the road would be a cinch. One of the best things about WordPress is the number of free themes and plugins that are available.

Tutorials

ChurchCommunicationsPro has a wealth of helpful material for helping a church get started with a WordPress site. You might find these series helpful:

• Building Rockin’ Cool Church Websites: Master Story List
• Using WordPress to Run Church Websites Tutorial

Themes

Cory Miller, the guy behind ChurchCommunicationsPro, also has a website where he offers more than 40 free WordPress themes: RockinThemes.com. If you want something a little nicer looking and are willing to pay for it, you might be interested in their newly launched ChurchTheme.com, “a new church website template solution . . . for churches.”

I think it’s a great solution for smaller church websites and those without the budget to hire one of these fine church website firms. It’s a do-it-yourself kind of template, where someone with basic familiarity with WordPress and some HTML experience can customize it for your church.

It’s built on the WordPress platform and made to let you use WordPress as a content management system—for easy and affordable website updating.

You can see the purchase information here . . . and see the live demo we’ve got up as an example of how it could work for your church.

Another option for those willing to spend a little is WebRight Design. They also use WordPress. Check out their sample sites.

Here are a few examples of churches using WordPress for their website:

• The Church at Severn Run
• First Baptist Church
• Palmerston Place Church
• Resurrection Lutheran Church

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