Church marketing

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Under Church Marketing means the marketing for religious organizations and religious communities . It is an instrument of market-oriented corporate management that includes the conception, implementation and evaluation of strategies and offers a systematic approach to make decisions in a market and customer-oriented manner.

background

The "orientation of a company to the promotion of sales", as the Duden defines the term marketing, is also of interest to churches and religious communities. Because for them too there is a market and therefore competition. State churches could ignore this fact for a long time because they hardly had to worry about their finances due to the guaranteed receipt of church tax. In the United States , however, it has always been different. Therefore, American churches have been marketing systematically and as an everyday task for decades. In Germany, this term was first introduced into broad scientific discussion by Hans Raffée and Steffen Hillebrecht around 1995 .

This link with marketing technology and research was initially taken up only hesitantly by churches, religious communities and scientists in order to be able to answer questions about the particular situation of churches and religious communities. The skepticism, if not the hostile image, of business instruments such as advertising or marketing was too strong . These concerns are increasingly recognized as unnecessary, especially since social marketing and marketing for non-profit organizations are recognized and undisputed management instruments on which church marketing is largely based anyway. Professor Raffée: "Church marketing is not about marketing love and personal affection, it is about nothing more than preaching with modern means." And Xaver Pfister in The Ecumenical Basel Church Study: "Church marketing does not aim to to correct and change the message to which the church is committed and which is not at its disposal. Rather, it is in the service of this message, yes it wants to be a help, so that this message can be communicated more precisely and understandably. Church marketing wants to make use of the experiences and knowledge of marketing for the specific concerns of the church. ”Therefore, marketing activities should be limited to the work of the church organization.

The religious basis of church action or personal beliefs are therefore usually no longer a justification for leading a religious community without a strategy and without economic awareness. The churches are becoming aware that their place in Western society has dramatically decreased in importance. In view of social change, increasing secularization, an often dramatic emigration of believers and the generally strained budget situation, they realize that the market and competition challenge them to develop new "products" and offers, to go unfamiliar "sales channels" and in an open-minded way How to communicate with the "customer". There are already marketing experts who have specialized in church marketing - many of them themselves former pastors or theologians who combine their church experience with business know-how.

Wilfried Mödinger, a pastor and marketing expert himself, wrote: “The church is no longer a monopoly provider in the market for the search for meaning, it has had competition. Even in the non-religious areas in which the church is active, companies have established themselves which, with the help of public funding and private support, have developed into profitable businesses and compete with the church for this funding. For the church, this competition can be seen as either a danger or an opportunity. Danger because parishioners seem to be running away from you; Opportunity, because through reflection and reflection on actual strengths, the function and activities of the church can be realigned and a positive path towards the future can be taken through appropriate changes. The challenges of the present and the future must be taken up and accepted. ”According to the more recent discussion, one can accordingly think about target group-oriented communication or also about consumer-oriented marketing of church sights. In their market-oriented realignment, churches can also make use of the services of external management consultancies, which Thomas Suermann shows by means of well-known consulting activities in the Protestant Dean's Office in Munich and in various Catholic dioceses.

Church marketing activities

Approaches to religious marketing efforts have in reality been known for decades and are also regularly practiced under terms such as “church advertising”, “public relations” or “church news”. The strategic direction of action is based on the content of the Bible, such as: "... go into all the world ..", "... you should give your tithes ..." etc.

In the context of youth work, churches and religious communities try to gain a unique position by offering meaningful weekly meetings and trying to bind the individual to the community through leisure time. Young people are targeted in order to win future members and train employees for the youth groups.

As part of the worship services, donations are collected for regional and supraregional projects, current life situations are illuminated by means of biblical statements and services of the community are advertised against the background of the common model.

See also

literature

Books

  • Cla Reto Famos , Ralph Kunz (Ed.): Church and Marketing . Zurich TVZ 2006, ISBN 978-3-290-17380-7
  • Steffen W. Hillebrecht (Ed.): Church Marketing . Bonifatius, Paderborn 1997, ISBN 3-87088-974-8 (an introduction and eight articles)
  • Steffen W. Hillebrecht: The practice of church marketing. Communicating religious values ​​in modern society . EB-Verlag, Hamburg 2000, ISBN 3-930826-58-5 . (Dissertation at the University of Trier from 1999)
  • Steffen W. Hillebrecht: Market the Church! LVH, Hannover 1999, ISBN 3-7859-0780-X
  • Winfried Mödinger: Church Marketing . Strategic marketing for church offers . Lucius & Lucius, 2001, ISBN 3-8282-0177-6
  • Peter Braun (Hrsg.): Enterprise Church - Organizational manual for pastors and congregations . Loose-leaf collection, 1st edition: Augsburg 1994 ff. With monthly supplements. ISBN 3-9801921-3-X
  • Dieter K Tscheulin, Martin Dietrich: Church marketing . University of Freiburg Business Administration Seminar II (2000) ISBN 3-931416-26-7
  • Matthias Roesberg: Target group specific church marketing . Diplomica, 2002, ISBN 3-8324-6471-9
  • Martin Dietrich, Dieter K Tscheulin: On the (in) compatibility of marketing and church. A provider-oriented analysis of church marketing . University of Freiburg Business Administration Seminar II (2003) ISBN 3-931416-41-0
  • Hans H Bauer: Church Marketing. An introduction and six theses . ISBN 3-89333-141-7
  • Joachim Hübscher: Marketing Concepts for Small Churches . Nonprofit Verlag & Service (1999) ISBN 3-932624-22-X
  • Michael Blömer: The parish as a company . LIT-Verlag, Münster / Westf. 1998, ISBN 3-8258-3915-X .
  • Meyns, Christoph: Church reform and business management, Gütersloher publishing house: Gütersloh, ISBN 978-3579081663 .
  • Eberhard Blanke: Communication campaigns, Stuttgart: Kohlhammer 2009, ISBN 978-3170209718 .

Fonts

  • Hans Raffée: Church Marketing . In: Martin Honecker et al. (Ed.): Evangelical Social Lexicon. W. Kohlhammer, Cologne 2001, pp. 843-847.
  • Hans Raffée, in: Marketing - Wrong Path or Commandment of Reason? The Benefits of Marketing for the Church. Working Group of Protestant Entrepreneurs in Germany, Karlsruhe 1998, p. 17.
  • AEU Working Group of Protestant Entrepreneurs in Germany eV (Ed.): Marketing - Wrong Path or Commandment of Reason? The Benefits of Marketing for the Church. Self-published by the AEU, Karlsruhe 1998.

Literature in English

  • George Barna: User Friendly Churches. Regal Books, Ventura CA 1991, ISBN 0-8307-1473-1 .
  • George Barna: A Step-by-Step Guide to Church Marketing. Regal Books, Ventura CA 1992, ISBN 0-89109-250-1 .
  • George Barna: Marketing the Church. Colorado Springs CO 1993, ISBN 0-89109-250-1 .

Literature in Dutch

  • Eric Sengers: Aantrekkelijke kerk. Eburon, Delft 2009 ( online )

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Steffen W. Hillebrecht: Kirchliche Werbung - An outline of history and its problems, in: Communicatio Socialis (Mainz), 28th Jg., 1995, No. 3, pp. 228-252. Drs .: Fundamentals of Church Marketing, in: Marketing ZFP (Munich), 17th year, No. 4/1995, pp. 221–231. Drs .: The decade of church advertising, in: Communicatio Socialis (Mainz), 34th vol., No. 3/2001, pp. 284–302.
  2. ↑ cf. Johannes Fischer: Church Marketing? In: Zeitschrift für Evangelisch Ethik, Hannover, 50th vol., No. 1/2006, pp. 83–88.
  3. ↑ Felix Krebber / Markus Wiesenberg: The Limits of Participation, in: Communicatio Socialis, Volume 48, No. 3/2015, pp. 289–315.
  4. ↑ See Jan Behrens: Church buildings as tourist attractions, dissertation at the TU Dresden from May 14, 2014, under https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:bsz:14-qucosa-144299
  5. ^ Matthias Suermann: The wise men from the economy? Dissertation at the WWU Münster 2011, at http://d-nb.info/1027021107/34