Every parish priest wants to give their very best. But if you’re weighed down by admin, that can be challenging. Here’s how ChurchDesk’s church management solution makes a difference.
Picture the scene. A stressed Anglican cleric is preparing for their working week. Sermons to write, funerals to arrange, a big harvest festival service to prepare for. Oh, then there’s the small matter of the harvest supper to set up, plus the usual round of admin, visits, sick communions and trips to diocesan training days.
Make no mistake: it’s by no means straightforward to manage all these demands. Which is why many parish priests feel overwhelmed by the vast array of tasks before them. And even with administrative support and a willing team of volunteers, it can be a challenge to make sure everything happens when it ought to.
That’s where ChurchDesk comes in. As an all-in-one church management solution, the software enables priests to manage the administration of church life with ease. Here are six ways it can make your life easier.
1. ChurchDesk keeps all your important dates in one place
Got a cremation to lead on Friday week? Need to remember to pop in for school assembly on Thursday morning? Want to make sure everyone knows the date of the church ceilidh?
With ChurchDesk, you can enter all your engagements in one easy-to-use calendar. Then, you can add public information to share on your website – meaning it’s easy to let everyone know about your exciting events.
Even better, your ministerial and administrative colleagues will be able to manage their diaries more easily, coordinating with you and the church calendar. The result? A slicker operation all round.
2. ChurchDesk enables you to manage tasks
Once you enter an event into your church’s diary, you’ll be able to add it to rotas and manage the people who will be involved in carrying out the event.
Need someone to take care of coffee, tea, and biscuits for your event? Just add the hospitality rota and the volunteers and employees in the group will be notified. You can assign specific users or leave it unassigned for group members to assign themselves.
With ChurchDesk, you can be confident that everyone knows what’s required of them, by when – leaving you to get on with the important business of being a priest.
3. ChurchDesk helps you communicate more effectively
Everyone knows that the key to mission is effective communication. Engage with people and they’ll engage with you, and the church.
With ChurchDesk, it’s much easier to keep in contact. You can establish regular newsletters to keep the wider community up to speed with church life. You can set reminders about baptisms and weddings, enabling you to send anniversary cards that show you’re still thinking and praying for the people involved. You can even send SMS text messages to give people last-minute updates about church events.
What is more, the Forms function enables you to gather information about people who sign up to events. This can be streamed directly into your contacts database, meaning you can target communications to people’s preferences and interests, and send follow-up emails to help keep in touch.
All in all, you’ll find that ChurchDesk keeps you in closer contact with the people in your communities. And that’s a sure fire way to build a vibrant and welcoming church.
4. ChurchDesk helps you manage donations
It’s always awkward to speak about money with church congregations, but ChurchDesk alleviates the stress. Thanks to its Payments & Giving feature, supporters can pay for attendance at events, or make a donation to an appeal, or even pay their regular giving, simply by using their computer or smartphone.
Even better, the system takes care of claiming Gift Aid and can be programmed to send an automated thank you message to donors. With a reporting function to help you see what’s been given where, the software couldn’t be simpler. Which means you’ll have an easy way to manage financial contributions, freeing important time for ministry and mission.
5. ChurchDesk equips you with a first-rate website
For many people in the 21st century, the first place they look for information about their local church is online. If you don’t have a website, you’re missing out on a lot of traffic. And even if you do have one, it may benefit from a more professional look.
That’s where ChurchDesk can help. As part of our all-in-one church management solution, we’ll provide you with your own website, for a church or benefice. You simply populate an attractive template with content and images, helping to put a distinctive slant on it. Then you’ll be secure in the knowledge that if people are searching online, your church is there to be found.
If you’re happy with your existing website, there’s no need to change: simply embed ChurchDesk’s calendar, and you’ll still reap the benefits of the software’s organisational prowess.
6. ChurchDesk supports you, every step of the way
Some clergy may feel reluctant to buy church management software, in case they encounter difficulties with the technology. ChurchDesk understands this, and strives to give customers all the support they need.
We understand that you don’t want to spend hours on the phone or in a live online chat when you could be out doing your job. That’s why we solve problems with alacrity, and are committed to a programme of continuous improvement.
As Henrik, one of our customers in the UK, says, “We always feel that things are moving when we say something to ChurchDesk. We always get an answer and action is taken.”
This isn’t just about our desire to offer great customer service. It’s also about our recognition that your calling is to love and serve God’s people, not fiddle around with computers. We’ll sort technical issues for you, so you can focus on fulfilling your vocation as pastor and priest.
