One of the big churches in the area hands out stickers for its members to put on the rear windows of their vehicles. What message does this broadcast to the community? I have seen dozens of these stickers around Cedar Falls, but only on late-model SUVs and new sedans. If I was part of the lower class, I would be reluctant to visit that church. I would get the impression that it’s a church for people with shiny new cars, but not for me.
When a church advertises, whether by stickers on cars or a sign in front, they promote the idea that the faith is equal to what they advertise. For someone who does not have much experience with Christianity, this is often aversive. Most people won’t understand that a statement on a church sign is just that church’s opinion and is not representative of the rest of us.
The best church advertising is objective and minimal. Say the name of the church, the times of the service, maybe the name of the pastor, but nothing else. Let them get their ideas about you not from an impersonal sign out front, but by walking in and meeting you. If they don’t come back, there’s nothing you can do about it. But don’t give them any reason to dismiss you before they’ve come through the doors.
I think we have similar thoughts on the big dog churches in the area but I suspect that your resistance to their marketing might be aimed at a more systemic problem that you smell? Would you feel any different about the window stickers if the church you speak of was made up of multiple small locations around the city (100-150 peeps, and had a mission like Kaio, but they had some of the most prolific, creative marketing. (btw – I don’t like window stickers as personal preference)
In retrospect, I was being kind of contradictory in what I said: “the best church advertising is objective and minimal”, followed by “I don’t like tiny stickers on the corner of people’s windshield”, which is about as minimal as it gets.
But I guess I link the two thoughts on the “objective” part. The sum effect of all these tiny little stickers is that people can draw conclusions about the church based on the vehicles the stickers are attached to. One sticker is fairly objective, but together they form a message.
I don’t think the stickers themselves are bad, or that marketing in that way is bad — just that we must always be mindful of the impression it gives. A church that does this well is using marketing for the glory of God! But we shouldn’t advertise to a “target market” (either actively or passively) because this excludes certain groups from the gospel.