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March 29, 2018
Christina Gray
Churches should have a clear grasp of their mission before making the leap into digital media, an expert on digital communications for Catholic organizations told an archdiocesan conference March 21.
“We often start with the tool and then figure out how to make it useful to us,” said Matthew Warner, who spoke at a digital communications conference offered by the archdiocesan communications department at St. Mary’s Cathedral.
Software engineer Warner founded Flocknote, a digital platform used by about 3,000 parishes nationwide. He said he was inspired to help improve the church’s “poor job” of communicating, especially to disengaged Catholics looking for a “reason to stay.”
Weak branding and non-specific objectives and strategies cripple Catholic organizations’ ability to draw others to the faith, Warner said.
Many digital tools are available, but beware of wasting time if you don’t know how to use them, Warner said.
“One of the reasons we get these tool things wrong is because we don’t do the hard work upfront to really understand what we’re trying to achieve in the first place,” he said.
Too often, Warner said, “We say, oh, we have to have Facebook or Instagram, without taking the time to work through what we want to achieve with it.”
The conference, attended by priests, sisters, parish administrators, ministry leaders and school principals also featured a presentation on social media by Lisa Hendey, founder of CatholicMom.com, a panel discussion by parish members who shared their success with digital communications and marketing and a discussion of “reputation management” by Jan Potts, the archdiocese’s assistant communications director.
Potts said the conference was organized in response to the many questions the communications department has received from parishes and schools about digital communications.
“There are many people who want to know more and do more in digital communications,” she said.
Slides of conference materials presented and additional resources are available through Jan Potts at (415) 614-5638 or pottsj@sfarch.org.