About Our Website + CMS
We searched and searched for MONTHS for quality, reasonably-priced providers that offered everything we wanted to do with our site and required for our church management solution, based on what we were willing to pay for them.
Our web hosting criteria was:
- The ability for editing by multiple people is a must - this because no one else would be better able to provide and edit content than those who are directly involved in a particular ministry. Plus, with a small staff and most of us part-time at that, we simply don't have someone who can dedicate most of their time to site maintenance.
- Because of the necessity of multiple editors, we need them to be able to edit their content whether they are in their office, at home in front of the fire, or relaxing on a mountainside or beach sipping a latte or lemonade. So web-based editing is essential.
- We need a provider that is specifically for churches. Churches have certain qualities that necessitate a church-niche provider.
- We need to have the capability of limitless pages as part of the standard package, rather than being stuck with a certain number, or charged extra for additional pages.
- Whatever the solution, it needs to be easily and quickly mastered. Remember those multiple editors? Well, all of us have differing levels of computer experience and comfort and we must cater to the least experienced amongst us.
- We need the ability to have no set number of email addresses at our disposal. We can't be tied down to 5, for example, or pay more for additional ones. We want to be able to easily and quickly add, delete, or change addresses. Most web hosting services charge extra.
- We want a way to easily and quickly provide access to public documents, as well as audio and video files. Many providers put a limit on the quantity and size, and we don't want that.
- We want to be able to grow into the possibility of real-time Sunday Worship viewing - podcasting. We're not there yet, but it's included as a standard feature if and when we do get to that point.
- We need skilled and fast-response tech support, in case we ever need it. Our provider is 7 hours ahead of us in the UK, but they are professional and speedy. We feel the latter two points are more important than their location.
There are other important considerations we could mention, but these are the key ones. With no exceptions, we feel, the absolute best solution for a church is our current provider, Church123. No matter what size the church, they provide the same service to all. Visit Church123 on the web and we're sure you will be impressed, and should you choose to utilize their hosting services we know you will be extremely happy. Based in the UK, Church123's number of churches over here in the States which they serve may be small in comparison to more widely-known companies; however, we feel they beat the competition many times over. The fact that they are 7 hours ahead of us does not affect their support and availability; we just have to consider the time difference a bit more. If you're in the market, you will want to check out Church123! Oh, and for the record, we receive no remuneration for recommending them.
Our Church Management System (CMS) is Kingdom Tools. Kingdom Tools is an amazing web-based CMS solution that is too comprehensive to fully describe here, so we invite you to visit KT's web site for all the details; there are even some online demonstrations. We manage our calendar with both Localendar (for online purposes - and it's both easy and free!) and KT, since we use Church123's web hosting rather than KT's simply because we had Church123 before KT - and we LOVE Church123's solution as stated above - but KT does have an online calendar if you use the website option. We have found no better CMS solution than Kingdom Tools. We highly recommend it to you if you're a church looking for the best CMS solution. One word of caution, however; online CMSs have issues with producing printed photo directories - due to the huge size (because of photos) of the upload / download requirements - so as long as you're aware of that and can live with it, you'll be fine. That said, the KT techies worked hard to accommodate our need for a printed photo directory (and did it!), and are extremely flexible and willing to accommodate customization within reason. This is another reason Kingdom Tools is the best solution we could find. We think you'll be happy with KT, as well. Be sure to tell them we sent you to them (no, we do not get any credit or renumeration from them, either).