Improve the Church Member Journey with 3 New Pushpay Features

Every person who walks through your doors is on a journey, both in their relationship with God and their relationship with your church. Wherever they’re at spiritually, you want to help them grow into faithful followers of Christ. And whether they’re a first-time visitor or a regular attendee, you want them to develop an intimate connection with your community, and you want them to become invested in your mission.

But as your church grows, it can be hard for your staff to personally guide every individual on their journey. That’s where you need digital tools to support your in-person efforts to get to know every person, steer them toward next steps, and create a unique experience.

That’s why we’re excited to introduce several new features that provide visibility to where people are on their journey within your community and tools within the app to improve their digital experience with your church. Take a look at the new donor development dashboard, deep links, and bookmarks features.

Donor Development Dashboard

Every giver is different. But when it comes to generosity and the way church members invest in your mission, there’s often a progression. Your church has people who:

• Have never given before
• Have only given once
• Have given twice
• Give occasionally
• Give regularly
• Give on a recurring basis

As you disciple the members of your church, and their understanding of stewardship and generosity progresses, you would hope that they would also transition from one giving stage to the next.

But church staff rarely have visibility into where each believer is on their journey toward open-handed generosity—or how to help them take that next steps.

We’re changing that.

The donor development dashboard gives you a convenient way to filter church members by where they’re at in their giving journey. You wouldn’t talk about tithing the same way to someone who’s only given once as you would to someone who’s been giving faithfully for years. But most churches have little choice in the matter—because their communication tools can’t tell the difference between a first-time giver and a regular giver.

You can also zoom in on each person’s giving history over the last 12 months, so it’s easy to see how someone’s giving has changed over time. You might see how someone has gradually become more invested in your church—or you might discover that someone has been growing more distant recently.

The Donor Development Dashboard also lets you see all members who have recently “lapsed” in giving—meaning they used to give regularly, but they haven’t given in 120 days or more. (You can also see if they used to be a recurring giver.) Before someone lapses, Pushpay can also flag them as “at risk” of lapsing, meaning they haven’t given in three months, or they used to be a recurring giver but their future gifts have been paused or canceled for 32 days or more.

These are people who have lost or lessened their connection to your church, and now you have a clear signal that it’s time to reconnect with them. This isn’t about getting them to start giving again. When giving stops, that could be an indicator of a major life event like the loss of a job, significant medical expenses, or even a change in churches. It’s an opportunity to minister to them.

Additionally, and perhaps most importantly, the Donor Development Dashboard gives you clear next steps to help someone move from one stage of their giving journey to the next. It’s incredibly valuable when someone gives for the second time. Or switches to recurring giving. Or gives for the first time. And while the journey isn’t always linear, Pushpay is here to give you visibility and recommendations every step of the way.

Deep Links

Sometimes when you send someone a push notification, it’s just a reminder to think or pray about something that’s going on in your church. But other times, you want your congregation to see something in your church app, like an event, video, or podcast episode. So you tell them what you want them to see and link to the app, where they can find it.

In the past, these links have taken your church members to the “app inbox,” and then they have to navigate to the part of the app you told them to go. This extra step may seem insignificant, but even a small hurdle can have a big impact on how many church members actually make it to the thing you want them to see.

Deep links eliminate that step and take your church members directly from your push notification to the specific part of the app you wanted to alert them to. By giving your congregation quicker, more convenient access to your content, you can improve their digital experience with your church and increase the number of people who benefit from your teachings and get plugged into your events.

Bookmarks

When you regularly publish sermons, podcast episodes, and other video or audio content, it can be hard for church members to keep up with everything they want to watch or listen to. Previously, if they were signed into your app, they could “favorite” content they wanted to save for later. The new bookmarks feature, which will launch to the general public in mid-December, improves this functionality.

This helps your church members focus on the content they’re most interested in and gives them easy access to the video and audio clips they want to experience again and again. Maybe you preached a sermon on doubt or marriage that really spoke to them. Or your latest podcast episode on the Gospel of John completely changed the way they understand John’s message. Bookmarks gives them a convenient way to revisit that content whenever they want.

Every member has a unique relationship with your church. And now, their experience with your content can be more unique, too.

Check out the latest Pushpay features

Want to see the Donor Development Dashboard, deep links, and bookmarks in action? Explore these features today, or if you don’t have Pushpay yet, talk to an expert.