Last week I mentioned that Buzzmarketing by Mark Hughes has been one of my favorite reads of the summer. As it turns out, Mark actually responded to that post and sent me a nice note. That speaks volumes to me about the integrity of the message he’s trying share with the rest of us mere mortals.

The entire book is filled with great insights about getting the word out about your organization. Some marketplace books you read take a lot to translate into the church world. This one doesn’t take much imagination to see how the principles Mark teaches easily apply to what we’re hoping to accomplish through ministry. As I’ve mentioned previously, about 75% of the people who attend our church come for the first time at the invitation of a friend. Almost all the growth at Granger is the result of word-of-mouth (buzz) marketing.

It’s worth the price of the book, though, just to catch the nugget on "corporate brands" versus "personality brands." Here’s Mark’s sample list of companies in these two categories:

  • HP (corporate) vs. Apple (personality)
  • Microsoft vs. Google
  • Breyers vs. Ben & Jerry’s
  • Pontiac vs. VW Beetle
  • uBid vs. eBay

Mark isn’t talking about branding a personality. (We certainly aren’t looking for that in churches.) Instead, he’s encouraging us to give our brands personality. Mark shares:

"What’s so special about personality? Without it, products can certainly still succeed, but they lack consumer passion–a driving goal in creating buzz, marketing, branding, and buying."

Here’s my concern. As churches experience success and growth, I think there’s a tendency to become more corporate and have less personality. They continue to ride the horse that got them to where they are, but they forget that part of their earlier success was because the ministry took risks, challenged the status quo and had personality that fueled passion. Because of that, the church generated buzz. People wanted their friends to come check out what was happening and share the same experience.

As time goes by, though, I think churches begin to fall into to patterns. They take fewer risks. They begin to follow rules. They become more top-down. They are formulaic in their approach. It may be the very same approach that brought them the success they experienced earlier, but now it’s lost its buzz-quotient. The approach may be different than other churches, but it’s the same for everyone that’s attending the church.

I’m not suggesting, obviously, that churches should change the message they are teaching. And, I’m not suggesting churches need to reinvent their mission or primary objectives. I do, however, think growing churches need to constantly consider the personality of their ministry and ask the though questions: What is the personality of our church? Are people still passionate about what we offer? If not, what do we need to do differently to recapture that passion?

Part of the answer may be picking up Mark’s book to begin to challenge the way you’re approaching others with your message.

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