Sermon series branding

What is sermon series branding?

Sermons series branding is when you think about how a Church may package and market a sermon series so that
1. it is appealing to the people you are trying to reach
2. your congregation is excited by the upcoming sermon series
When you come up with a brand you may just have a title and a graphic or you use the brand in videos or a website, you may create an evite or an invite or a tshirt or whatever.

Is this marketing?
Yes it is. But if you preach the word faithfully does it matter that you market a series? Shouldn’t you do all things so that some people may connect in with what your Church is doing? Now I am not saying that people will become Christians through a great sermons series branding, what I am saying is that the brand is just an in where people may connect with your Church or have an interest sparked because of the branding. They hopefully will come to hear the sermon series and be changed by the preaching of the word.

Why have sermon series branding?
1. We brand because we Love. We are meant to do all things so that all men might find Jesus. We at Resolved are spending good amounts of time to brand our series on the Gospel of Luke so that our lost friends may see the branding or the video and have an interest sparked and then it will be hopefully easier to invite them to Church with the hope that they may hear the gospel and respond. We do all this work because we love the lost
2. We brand because it forces us to think about the sermon series and what we want to get out of it. In thinking through our current sermon series branding I had to ask myself questions like: What are the themes that we want to hit on in Luke? What are the main applications from Luke that we want to emphasize? How is Jesus Presented in the Gospel of Luke? Working through these questions will help me with preparation and the communication of the text.
3. We brand because it forces us to think about the people we are trying to reach. We had to think about what are the thoughts, hopes, dreams, worldviews of the people we are trying to reach and then how the Gospel of Luke answers, encourages or confronts those hopes, thoughts, dreams and worldviews. So in branding we have to think more about the people God has placed on our hearts to reach. Which is never a bad thing is it?
4. We brand because it harnesses the creativity and the gifts of the congregation. I must admit for this series the thought about branding was mostly done by me. (I did consult a few people on team though) But despite that we used the gifts of a graphic designer and a director/ film editor and I will be talking to one of our artists about how we can tap into the creativity of our artists by getting them to create art in response to this series. In the future I hope to get teams of graphics people, web people, video people, musicians etc all working on different aspects where they can use the branding to get the word out about this series. So as you can see if we used all those people we would be tapping into the creative gifts of many in our congregation. I think if people were in some way to own a sermon series through having creative input they will be more excited about the series and more likely to invite people to Church to hear the series. Do you have people in your Church that would love to use their creative gifts in this way?

Steps to branding a sermon series
1. Ask where the congregation is at and what series we should preach next? Is the congregation or Church weak on Christology? Maybe do a sermon series on John’s gospel or Revelation. Are there massive moral issues in your Church? Maybe a series on the Sermon on the Mount or 1 Corinthians is in order. The sermon series branding starts with, after deep prayer reflection and discussion, choosing a sermon series that you think would be helpful to your Church. (I know that all scripture is God breathed and therefore any part of scripture is good to preach at any time. But, as we all have experienced, certain parts of scripture speak to us more in certain times then others based on what is happening to us at that time or what we are learning or where we are heading. I am saying that a minister needs to ask these question of his congregation when thinking about a sermon series.)
2. Work out the themes you want to emphasize in the series. Are you going to emphasize the idea of being sent or belief in the gospel of John for example? I think asking these questions will help you to be clearer on what you want out of your sermon series. For example I want to emphasize a few things from the gospel of Luke. That Jesus ate with those who are outcasts and the subsequent invitation he gave to them, that he was clashed wit the leaders of his day by emphasizing who he was and what he came to do, the fact that Jesus cared about the poor and had a lot to say about money, and the person of Jesus; he was not just a normal guy but he claimed in word and deed to be God who has come to bring a new age and eternal life.
3. How do your emphases interact with your congregations and those people you want to reach? How does it come up against some of their worldview issues? How does it encourage them? How does it meet their felt needs and deepest needs? Thinking through these things is going to help you with application and communication.
4. Come up with a sermon series title. Up until this point the hard work is usually done by the preacher of the series, hopefully with consultation with trusted congregation members. Now is the time to get your creative people together and lay out what the sermon series is and what are the theological emphases and how it interacts with the congregation and the people you are trying to reach. You then come up with a sermon series title that will catchy and will hopefully spark the interest of the congregation and those they may invite to Church and yet still communicate what the series is about. Our sermon series is called ‘Jesus the Progressive Saviour: Come discover the ultimate revolutionary.’ This brings out that Jesus ate and hung out with the ‘wrong people’ and clashed with the establishment of his day and he was therefore both progressive and revolutionary. The words progressive and revolutionary are buzzwords amongst some of the people we are trying to reach.
5. Create a series Graphic. You will need a graphic designer for this. The clipart you got for free off the internet will not do. If there is not a Graphic Designer in your congregation I am sure you would know someone who knows a graphic designer. The graphic should communicate the series title and hopefully will spark interest in the series. You want to get your graphic designer to put your graphic in a few different sizes so you can use them in a video or a flyer or an internet banner etc. If you can’t find a graphic designer two great friends of mine who are great graphic designers are Corrine Moseley corrine.moseley@gmail.com and Murray Bunton murray@streetlinemedia.com.au.
6. Create an invite that people can give to their friends and an evite that people can email to their friends inviting them to the sermon series. You want to advertise through word of mouth and word of mouse.
7. Create a video. We spent one morning shooting two videos so it shouldn’t take long. The video needs to explain why you are doing the sermon series and in a way which is winsome to those who may not go to Church. Keep it short, sharp, simple and on message. Our series video should be up on Youtube within days and when it is I will post it here. The video was shot on a handycam but was edited brilliantly by one of our team. I have been told that the gear you use is not half as important as having great editing. So maybe you can use the handycam you have but you may need to pay someone to edit it well.
8. Create a minisite that will have a blog and or a question answer section about the series. It may have a forum section too.
9. Find ways in which you can use Facebook, Twitter, Youtube, Myspace and anything else on the internet you can use to spread the word about your sermon series. There are bound to be geeks in your Church that can do this for you. Get them away from playing World of Warcraft and give them this as their ministry.
10. Brainstorm new items that can be used in the services during this series. Is there a singer/songwriter that can write a song about what she has learnt in this series? Can your music director write a new song to sing as a congregation based on this series? Is there a drama or a series of dramas that can be used for this series? Can you have a panel during the service? Is there a book your congregation might read for the series?
11. Create other things that might spark interest. You could do a tshirt, or a Facebook application or internet game or whatever? The idea is put as many things out there that people can connect with as possible so that they may be intrigued and come along to hear about Jesus and that your congregation are excited about the upcoming sermon series and may invite their friends to hear about Jesus.

One final note, all this takes time. Resolved will be doing our current series till Easter 2010. But we will be thinking about our series after that and panning all this stuff from the start of October this year. This gives us more than half a year to brainstorm and come up with all the things listed above. Also, as I said before, branding may be as simple as creating a series title and a graphic all the above suggestions are optional.

I hope this stimulates discussion.