{"id":20221,"date":"2002-07-01T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2002-07-01T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/2002\/07\/01\/second-impressions\/"},"modified":"2002-07-01T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2002-07-01T00:00:00","slug":"second-impressions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/content\/second-impressions\/","title":{"rendered":"Second Impressions"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>First impressions are important to first-time guests at your church, but the half-hour after service can determine whether they&#39;ll come back&mdash;and stay. Our research reveals three insights:<\/p>\n\n<p>1. &quot;Friendliness of the people&quot; is the most important thing newcomers look for.<\/p>\n\n<p>2. &quot;Friendliness&quot; is based on how many people talk to them.<\/p>\n\n<p>3. The most important time for &quot;friendly talk&quot; is immediately following the service.<\/p>\n\n<p>My family moved recently, and we have visited a number of churches. I&#39;ve found some simple, but significant ways to increase repeat visits.<\/p>\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n\t<li>\n<em>After-service hosts:<\/em> A greeting time during the service is good if folks resume their conversation with the newcomer following the service. It&#39;s bad if they pretend nothing ever happened. If your people are not naturally congenial with newcomers, then appoint &quot;hosts&quot; for after the service. They are to make a beeline to newcomers, escort them to the coffee table, introduce them to others, and invite them back.<\/li>\n\n\t<li>\n<em>The three-minute rule<\/em>: In one church we visited, the pastor reminded the congregation that no one could talk to anyone they knew for at least three minutes after the service! It worked for us. We met a wonderful person who had been attending for the past year. Our conversation lasted over 15 minutes! And we&#39;ll look for her friendly face when we return.<\/li>\n\n\t<li>\n<em>Church tour:<\/em> Guests are hesitant to wander around, even though they&#39;d like to. So, offer a short tour after service. It&#39;s a low-commitment, limited-time, high-information event. The guide explains activities that take place there throughout the week, and guests naturally ask questions. It&#39;s a much easier next step than, say, joining a membership class.<\/li>\n\n\t<li>\n<em>Follow-up contact:<\/em> It&#39;s standard for pastors to send a &quot;thank you for visiting&quot; letter. We got nice ones from every church we attended. But following our second visit to several of those churches&mdash;nothing.<\/li>\n\n<\/ul>\n\n<p>In typical, plateaued churches, 9 percent of all first-time visitors join the following year. But among second-time visitors (twice in a six-week period), 17 percent join. And third-time guests unite at a rate of 36 percent in the ensuing year.<\/p>\n\n<p>The pattern is similar for growing churches: 21 percent of first-timers, 38 percent of second-timers, 57 percent of third-timers return and join.<\/p>\n\n<p>A unique follow-up contact with second-time guests is like planting seeds in good soil. A follow up strategy for third-timers is like bringing in a ripe harvest.<\/p>\n\n<p class=\"is-style-article-bio\">Charles Arn, Church Growth, Inc. Monrovia, California<\/p>\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-group aligncenter is-style-sidebar has-global-padding is-layout-constrained wp-block-group-is-layout-constrained\">\n<p><strong>Reaching an R-rated Culture<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Pick up a matchbook at a restaurant or tavern in Newport News, Virginia, and it might say &quot;Hope Community Church.&quot; The church targets young men, and puts its message where they&#39;ll find it. Hope&#39;s black and white matchbooks announce the new Saturday night service. Associate pastor Mike Hale gets a cool reception in some places (dancers in cut-offs shooed him from The Katt club), but others place a basket of matchbooks on the bar.<\/p>\n<p><br>\nOpen Door Community Church advertises during TV wrestling and places ads before movies at a 24-screen multiplex, regardless of rating. &quot;Most people live in an R-rated culture,&quot; pastor John Redmon says. &quot;We want to reach out to people where they&#39;re at.&quot;<br>\n<br>\n<em>&mdash;from The Daily Press (3\/11\/02)<\/em><\/p>\n<p><strong>Preventing Freshmen Drift<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>When we sent high school graduates off to college, we found they didn&#39;t come to church much when they returned for holidays and summer vacations. To counter this drift, we started Fresh Walk&mdash;for freshmen starting a new walk of life. We pair each student with a caring adult who makes contact throughout the year, e-mails, birthday cards, and goodie boxes. Plus we send the church newsletter. Now, during holidays, we see most of these students back in church, because they know they are loved and missed.<br>\n<br>\n<em>Scott Van Oostendorp<br>\nFirst Reformed Church<br>\nZeeland, Michigan<\/em><\/p>\n<p>\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading is-style-article-subhead1\">Ideas That Work<\/h2>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n<\/p>\n\n<\/div>\n\n<p class=\"is-style-article-copyright\">Copyright &copy; 2002 by the author or Christianity Today\/<em class=\"citation\">Leadership<\/em> Journal.\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/le\/help\/permissionsprivacy\/permissions.html#answer\" target=\"_blank\" class=\"copyright\" rel=\"noopener\">Click here<\/a> for reprint information on <em class=\"citation\">Leadership<\/em> Journal.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>First impressions are important to first-time guests at your church, but the half-hour after service can determine whether they&#39;ll come back&mdash;and stay. Our research reveals three insights: 1. &quot;Friendliness of the people&quot; is the most important thing newcomers look for. 2. &quot;Friendliness&quot; is based on how many people talk to them. 3. The most important <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.christianitytoday.com\/pastors\/content\/second-impressions\/\">Read more&#8230;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":20222,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"tax_ctp_authors":[1081],"tax_ctp_books":[],"tax_ctp_categories":[154,160],"tax_ctp_field_guide_subcategory":[],"tax_ctp_field_guides":[],"tax_ctp_format":[131],"tax_ctp_multimedia":[],"tax_ctp_point_editor":[],"tax_publications":[678,156,681],"tax_ctp_tags":[3604,3609,5074],"tax_ctp_topics":[],"class_list":["post-20221","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tax_ctp_authors-charles-arn","tax_publications-2002-leadership-journal","tax_publications-leadership-journal","tax_publications-summer_2002-leadership-journal","tax_ctp_tags-church-attendance","tax_ctp_tags-church-growth","tax_ctp_tags-statistics"],"acf":{"scripture_references":null},"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is 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