If you serve on staff in children's ministry or student ministry, you probably put on some important events each year. Church event promo isn't exactly something we're trained in before serving in ministry but it's something we have to learn quickly. Most churches and ministry hold tons of events each year. Hopefully, you're only doing events that really help people take steps in their journey, so you obviously want as many people to come as possible. See Tony's post about Are Events Killing the Church for more on that topic.

Let's talk about how to advertise church events to get the best turnout.

For events we want to continue doing, we all know communicating and promotion go a long way toward helping people attend. In my opinion, there is no better promotion than word of mouth from establishing a history of excellent events.

However, you have to start somewhere, and I think you should promote with the first time attender in mind. Here are 15 church event promo ideas. Tip: you might want to save this to use as a checklist for each event you promote.

Church Event Promo

1. Church Website – Every event that's open to the church should be on your website 6-8 weeks out. If sign up is needed, include a way to sign up online if possible. You can do this through Google Forms if needed.
2. Church Facebook Page – Schedule 2-4 posts on your church Facebook page and be sure to include a good image and a link to the web page about the event. Optionally, you can pay to “boost” the post to ensure it hits the most people but true Facebook Ads are a much better approach.
3. Church Blog – Write 2-3 blog posts about the event, but try to make them different from the website by including stories or something else designed to see it from a different perspective.
4. Church Program – Be sure to include it in the church program/bulletin. It's usually one of the top 3 ways people get information about events in your church.
5. Printed Mailer – We use these for bigger events, but creating a custom mailer (postcard or 8.5×5.5 size) and sending it to people's homes is a great way to bring attention to an event. We use Overnight Prints for a lot of our stuff.
6. Invite Cards (Business Card Size) – Create business cards designed for people to hand out as invitations.
7. Instagram – Put pictures on your church, ministry, or even personal Instagram account related to the event to build up excitement.
8. Personal Facebook/Twitter Account – Post a couple of updates on your personal Facebook or Twitter account to promote the event.
9. Mass Email – Create a well-designed email in MailChimp and send it to anyone in the church database it applies to.
10. Talk About It In Small Groups/Classes – This doesn't work in every church, but see if your church's small group leaders can intentionally mention it in their small group one week.
11.  Interview Someone About It – You could do this live in service or via video, but interview someone close to the event about the event itself. Make it fun and informative.
12.  Write Personal Notes – Have your children's and student ministry small group leaders write personal notes on a card with information about the event, inviting them to it.
13. Banner – Purchase a banner to display in the lobby or in your children/student environment. If this is an annual event, the investment is more than worth it. We use Group Imaging for most of our banners/displays.
14. Create a Video – The video could include highlights of previous events. It could be a comical Top 10 Reasons to Attend. Or, it could be a simple voice-over style video with key information about the event. Videos are great because they can be used more than once in multiple settings. But, they're hard to do well, so that's why I list it near the bottom.
15. Announcement From Stage – I saved this for last, as most of us probably need to use the stage less and less for event promotion. It is effective, but my approach is to create a promotion plan for each event that would work well without any mention of it in services.

Bonus Free Resource: 15 Best Practices

What ways have you found to be the most effective for your church event promotion?

What church event promo ideas have you used that aren't on this list? How do you advertise church events and what results do you see? Comment below and share your thoughts.