For smaller churches, it can be difficult to find cost-effective ways to implement media in your services and on your website. You want it to look and feel professional without having to break the bank by hiring somebody or investing in expensive software (that most of your staff might not even know how to use anyway).
Sometimes it’s not even the price of the program or media, but you don’t have the manpower to execute creating new graphics every week or filming top-notch videos.
We’ve compiled some cost-effective church media tools that are helpful for smaller churches (and some mega churches even use these too!).
Graphic Design Tools
You don’t have to hire a professional graphic designer to display some creative and beautiful designs for your church. There are free websites like Canva and Crello (they also have paid versions), with many templates to design graphics for social media, marketing campaigns, logos, videos, and more. Or you can use the FREE image editor that comes with every Clover Sites Account. This free program has features like Photoshop and typically would cost $29 - $50/month. With Clover Media, it's free!
They have designers that have created templates that are simple to use and curate as needed for your church or ministry. It’s not difficult to swap out colors or photos and even add or change text as needed. Create beautiful designs that don’t cost a fortune.
Video Creation
Though videographers are obviously a great asset to have on your church team, you may not have access to a professional or you don’t have the budget. But with video content being one of the most popular forms of content being consumed on the internet, you may want to implement videos for your church. There are plenty of video creation companies/sites that allow you to create your own videos using photos, graphics, video, animation, and music. Animoto is a fully automated video editing tool with many customizable options. Animaker is a great one to use for animated videos. Both allow you to get started for free, or you can use a paid subscription, depending on the customization you need.
Stock Photography
It is usually preferred to have original photography so your congregation and visitors can experience your unique church. However, with so much content to produce for your website, social media, slides, etc., sometimes you just don’t have the bandwidth to utilize photographers from your own congregation. When this is the case, there are free stock photography (and video) websites at your fingertips. Unsplash and Pexels are among some of the popular options for free photos and videos. You can search and download what you’re looking for from thousands of free, high-resolution photos.
Clover Media
If you really want to make it easy, Clover Media has over 90,000 images, templates, and pre-designed files for your church. Your team won’t have to scour the internet for various tools; you’ll have access to all of the media you need in one place. Plus, aside from the media, Clover Sites has the option to integrate your church website, app, and media, all in one. There are multiple pricing options available, too.
Ministry is such a blessing, but it is also demanding and time consuming. With so much going on to share the hope of Christ, it’s no wonder it can be challenging to find the time, resources, and money to create the media and content you’d like to. Hopefully some of these tools will be helpful in expanding your ministry.
