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A report from Informate Mobile Intelligence revealed that Americans are spending an average of 4.7 hours a day on their smartphones. Consumers spend most of that time on their smartphones using apps. It’s a fact that your church’s members are using smartphones. They are using mobile devices for daily activities such as keeping a calendar, banking, getting directions and even reading scripture. Smartphone apps are now the primary means for communication and accessing content. Churches should consider a mobile app to reach and engage the increasing number of their members and visitors using smartphone devices. App and mobile engagement are the most vital means of communication to your church members because it can scale and be segmented more than a church website can.

Here are a few reasons why your church should consider a smartphone app:

1. Support.

Members can use a mobile app to submit prayer requests or hospitalizations to the church and find out about support groups and events within the church. Support resources can be connected to your smartphone app enabling your members to find the help they need or share these services on social media. Through a mobile app, your church can communicate about ways your members can support the church through missions and volunteering. A smartphone app is a great way to increase outreach participation and keep your members engaged in service. You can share service event photos, messages about upcoming volunteer opportunities and allow your members to share needs through social media channels.

2. Communicate.

A smartphone app enables your church to communicate interactively with your members. You can communicate via push notifications which are short messages that your members are notified of on the home screen of their phone. Your church’s app can display Facebook, Instagram and Twitter feeds to keep members updated of news and events. You can include an event calendar in your app to inform users of upcoming worship services, bible studies, small group meetings, etc and allow your members to save events right to their phone calendar. Your members no longer have to check several places for information - all communication from the church can be obtained from your app. Sharing buttons on your mobile app give your members a way to immediately text message, email or share your app on social sites.

3. Share.

What can you share through your smartphone app? Everything! A smartphone app lets you share videos or audio of sermons, church blog posts, bulletins/announcements, photos, contact information, maps and any other information you want to share with your members. Sharing via a mobile app is a great way to reach members that are ill or traveling. Mobile apps let you live stream your service or event, helping your members stay connected that are unable to attend in person. If you pass out a bulletin or announcements during service, you can give those that are unable to attend access to those from the mobile app. You can also encourage those that do attend services to retrieve the bulletin and announcements through your smartphone app and save your church lots of money spent on printing costs.

4. Fundraise.

With a smartphone app, your members are able to donate at any time and from wherever they want. They don’t have to physically be at the church to donate which helps your members to give more frequently. It also enables those who aren’t able to attend church services to give. For those attending a church service who don’t have cash or a checkbook on them, they can simply pull out their phone during the service and donate through the app. Mobile apps are a great way to ask your members for donations. With a smartphone app, you can send reminders for fundraising and let your members share donation links with their social networks.

Apps are a great way to keep church members connected, communicating and involved. Could your church benefit from a mobile app? For churches ready to create a mobile app, Paperless Transactions can help. We offer the most Complete Church App in the market and encourage churches to use it for providing enriched content, sermons/audio messages, group messages, push notifications, and more to the daily life of their church members. Contact us today to see how we can help your church build a mobile app for your members.