Over the last month, it's been interesting to see how people view thier websites, and the results we got were rather surprising to me. I honestly expected the majority of sites to recognize themselves as destinations, but instead it came out as a balance between hubs and basic information.

I guess I'm surprised because I've always thought of having a site that is a destination to be ideal. I know it's not the only way to make a site. I guess it begs the question of whether our church website is meant to be a resource or a connector. While I do feel that it is important to have a some connections to resources on the site, I think it's more important to provide something original for your congregation and visitors to connect with.

Our next poll is looking to the summer and asking if your church does anything special on it's website for Vacation Bible School (VBS). Since VBS tends to be one of the most invested-in programs of the year at most churches, I wante to see if your church website matched that investment, or at least bothered to mention what was going on.

Interestingly enough, over the last few months, I've learned that Lent is much less practiced than I had originally thought. Maybe it's because every church I had been a part of until a few years ago observed Lent and I have friends whose churches practice it, but I definately was mistaken. It turns out, at least among you readers, that Lent isn't a major focus.

I'd be curious to hear more about your different experiences with the observation of Lent in the comments below, if you're willing to share.

Our next poll asks if you consider your church to be a hub, connecting visitors to useful information that can be found elsewhere, a destination, providing original information for visitors to consume, or a business card, just covering the basics that need to be there.

Once we see where people are, I'll be putting together a piece on the advantages and disadvantages of each. But for now, let's just take a look at where we all are.

Well, it looks like my North American breatheren make up the majority of IJHAW readers, which is probably for the best because I'm probably most familiar with the contemporary American church, so that's the typical perspective I come from. Plus, I really only know English and a little bit of Spanish, and that's probably ruling out a lot of potential readers in Asia, the Middle East and Africa. Eventually I may have to work on that, but for now, it is what it is.

Oh, and whoever cast the vote saying they live in Antartica, either you're a penguin with very good technical skills, or you're not being entirely truthful. I'm calling shennanigans on that one!

March's poll brings up one of the annual discussions between myself and my best friend Wade, who is a Lutheran pastor. He asks what my church is doing for Lent, and I would tell him that my church (and denomination, the Assemblies of God) doesn't celebrate Lent. Then he'll ask why, and I'll explain that they view it as an old tradition that isn't biblically supported as something everyone should do during the season. However, I will make certain sacrafices for Lent if I feel so called by the Lord.

I'm probably in the minority on this one, but I'm curious to find out what everyone else does, from the strict observance, to the non-traditional observance, to the non-observance, and to the non-observant. And don't worry, nobody will think any less of you whatever you pick, since it's for research purposes only.

Once again, a big thanks to everyone who participated in last month's poll. Sorry about getting to the results so late, but I started a new job this week and the change has kept me busy.

So, our results clearly show us that we've got a lot of people working on the early stages of their websites, which tend to go:

1. "Awesome! I made a website, and it doesn't look half bad."
2. "I learned how to do more things, and now the site looks like crap. Now I'll basically start over again and redesign!"

If you actually uttered those words in that order, no I'm not spying on you. I just pretty much said the same to myself several years ago when I was starting out.

Anyway, I'm encouraged by this because even though not a ton of people were focused on the "bleeding-edge" website trends, it's just nice to see more people actually taking a look at the importance of having a site, and the impression a site design can have on visitors. I'll take a couple dozen of those cases over a handful of podcasting and vidcasting upgrades (no offense to those guys who are focusing on that), because it means more churches are trying to lay solid foundations online and things will likely grow from there.

Regardless of how you voted, keep of the good work everyone!

This month's poll is a simple "Where in the world are you?" question. I've seen some trends in visitors in my Clustrmap, but that tracks visits and not people, so I'd like to get an idea of where y'all are coming from to make sure I'm not missing any important topics that I need to cover in the international theatre! Make sure to swing by the main IJHAW page to vote!

Admittedly, I was not surprised by the results of December's poll. While a seasonal change to a website can provide a few benefits, we often don't see them directly. So, props to the five of you who said that you do make these seasonal changes. If you don't mind answering, what motivates you to make the changes? I know it's different for every person (like me, who did the Pink In October thing because my mother is a breast cancer survivor), so I'd be curious to hear your reasons.

For the rest of you, I completely understand where you're coming from. There are times when I have a hard enough time coming up with things to write about, let alone taking the time to come up with a new design to only be used for a season. Especially when it's a busy season for everything else as well, like December is.

This months poll asks what your church website goal is for 2007. I'm just curious what everyone is working on, or at least hopes to work on, this upcoming year. If I've missed anything major, just let me know and I can add it on it.

Well, another month has come and gone already, and that means we're collecting poll results and bringing them to you. I have to admit that November's results to the question "How often do you redesign your church's website?" were pretty much what I expected. Most major redesign is done every few years, which I'm sure is a combination of indicators, such as: a) good design, b) time and resources and c) laziness (and don't get me wrong, it's a lot of work to do a major redesign...I'm hoping mine tides me over for a while ).

Not only that, but I was also expecting the continual-process crowd to be the next largest. However, I did expect a few more in that group. Maybe there aren't quite as many Type A personalities amongst us as I had thought.

Kudos to those who take the initiative to do more redesigns, but make sure that you're doing it for the benefit of the site, and not just because you don't like it anymore!

December's poll builds off the Christmas season and my recent post about seasonal designs/modifications. We're asking if you make any seasonal changes, such as the Google logo changes, to your church website. Let us know if you like to put up any virtual decorations for the holidays by voting after the jump!

Well, the results of our October poll are in (a week late...boy, does time fly by). Anyhoo, it looks like 74% of churches don't seem to be taking full advantage of their websites as sources of key information.

I personally am a bit disappointed in this result, but not surprised. I feel that there are two places that key information needs to be placed: the church bulletin and on the church website. The church bulletin is important because then you can make sure that everyone who walks in your doors has access to the information, but the website is just as important. If people miss a service, are looking into your church, or, unthinkably, lose their bulletin, then they can turn to the website for the same information, if not more detailed information.

We have to remember, the goal is for the church website to be an extension of the church, and that's best done by getting the two to work together, and not independently.

November's poll follows up on our Site Longevity series, asking how often you redesign your church's website. Check in on the main page to vote today!

Well, the month of September has come and gone already, so it's probably time to look back at last month's poll.

When you were asked what the primary function of your church's website was, the majority of you let me know that information was the key component for your church. Coming in a close second was the do-it-all approach, where the site is meant to do a little bit of everything.

Interestingly enough, socialization received a total of zero votes. With the advent of social websites and interactive functionality that has arisen amongst web 2.0, I expected to see a vote or two here. While I agree with the majority of you and feel that the main purpose of a church website is to disseminate information, I can't help but wonder if we're missing an opportunity by being behind the technology curve. After all, today's church is constantly pushing the "it's not a religion, it's a relationship" approach, so are we not focusing enough on creating relationships online? I'm not sure what the answer is, but it's definitely something to consider.

In the vein of the results of September's poll, October's poll asks " How big a role does your church website play in the church's distribution of key information?" If you're a feed reader, swing by the main page to make sure your voice is heard.

(Oh, and on a bit of an unrelated note, I got my hands on FireFox 2.0's Release Candidate 2, and I have say I'm pretty impressed. The program seems to run smoother, and it does automatic spell-checking for form fields. If you, like me, are a blogger, that comes in really handy!)

Wow, the month is already beginning to fly by, and I realized that I had not posted last month's poll results yet. Time flies when you're staying busy.

Looking over the results, it looks like the dominant player for most church websites is PHP. I can't say that I'm surprised, but I can say that I'm glad to see it winning out over static coding.

The biggest surprise for me was that nobody was using Plain HTML. While that's great news, I did expect to see a few cases of it. Of course, there are some sites out there using it, but obviously it's none of you.

Oh, and I was glad to see that I have a few partners in crime on the ColdFusion front!

For those of you who voted for other, I'd be really interested to hear what you're using. Maybe I just comepletely missed something.

For September, I'm asking what the primary function of your church website is. Hopefully, this one will make you think a little bit. Try to vote for what the primary function actually is for your church and congregation, and not what you want it to be (because often they are not one and the same).

After a month of voting, our third poll has shown that there is definately a breadth of experience among our readers. However, more than half of your are what I'd call "seasoned vets" with 3-10 years of experience of working on the web. That's where I fall myself, so I find that interesting.

Thanks to everyone who voted. I was curious to see what kind of background my audience had so I knew where to focus my writings. So, it looks like I can stick with some of the semi-technical stuff I'm typically drawn to. However, if anyone ever has anything they'd like me to cover that I haven't, then you can either leave me a comment at any time, or reach me by email at gnilsen [at] ifjesushadawebsite [dot] net.

You'll also see the new poll up, asking what your preferred language for website creation is. I'm already checked off for ColdFusion myself, but I'm curious to see what everyone else is using. RSS readers, be sure to make the jump to vote!