At Think Ministry we're used to working with BIG churches. They often educate us about the special circumstances surrounding special donations they receive. Just about every ChMS will support designated giving, but what happens when you need to track more than who, how much, and what for? Sometimes you need to track "why" and "for how long".
Think Ministry Inc. built MinistryPlatform so that churches might leverage the open architecture and API to do lots of cool things! Chris Keheyias describes a great example from Calvary Chapel Melbourne in Florida. They have made MinistryPlatform the database for their Media Management System. Here's the opening paragraph from
We are big fans of Chris Kehayias at Calvary Chapel Melbourne. He used some of his valuable personal time to build MPMobile which he describes as "a quick, mobile way to lookup contact information about your congregation on the go."
Chris is sharing this tool for free with other MinistryPlatform churches. You can learn more on his blog!
So you have a big church database with tens of thousands of people. Whose job is it to clean it up?
Let's get one thing straight first. It's everyone's job to use the database. Using the database is important. You don't need to clean a database that isn't used. That means the database has to be useful, but it also means you have to provide some amount of training, support, and leadership.
Here's my opinion about roles and responsibilities as they relate to keeping the database useful (current and clean):
We've got a new tool that will allow your staff and volunteers to create batches, scan checks or envelopes, then distribute donations to donors and programs. We called it the "Donation Batch Tool," but you can call it awesome.
What does it do?
The Donation Batch Tool is a windows application that works with MinistryPlatform. It sends and receives data through the MinistryPlatform API. Users can connect a variety of check scanners to this easy-to-use utility.
The MinistryPlatform Check-In system is super easy to use and very flexible. It does a fantastic job with secured children's check-in for worship services in multi-site, multi-service churches. It can also be used at just about any event. Check out this video then read below to learn more.
There are many online giving solutions out there. Newer, browser-based church management systems generally provide some mechanism to take online donations. Even the old, LAN-locked Windows systems have a bolt-on solution or partners they recommend.
So, what makes online giving special in MinistryPlatform? Well, we are Think Ministry Inc. after all!Below you’ll find a few ways we thought ahead and made our system stand out from the rest:
Our friend Chris at http://calvaryccm.com did a fantastic job on a video to show the church body how to use the MinistryPlatform Online Giving tool. We love the big buttons they put on the Online Giving page.
LOTR fans out there will appreciate the quote in Chris Kehayias' article about their decision to select MinistryPlatform as the ChMS for their multi-site church. Chris says, "We had landed on the "Holy Grail" database… One Database to Rule them All".
So, what makes online giving special in MinistryPlatform? Well, we are Think Ministry Inc. after all!Below you’ll find a few ways we thought ahead and made our system stand out from the rest: