What Are Third-party Services?
Getting Started With Third Party Services
I can help you and your organizations set up third party services in addition to your website or domain-level services. So what does this mean? A Third Party service is a software or web app that is not created by your organization or team. There are many different third party services that small businesses and churches use. From Customer Relationship Management (CRM) tools to Online Donations Softwares and more, I can help you establish a link between your website and these tools.
Website CMS
Website Content Management Systems or CMS is an online service that organizes and allows users to create and modify existing content for their website. This tool is typically hosted on a server and is what houses your website’s unique content, photos, and videos, or files. Picking out a good CMS, like WordPress or Shopify, can give you a great creative advantage to setting up your website. When you are looking for a CMS, it’s important to consider the purpose of your website. Are you looking to showcase a gallery or sell a product? Maybe you want to include a blog or generate content that helps users find your church or business.
I can help you get set up on a CMS to kick-start your website or manage the contents within your existing ecosystem! No matter if you’re starting from scratch or wanting to take the next step to optimize your site, I have great resources available for you.
ChRMs
Church Relationship Management, or ChRM, is software that helps you keep track of your relationship with customers in physical or digital ways. They typically offer services to store contact information, create newsletters or other means of communication, or generate reports. Choosing the best ChRM for your organization can be challenging. There are many options, and it all depends on your company size and purpose of your organization.
Services like Hubspot are awesome places to start for non-profits and offer free versions until you reach a certain sales volume or contact frequency. If you’re a church, I recommend the Planning Center ChRM. It covers a multitude of services, from Online Giving features to Order Of Worship scheduling and more!
When you are getting started with a new CRM, the implementation may be time-consuming or challenging. Let me help! I love connecting services like ChRMs to your organizations website and getting you set up to start taking customer information.
Email And Newsletters
Communications to your community is important. With over 99% of active email users checking their emails daily, email is still the most effective form of communication today. When you need to send an email, it’s important to be able to track performance and measure the results. Tools like Mailchimp are great for email and newsletters. You can organize and segment your users to send custom campaigns each month. With a drag and drop builder, this option is great for users of any level of HTML experience!
Podcasts
Podcasts are a great resource for content creation. There are many platforms used by millions of listeners that you can choose from. For churches, having your pastor’s sermons online is an easy starting place. Take a digital version of your weekly message, including an opener introducing the church, pastor, or topic from the week and a closing that invites listeners to tune in or visit next week.
Once you’ve got a great start, you can build on your existing audience. Create a new show with your pastor and/or church staff that engages in topics that are relevant in your church family, listening audience, or denomination. This can open door for great conversation and even deeper connection with guests and your church family!
Video Hosting
Depending on your budget, there are many options for video hosting online. On the cheaper side, using Youtube is a wonderful tool. Youtube is free and offers many editing tools available to users, even if you don’t have a lot of experience with editing or producing videos. If you have more room in your budget, you can subscribe to tools like Vimeo or upload to a self-hosted video platform.
Keeping your videos hosted somewhere besides your website enables your website a chance to stay fast. The fewer videos on a given page, the faster a user will be able to load and interact with the page. This is a win for your website every time, especially when you have visual content to share with users.
Online Storefronts
When selling physical products, having an online storefront is a great way to reach your entire audience. Whether you are selling food, clothing, or digital products, a digital storefront can benefit your organization.
WooCommerce is a powerful (and free) WordPress plugin that enables your website to have a storefront with a checkout and payment portal. In the backend, you can track orders, set up billing and tax details, create coupon codes and even create shipping labels with some paid services they offer.
Analytics
Finally, every website needs analytics. Whether it’s Google Analytics or Adobe Analytics, you should know what users are doing on-site. These tools are implemented on-site with Javascript and allow you to review metrics. Once you have analytics, you can start to do research and development of your site.
Tracking user behavior helps SEOs make smarter decisions when optimizing a website. We can use the data to refine our A/B tests or optimize CTAs and much more.