Once you have guests visiting your church the goal is to get them to stick around. The easiest way to accomplish this is to track them. How do you know if you are losing people if you don’t track them? We’re not talking about following people to and from church, rather, using simple online tools and gathering basic information from your guests gives you the ability to count the sheep and keep them coming back.

Information worth tracking:

  • Service check-in – who’s coming to church services or events at your church. See trends and make better decisions to grow your church
  • Attendance – See an individual’s attendance over time. Are they attending more or less often? This helps with following up with people and suggesting a next step or offering help when they need it. Many of the programs have reports which can show when attendance dips throughout the year allowing you to plan better.
  • Spiritual Decisions: Salvations, Baptisms, Rededications – If a person’s name were to come up in a conversation among church leaders would they be able to recall if they had been baptized? Tracking tools helps you track the spiritual journey of your members.  This helps you to tailor ministry directly to the spiritual maturity of the individual.
  • Giving – While most people prefer to have their giving tracked so they can file it on their taxes at the end of the year, tracking your members giving can also be a good indicator of their commitment level.  Little or no giving may reveal low commitment where medium to high giving can reveal high commitment.
  • Volunteering – Have people who attend your church found a place to serve? It’s great to offer one-time and regular opportunities for people to volunteer. Some tracking programs even allow you to add spiritual gifts to their contact which is helpful when you are looking for a particular type of volunteer.
  • Messaging – One way to ensure your interaction with people in your church is effective is if all of the emails and texts sent to and from is linked to their contact. 
  • Integrated Background Checks – Many tracking programs have background checks built right in so you can easily have people who desire to volunteer with minors or be a leader at your church fill one out and keep the information current.

Tracking the people who attend your church is important no matter what size you are, it allows you to quantify growth, budget and plan ahead. “If you fail to plan, you are planning to fail!” ― Benjamin Franklin

While we don't officially recommend any one site/software or method, here are just a few options worth reviewing:

fellowshipone.com

planning.center

churchmetrics.com

churchcommunitybuilder.com

What's your favorite tracking software? Let us know and we'll add it to the list!