Church Executive SEPT / OCT 2019 DIGITAL ISSUE | Page 32

Church Executive
CASE STUDY
A better way to
reach out — fast
By RaeAnn Slaybaugh
Prior to enlisting One Call Now [ onecallnow.com ] notification technology (text-
messaging en masse) at Seventh-day Adventist Church in Adairsville, Ga., email
was the main channel for keeping members up-to-date on church happenings.
As Elder Woody Davis explains, this approach presented a handful of challenges
and limitations.
Woody Davis
Elder
Pathfinder director, youth group
A/V Director
Seventh-day Adventist Church
(Adairsville, Ga.)
"Now, as members join our
church, they're bringing me
their phones and saying, 'I
hear you can put me on a
text-messaging list.'"
— Woody Davis
“People just didn’t get the information
quickly,” he explains. “I started looking for
something better after we had to cancel
church one Saturday due to an ice storm. We
let people know by email, but we never knew
if they got it.”
When Davis looked into it, the emails
weren’t seen for two, three — sometimes
four — days. He would hear “Oh, I never saw
that” a lot.
But with a text message, he says, they’re
usually checking it within a few seconds.
And, as Davis points out, even if they don't
respond, they usually see it before they see
an email.
Here, he talks about the process and payoffs
of embracing a new way of communicating.
How did you build the database of
phone numbers to populate your
notification technology platform?
Woody Davis: Honestly, I probably did it the
hard way because I'm very detail-oriented.
When we first started using One Call Now,
I used our church directory to cross-check
everyone’s cellphone numbers, emails and
home phone numbers as I saw them at
church. Even landlines were important to
collect, since — if someone doesn’t have a
cellphone — One Call Now will “read” them
the text message on their home phone.
One day, I stood in the foyer and literally
added the church as a contact (“Church Alert”)
on everybody's phone, then texted the word
“alert” to that contact. From there, I could make
sure they’re in our One Call Now database.
Now, as members join our church, they're
bringing me their phones and saying, “I hear
you can put me on a text-messaging list.”
32
CHURCH EXECUTIVE | SEPT / OCT 2019
How difficult is it to keep that text-
messaging database up to date?
Davis: It's real simple; it's in an Excel
spreadsheet. I just type in the name and
number, then click the group for which they
want to receive texts.
I have one group that's called Entire
Membership. Then, I have Elders, Deacons,
Deaconesses and Pathfinder (my youth group)
and Pathfinder Staff.
I save that information and import it into
One Call Now.
Compared to email, how much
time do you save every week using
notification technology?
Davis: Oh, a ton, because I can do it from
my cellphone if the pastor or anybody calls
me up and says, “Hey, can you send out a text
for me?” I might cut down what they send
me, or reword it — depending on how many
characters I can use — and then I send it out
en masse. Done.
In the past week, how many times
have you used notification technology?
For what purposes?
Davis: In a normal week, I use it for my
youth group the most — probably four to six
texts per week.
I also send two to three texts a week to the
entire membership.