Church Website article in the Philly Inquirer

The Philadelphia Inquirer cited research done by Monk Development on church websites.  The article includes quotes from Monk's CEO Drew Goodmanson.  It begins:

In the last few weeks, 30,000 big white postcards have landed in Center City mailboxes, inviting recipients to check out a start-up church that meets in a Manayunk multiplex.

"We're pretty casual," the card reads.

It gives the street address for Epic Church: United Artists Theater, 3720 Main. In lettering twice as large is its Web address: epicwired.net

The hip interactive site was set up to lure young spiritual seekers, and it has done its job, said the Rev. Kent Jacobs, Epic's 30-year-old pastor. After just 16 months, the church typically draws more than 200 people to its 10 a.m. Sunday services.

Epicwired.net is "what has helped us grow," said Jacobs, who is assisted by a "media pastor." "If you've got a sorry Web site these days, nobody's going to go."

Online technology is "by far the biggest change" that has occurred in religious congregations in the last decade, according to the latest National Congregations Survey by Duke University. Of the 1,506 churches and synagogues polled in 2007, nearly all of those with at least 500 "regular attenders" had Web sites.

Read the whole article: Manayunk church reaches out through Web