The Effective Design of Church Web Sites: Extending the Consumer Evaluation of Web Sites to the Non-Profit Sector

Abstract

Web sites are becoming an important gateway for churches to attract new members and communicate with the membership. Research has focused on developing guidelines for web site design in the for-profit world, but little has been said about non-profit web sites. This study uses an established instrument to elicit over 1100 responses from parishioners who evaluated a random sample of 250 church web sites. The results provide some guidance about which features are most valued by church members.

Keywords:

• non-profit web sites
• church web sites
• best practices
• TAM model
• web site design

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

This manuscript has been substantially improved by the comments of three anonymous reviewers. Funding for this project was provided by a foundation that wishes to remain anonymous.