The last few years the App and Play stores have been inundated with churches staking a claim securing their app name in the mobile world. This week begins with the first of a three-part series highlighting key benefits of using an app and cloud based platform for your church’s digital content. History tends to repeat itself and even though apps are new, what is happening with content and the digital face of the church is circling again. Remember the first website your church had? Neither do we. Web infrastructure has changed rapidly and keeping up requires continuous effort, apps are no different. Managing, storing and distributing content looked a lot different when cassettes and vhs were the defacto method of obtaining a sermon or series. It was as simple as keeping a master tape in a cabinet or drawer and making copies as needed. Migrating to CDs and DVDs didn’t change much in that realm. When websites became a necessity it started a paradigm shift in managing, storing and distributing content for the church. The migration has been slow and steady. Online stores added ordering convenience for products. Streaming content live or pre-recorded is now second nature. The first round of apps for churches, much like the first round of websites, left a lot to be desired. Mobile enabled web pages were the cool kid on the block for a New York minute. That magic show was short lived as the mobile industry momentum took course. Bandwidth technologies and upgrades volleyed between networks, fast and reliable coverage like we have today was something everyone desired. With the first round of native apps a few years into the mix now, the path becomes clear that the cloud is the new defacto medium to obtain a sermon or series from the church. The ease of digital reveals hidden layers and endless options to manage, store, distribute and archive content. 150,000 plus churches are creating, managing and distributing content on a weekly basis, no two churches execute the workflow in the same way. There are too many options, different workflows require custom integration and just when you have it all tied together and running smooth, something in the mix gets updated and you start all over again. A cloud based platform worthy being considered ‘2016 and beyond’ should not charge for content based on storage, that’s old school thinking. When is the last time you paid YouTube to store your videos? Storage should be an included standard for any worth while cloud-based solution. When apps moved from mobile enabled web pages to native apps that install on a device the methodology was still to charge for cloud storage. Some storage is included, but go over that amount and here come the overage fees. Couple that with website media storage, merchant transaction and delivery costs and suddenly there are multiple payouts each month for the same service, to manage, store and deliver content. That’s one method to achieve redundancy I suppose, there is a better way however. Using the latest generation cloud-based platform that includes unlimited storage and redundancy for one price will save churches money, ease workflow requirements, and provide a seamless interface with co-locations. Let’s walk this through. Website – it may include unlimited pages, but does it include unlimited storage of your audio and video media? Merchant accounts with digital delivery – they include a base amount of storage and like your mobile plan, as soon as you reach your limit you are charged for overages. Considering you are paying for delivery anyway, the storage should be included, and that’s the approach with Sermons Anywhere®. With Sermons Anywhere® all your audio and video media storage and delivery is unlimited, and it’s delivered to app and web. Take it to the next level with push and inbox messaging complete with rich content. Top it off with one of a kind analytics and you have a cloud-in-a-box. The latter two topics are beyond the scope of this article but will be covered in the next two segments of this three-part series. Adding up the monthly costs looks something like this. Website hosting starts at $20 a month for base features, but unless your church is a small or a start-up, your paying between $50 and $200/month. A merchant account for your online store starts at $50 a month for limited media storage and not including processing and delivery fees. A first generation native app ranges between $40 and $200 a month, also with limited media storage and delivery fees. All together it’s common to pay between $200 - $400 a month for those combined services, not including storage overages. If you are a medium or larger church and do not manage your online media storage by purging the old and adding the new, then your overage fees will extend into the $1,000+ category per month in a few years if they haven’t already, YIKES! The concept of a monthly service fee has become far less of a nuisance with the digital age considering all the infrastructure and maintenance is handled by your provider so you don’t have to lay awake at night wondering if your content is backed up and safe. The caveat is not paying for overlap in services, it’s not an easy task with the almost infinite options available. When you use a app and cloud service provider like Sermons Anywhere® you are able to reduce your monthly costs with your web and merchant providers by taking advantage of unlimited storage for your digital media. It appears so simple, yet we see overlap being paid for month after month. It takes discipline and time to dissect – assuming you know what to look for. Next week is the second segment of the three-part series highlighting key benefits of using an app and cloud based platform for your church’s digital content.
Find out if you are paying for an overlap in services. Contact your personal content concierge today for a free evaluation of your digital media service providers to see where you can save money and how you can maximize your content’s reach and impact.
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