If your church meets at different locations locally, nationally, or even globally you might wonder how you can help your web visitor find their nearest church. Hats off to the Church of England's, A Church Near You that does this well, but if you aren't in the Church of England, or you still want a map of where your churches are located on your own website then a directory is for you.

What is a web directory?

Traditionally a web directory was just an online list of websites. At the onset of the internet this had value, but since the rise of the search engines, and accuracy of searches, directories have been on the decline and in some cases lost their significance. However, there is still certain situations where a directory can be of enormous value.

If you are a group of churches, or ministries that operate in different locations, then enabling web visitors to find the nearest church or ministry on a Google map is excellent. And if you can give further information as to what is going on at that church or ministry then the directory becomes even more useful.

How to use a directory for outreach

How can you let your community know what goes on at all your different churches? Well this is where the directory comes into its own. Perhaps you run Alpha toddler groups, youth clubs, debt advice clinics, food banks, dementia cafés, sports clubs, etc.. As each directory item can have its own list of attributes, that are searchable, people outside of your church can quickly search to see what and where is going on near them. And every directory item has its own page so that you can add in further information about what precisely is happening.

How to use a directory for promoting events

You might also consider using a directory if you are a Christian organisation that offers a training course that is either run by yourself or has been taken up by different churches. The different courses and locations can then be searched for by the web visitor.

Examples of directories

We have a few examples of directories at Church Pages. Jesus Ministries run a number of different courses and provide information on what churches offer which courses and where.

North Manchester Deanery have only recently gone live, but have 14 churches in their Deanery and wanted their community to be able to locate them easily as well as know what times the services were, as well as what was available at each church.

We are currently working on a directory for a church that outreaches to the Tamil community in the UK and it what was very important to them that the location of their centres in the UK could be seen.

How can Church Pages help?

As specialists in creating directories not only for churches, but also for commerical organisations, we can help your churches or centres to be found quickly on a Google map with what services they offer. Please feel free to contact us if you need more information.