The Church Co is a subscription-based website and app platform for churches that want a professional online presence without hiring a developer. The company says more than 5,000 growing churches worldwide use it.^1
A church gets a drag-and-drop website builder with the tools congregations use every week built in: sermon and podcast libraries, an events calendar that updates automatically, Stripe-powered online giving, prayer requests, small groups, a members portal, sermon notes, and Church Online livestreaming with live chat.^1 Churches can add a fully branded mobile app under their own name and logo, kept in sync with the website automatically.^2 The platform connects to Planning Center, PushPay, Tithely, Church Community Builder, and ChurchSuite, and the company also offers managed church marketing, including Local SEO and help securing and running Google's Ad Grant for nonprofits.^1^3 Pricing is subscription-based with a 14-day free trial, yearly plans include the team building the website for free, and paid setup packages are available for churches that want more design help.^1
Founder Paul Cox launched the first version in 2015 after asking a simple question: what do churches need online? The answer he started with was pages, blogs, events, and podcasts.^5 Cox studied digital media at the University of Central Florida, moved to Sydney in 2009 to attend Hillsong International Leadership College, and worked on Hillsong's web team building Hillsong.com.^6 The company frames the work as ministry: their strength is building websites, and they want to use it to help churches reach people.^5
Kevin Wells, pastor of Family Life Church, says: "The people who work there seem to have genuine concern for meeting the needs of the local church. It’s a very comfortable process." Wells estimates that over 80 percent of his church's visitors in recent years found it through the website.^7
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