I recently signed up for a newsletter called Your Church Newsletter and according to the tagline, it is The biweekly newsletter helping you with the business of ministry .
The issue that arrived today focuses on Church Management Software(CMS) and it goes through many points to consider as you look at upgrading your existing software or take your initial step into the CMS arena. This link will take you to the source of the newsletter at the Christianity Today site and this link will take you to the newsletter signup page. It looks like a quality newsletter.
CMS is really making great advances lately, as churches, large and small, are finding it more necessary to track many aspects of ministry. This includes things such as attendance, giving, visitor followup, small group assignments, spiritual gifts inventory, volunteers, etc.
The information that Your Church Newsletter links to is not a detailed comparison of the various CMS available, but it does give leads to many of the players in the game. A good source for comparing features is here, although I ‘m not sure how current the info is. There have been many changes in the CMS landscape, even in the past 6 months, so a grid created 9-12 months ago may be a little outdated, but still, it’s a good place to start. This document also has contact info, including websites for all the CMS listed.
The biggest advancement for several of the better known packages is on web access and website integration and if the grid does not indicate web integration for a particular package, their website should show their latest features.
Use the above as a place to start your research and I’ll be writing more on this topic soon, specifically on who the top players are in this game, in my opinion and the best way to approach this decision.