Retention vs. Acquisition

[AllSeasons]

The Church spends a lot of resources on the acquisition of new members/converts; however, it seems to me that much less is spent on retaining existing members. Usually, it costs a lot more to acquire a new member than it is to retain - or renew - an existing member. If the ultimate aim of the Church is to grow its member base and get the most number of people to Heaven as possible, it makes sense to me to spend more resources on the retention of current members. I don’t know what the churn rate is for current members, i.e. the rate at which people are leaving the Church, but I would think that if more resources were spent on retaining them, that rate could be significantly reduced.

Honestly, this is a just plain Economics/Marketing 101 stuff. I think this also highlights another issue, which is that most clergymen are not trained in these disciplines, and I worry that resources are not being used to maximize results.

Anyway, just my $0.02.

 

[Ruthie_again]

Honestly, this is a just plain Economics/Marketing 101 stuff.

What do you want?

“Sale! Half off your penance, if you come to Confession on Saturday! Just show Father your loyalty card!”
“This Sunday only! With your loyalty card, two Hosts for the price of one!”
“Come see your new, improved Church! Fewer sins! More fun!”

No… The Church doesn’t need to buy my loyalty, or pay some marketeer to tell them how to keep me.

She offers me something I can’t get anywhere else: The Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist. That is the best thing in this life. The only thing better than that will be meeting Him face to face in the next. I will do that, but only if I play by the rules. Heaven never goes on sale.

 

[AllSeasons]

What do you want?

“Sale! Half off your penance, if you come to Confession on Saturday! Just show Father your loyalty card!”
“This Sunday only! With your loyalty card, two Hosts for the price of one!”
“Come see your new, improved Church! Fewer sins! More fun!”

No… The Church doesn’t need to buy my loyalty, or pay some marketeer to tell them how to keep me.

She offers me something I can’t get anywhere else: The Real Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist. That is the best thing in this life. The only thing better than that will be meeting Him face to face in the next. I will do that, but only if I play by the rules. Heaven never goes on sale.

Thank you for the reply. But don’t you see? This is exactly the problem. Most people - and most Catholics - do not know marketing or business. There’re a lot of tools available to help get the Word out to the right people, and to make that targeting more effective and more tailored to the right audience. If God made these tools available, then I would think that He wants us to use them to help build His kingdom on earth. In my opinion, the Church is not effectively using these tools, because people are just not educated on them. Priests learn about philosophy, theology, etc., which is all well and good, but they don’t usually take courses on economics or marketing or business, which is a HUGE gap.

Sure we can rely on word of mouth to evangelize, but we’re really making ourselves less competitive by not making use of the tools that are available. The Reformation was the first battle where “multimedia” advertising, i.e. the printing press, was used. The Lutherans used that to great advantage, and to great detriment to the Catholic Church. I don’t think we should turn a blind eye to all the new technologies out there to make a connection with someone who’s already Catholic or thinking of becoming a Catholic. To do so, in my opinion, would be doing a disservice to God.

Also, marketing is not just advertising, which is another major misconception. Sure, advertising is part of that, but there’s so much more. And I think with better marketing, more people will hear about the Word in the manner that makes the most sense to them.

Anyway, I’m off my pedestal now.