Church Software as a Service: Now is the time

In the past, churches have often been slow to adopt new technologies, sometimes by months or even years, compared to secular businesses. Thankfully, that trend is changing. Churches are now leveraging technology to reach out to their congregation and the community in new and exciting ways. Even traditionally conservative churches are making use of tools such as Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and live video streams in their worship services. However, some of these same churches are slow to consider new ideas and technologies when it comes to managing one of their most important assets, their data.

A church management software (ChMS) application allows the church to store and keep track of this invaluable asset, the data related to members, visitors, volunteers, attendance, donations, and much more. Additionally, some ChMS application suites offer tools for small groups, child security, background checks, online giving, event registration, bulk email, among other things.

Software as a Service

Software applications, including ChMS applications, can initially be differentiated by where the software is physically located. If the application software is purchased for an upfront fee, typically with an annual maintenance fee, and requires that you install it on a computer located on the church's premise then it is considered to be "on-site" or "site-licensed" software. With site-licensed software the church is responsible for the maintenance, operation, support, and physical security of the application and the sensitive data it stores.

Alternatively, Software as a Service (SaaS) is a model of software delivery where a company hosts and operates web-native applications for use by its customers over the Internet, alleviating that customer (or church) from the maintenance and support of the software, and the security of the data.

Advantages of Church Software as a Service (SaaS)

The conventional wisdom is that site-licensed software allows the church to maintain control over, and easy access to, their data. Church management software delivered as a hosted, web-based, service offers those same benefits but with far greater advantages:

• Anytime, anywhere access - With web-based church management software you can literally access your data anytime and anywhere you have an Internet connected web browser. It doesn't matter if you're at home, on vacation, having a coffee at Starbucks, or even on a mission trip to a foreign country - your data will be at your fingertips.
• Easy to learn and use - Web-based user interfaces are often more intuitive which makes it easy for new users to learn and use. If you can order a book from Amazon.com, then you can typically use a web-based ChMS.
• Reduce your risk - If the church is storing their data onsite, the church is at risk of losing or exposing that data due to natural disasters and security breaches from internal or external threats. The potential costs associated with losing the data or being held liable for financial losses or identity theft far outweigh any perceived benefits of site-licensed software. SaaS vendors are held accountable for keeping your data secure, backed-up, and compliant with industry standard audit requirements.
• Lower total cost of ownership - Even the largest churches cannot afford the professionally managed hardware and security infrastructures that a typical SaaS vendor has implemented for security, stability, and scalability. Even if they could, why would they try? Churches must be good stewards of the financial resources with which they have been blessed. Offloading Information Technology (IT) costs to a SaaS vendor helps to reduce the costs of maintenance and internal IT support.
• No touch, no cost upgrades - The leading ChMS SaaS vendors regularly upgrade their offerings with new features and enhancements; the upgrades are typically free and require no action on the part of the church to install them.
• Easily extensible - In order to tap into the true power of a SaaS, the vendor should provide an easy to use Application Programming Interface (API) that allows a church or business partner to build add-ons or integrate 3rd party applications to the ChMS.

Introducing Fellowship One, Church Management Software

Fellowship One, developed by Fellowship Technologies, is a leading 100% web-based church management software solution, that helps dynamic churches of any size or denomination to effectively care for people, efficiently manage resources, and enable real growth. Why should you choose Fellowship One over other church management software vendors? In addition, to the SaaS benefits described above there are several things that we believe set us apart from the pack:

• Every feature is fully integrated together - Every feature of Fellowship One is connected by a common data source. Additions and changes made by the church staff, or their members, to attendance records, notes, contributions, staffing assignments, etc. are immediately available and visible within every area of Fellowship One. This helps to eliminate work, data redundancy, and the silos of data that often exist within the church's various ministries.
• Excellent for churches of any size or denomination - Fellowship One is an enterprise ChMS offered in various editions to meet the specific needs of your church. Fellowship One is being used by over 1,100 ministries ranging from new church plants to mega-size, multi-site, churches.
• Focused on Customer Effectiveness - We realize how important it is that your church effectively leverages the power of Fellowship One. We believe in that so strongly that we formed a group focused solely on customer effectiveness that comprises a third of our company's staff.
• An open API for churches and business partners - Fellowship One offers an application programming interface (API) that allows churches and business partners to easily extend the power of the Fellowship One church management software. The Fellowship One API is built upon REST application architecture principles and is open for use by churches using Fellowship One and for qualified business partners.
  
  There is also a community site, specifically for developers using the API, located at Developer.FellowshipOne.com. The community site includes all of the details you need to begin building add-ons or integrating a 3rd party application with Fellowship One. The site also includes several example applications for the iPhone, Facebook, and ExpressionEngine.

A quick review of Fellowship One's product features may look similar to other ChMS applications but there are significant differences in how they are implemented. We encourage you to take the time to learn how Fellowship One brings a fresh approach to common church processes and tasks.

Now is the time to consider Church Software as a Service

It is important to note that Software as a Service is not a new concept. Hosted, web-based software applications have been around since the late 1990s. Over the past decade many improvements have been made in the security, stability, and extensibility of SaaS applications. Many of the applications you rely upon today are considered a SaaS even though you may not think of them that way. Online banking, online bill pay, accounting and billing applications, email services like Gmail and Hotmail, Google Docs, and social sites like Facebook and MySpace are all considered a type of SaaS.

So if you already trust your financial and personal data with a SaaS vendor, now is the time to consider moving your church's data to web-based, church management software. Please visit www.FellowshipTech.com for more information.