While the websites of churches in Australia have been a little bit behind the trend (particularly compared to US churches) there are a few particularly great examples I thought it was worth pointing out. When looking for great church websites I am looking for a couple of things. Obviously the overall look and feel is important – but also the technology and techniques being used, whether the site is responsive, and how well the site communicates.
Let’s take a look at some websites:
City on a Hill
This site is my current favour of the crop – It’s fantastically thought out in its design (love the contrast of dark panels with light panels) and has amazing depth of content. Bonus points for being responsive as well.
Hope Centre
The Hope Centre website is a lovely piece of minimal design work. The site itself is predominantly a framework that allows the great design work of the slides, and panels to show through. There’s great consistency of style in all of the graphical elements – and a nice focused on considered typography. There’s a few nice little technical touches as well – like the persistent top navigation on longer pages.
Enjoy Church
First off the bat – the Enjoy Church website gets points for being responsive – it scales and adjusts nicely down at smaller screen sizes. In terms of the visuals – it is another fairly minimal, type focused, design. I particularly like the way the semi-transparent logo interacts with the big hero images.
White Horse Church
White Horse Church hits you in the face with it’s clean, slightly unexpected branding. The whole site continues a visual feel that fits well with the church, a plant that meets in a pub in inner Sydney. The typography is well considered, and the site has a bunch of compelling content – beyond the obvious service times and info.
Bridge Church
At first glance the Bridge Church website seems perhaps a little plain – but a closer look reveals lots of nice little details (check out the navigation on the homepage slideshow). More amazing visuals fill up a nice, clean shell – and really do all the talking.
CitiPointe Church
Citipointe Church’s website fits the trend of a big slideshow of compelling images on the homepage – but takes it a step further. The little labels underneath do a nice job of previewing what each of the slides will be – particularly if you are looking for something specific. The site is nicely designed, with nice big background images framing the well laid out content.
Are there any great examples of Australian Church Websites you have seen?
Hey Jordan,
great post, nice to see a collection of Australian sites! Hope centre looks is probably my pick of the bunch. What sort of budget do you reckon these churches have put towards their site? I customised a joomla template for my church website, am quite happy with the result.
Cheers
Rowan
Ps your twitter and Facebook icons/links are the wrong way around at the topof your site 🙂
Hey Rowan – I would say that in all likelihood most of these examples would have either a reasonable budget – or in some cases a dedicated Communications team on staff.
The customised Joomla template you’ve put together for your church looks really great – nice and professional.
I think http://www.Kingdomcity.com/ in Perth has a nice site!