Simplifying Giving TO ENGAGE AND ENCOURAGE NEW GIVING, YOU’VE GOT TO MAKE IT SIMPLE. Sponsored by eChurchGiving is bringing
to churches
Funding ministry — simply In an age when digital giving is common — but often frustrating and impersonal — Pushpay provides an experience that’s beautifully simple and can provide points of connection between a church and its members. It’s always such a joy to hear good news stories from our church partners. It’s a refreshing reminder about the amazing results that simplifying the ability to be generous can have. Pushpay is a business that was born out of the frustration encountered when trying to give to a local church. We now have the privilege of serving hundreds and hundreds of churches across the United States and are always blown away when we hear stories of ‘doubling online transactions’ or ‘record numbers of new givers engaged.’ We have set up a specialized division called eChurch who are the experts when it comes to bringing Pushpay to churches. The eChurch team loves working with church Staff, fulfilling unique needs, learning about specific outreaches, and implementing the Pushpay platform in a way that will ensure barriers which stand in the way of generosity are removed. Everything we do is based on helping churches solve the problem of how to make it simple for people to make that first or subsequent gift. The State of the Plate tells us that, on average, only 20 percent to 25 percent of people who regularly attend church will give regularly. This means there’s tremendous opportunity to fund ministry by engaging a bigger portion of our congregations. Our beautifully simple mobile app is one part of our platform and allows giving in less than 10 seconds. By removing barriers to giving, our church partners have found that they engage both new and existing givers, leading to an overall increase in giving in their churches. Pushpay makes giving about the ‘moment’ — not the process! Please take time to read more about what we do, our vision, and the results churches just like yours are seeing from partnering with us. We look forward to speaking with you soon.
Chris Heaslip, Group CEO and Co-Founder
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BUILDING A BUSINESS THAT ENCOURAGES GENEROSITY The origins of Pushpay involve a most unlikely element: a bike.
After college graduation, while listening to a challenging sermon via podcast on a training ride, Pushpay co-founder and director Eliot Crowther asked himself a pivotal question — one which so many young people don’t: Will Godly generosity be a part of my life? At the time, it wasn’t. He recounts getting off his bike and repenting on the side of the road. It was a big moment, personally — and, though, he didn’t know it at the time, for Crowther’s career. Having spent a decade as a competitive cyclist, Crowther realized he needed to get out of the circuit several years ago while competing overseas. He went back to New Zealand. “I needed an idea,” he recalls. Crowther prayed for about a year. Then, at a café, he came up with an idea for a smartphone-based giving platform. He took his idea to Chris Heaslip — now Pushpay’s CEO and co-founder — and the two immediately began strategizing the vision of the company and identifying the values the team behind it should have. Then, they prayed. In mid-2012, Crowther and Heaslip developed the technology that’s so unique to Pushpay. After downloading the app and making the first gift, any future donations can be made in 10 seconds or less — any time — by smartphone. Soon after, they rolled out the platform to churches in New Zealand.
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It was a great test case for Pushpay’s expansion potential. Within months, Crowther and his family sold their possessions and moved to Irvine, CA, to see what Pushpay could do there — a relocation made even more momentous when, the day before departing, they learned they were expecting their second child. “It was pretty scary going to the other side of the world, but God blessed us,” Crowther says. “The market was very receptive right away. Incredible stuff happened.” Among the amazing happenings: the employees — most with church backgrounds — who came onboard right away. Among them was Troy Pollock, executive pastor at one of the company’s first church partners. Although Pollock’s church was already generous, implementing Pushpay’s platform ramped up the giving culture in dramatic ways. “Troy came onto the team as a calling from God,” says Marketing Director Fraser Clark. “We’re blown away by his heart, and by our church partners’ reaction to him.” Today, he’s Director of Church Operations at eChurchGiving, the entity which brings the Pushpay platform to U.S. churches. Like Pollock, all of eChurch’s representatives come from church backgrounds. “Lots of them are still in lay ministry, and many have been >>
The Cause Community Church (Brea, CA) How simplifying giving is freeing up valuable staff time for ministry Once upon a time at The Cause Community Church in Brea, CA — as with so many churches — giving online required creating a unique login and filling out a litany of details first. “This timeintensiveness was always on the back of my mind,” recalls Business Administrator Joshua Reeve. So, Reeve decided to mobilize the Pushpay app-based mobile-giving platform. But, first things first: he needed to familiarize his staff with the new tool. “We explained why it was chosen — in particular, the administrative benefits,” Reeve recalls. What he told the team ultimately conspired: Less processing time was required, freeing up their time for ministry projects.
A database integration feature with the church’s management system, Fellowship One, made it possible. This integration — performed by the Pushpay team, with the church’s permission — meant staff didn’t have to re-enter members’ information. Now, when someone makes a gift, the platform attempts to match that gift to an existing record using the donor’s email address. About 80 percent to 90 percent of transactions merge immediately. If a donor isn’t in the church’s database, a new record is created. “People are really processing their own donations at this point,” Reeve says. n
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church staff,” Clark says. “So, they understand the nuances of how the platform should (and does) work.” Within a year of setting up shop in California, the company moved its headquarters to Seattle, WA. There, it found an abundance of technology and a “wonderful cultural fit,” according to Crowther. “We were — and are — in a very privileged position where we could go out and build worldclass technology,” he adds. “The church shouldn’t be playing catch-up when it comes to technology, so we’re playing leapfrog instead.” Technology built on a vision The company’s guiding vision is to see the Kingdom of God resourced, equipped
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and growing through generosity. “That means removing barriers to giving, especially on the first gift,” Crowther says. “We want to help people start being generous. God isn’t changing, but the world — and technology — are.” When designing the Pushpay platform, Crowther and his team were intent on overcoming a few challenges inherent to existing tools — beginning with the amount of information required prior to giving. “If people have to fill in a bunch of information first, statistics show that 50 percent to 60 percent of them will abandon the effort,” he points out. And this isn’t just a hurdle for small and growing churches, he adds: The average online giving experience in the 50 fastest-growing churches in the U.S. is more than three minutes. In contrast, giving via Pushpay requires just a handful of seconds. “As a result, we’re consistently seeing a significant impact in online giving — often doubling,” Clark says. “We’re also seeing the engagement of new givers. In the future, we want to see $1 billion in new giving raised for the Kingdom.” One church who can testify to the power of simple giving is The Cause Community Church in Brea, CA, where the platform has been in place for nine months. Originally, Business Administrator Joshua Reeve took a look at Pushpay as a courtesy to a church member.
“But, I could see that it met a need our church had, but didn’t know how to address,” he recalls. To introduce the tool to the congregation, Reeve and his team showed a video (provided by Pushpay). Then, using the app, the lead pastor made a gift in real-time. The following Sunday, they showed the video again. Less than a year later, the church has doubled its online transactions. “Previously, 140 transactions per month was great,” Reeve says. “Now, 300 per month is a pretty consistent figure.” Of these, about 80 percent are given using the Pushpay app, and about 10 percent are new givers. Reeve anticipates transactions will
grow by an additional 15 percent to 20 percent as pipeline integrations are rolled out in the Pushpay platform, further fortifying the ministry he and his team can offer — the most welcome benefit of all. To this end, every Sunday, Reeve watches a 50-year-old, longtime church member with cerebral palsy give, independently, with no assistance. “He loves the Lord, but he could never participate in the offering on his own before,” he explains. “Now, in a matter of seconds, he can take out his phone and give. It lets him really be a part of the worship service.” n — Reporting by RaeAnn Slaybaugh
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The state of church giving Tim Abare, president of eChurchGiving, talks about what has (and hasn’t!) changed when it comes to generosity.
Compare the state of church giving 20 years ago to today. What has changed? There are several changes: Years ago, I had lunch with researcher George Barna as he talked about the 1.5 million people who were leaving churches and forming spiritual mini-movements. Some refer to it as the “grazing effect” meaning people are worshipping on Because it’s app-based, our giving platform accommodates spontaneous, in-the-moment generosity. In fact, our data shows that 40 percent of people who give using Pushpay do so on days other than Sunday. their own, via podcasts, home churches, cause-driven events, and more. This speaks to a whole new movement that’s going on outside of the four walls of the church; statistics show about 6 million 8
people meet weekly in small groups, but they don’t attend worship services. As many churches have grappled with being seeker-sensitive, there has been a steady decline in pastoral teaching about biblical mandates to give. Other changes are pretty obvious — technological advances and economics ups and downs, in particular. Today, only 2.4 percent of income is given to the church, compared to 3.1 percent in 1968. And, churches have seen four years of consecutive declines in giving. That hasn’t happened since the Great Depression. Since the Great Recession, many churches are focused mostly on maintaining (not growing) giving. Meanwhile, the U.S. population has grown by 48 million people in the past 20 years. So, it’s clear that the church isn’t keeping up.
So, we know what has changed. What has stayed the same? There’s always going to be a remnant of loyal, grateful people who are naturally and intentionally generous. Also: Then and now, people give when there’s a sense of mission, purpose, cause and heart connection. That was true 100 years ago. It was true 20 years ago. It’s still true. It’s been said that about 20 percent of a typical church’s membership gives the majority of the gifts. Is that accurate? As far as available data indicates, yes. Generally, 20 percent of members provide 50 percent to 80 percent of total giving in churches. As our team talks with thousands of churches, those figures hold consistent, with small variations: In smaller churches, the
percentage of giving provided by that 20 percent of members tends to be a little higher. It’s a bit lower in larger churches. Overall, right now, more churches are reducing program offerings due to lack of funding versus expanding those offerings. Taking the church as a whole, do you believe technology has enabled a more generous church giving culture? Yes. It’s simple: To maintain or increase giving, there needs to be different options to engage the giver. There’s always going to be envelope / collection basket people, EFT people, those who prefer online giving, and others who like kiosk giving. However, mobile giving represents an unprecedented opportunity to increase giving and generosity. Over and over again, our church partners see >> 9
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increases in their offerings from people who have engaged with our mobile app that allows for giving in 10 seconds. With the unmatched ability to give spontaneously from their smartphone, both new and previously intermittent givers are able to give easily in the ‘moment’. We just want to make giving simple. All of our technological development is geared towards making it easier to give. There are enough challenges to giving, and we’re compelled to eradicate as many as possible. When someone feels moved to give, they shouldn’t be obstructed by process. When Pushpay’s 10-second mobilegiving platform was designed, what major hurdles to giving was it modeled to overcome? It all began when Eliot Crowther, Pushpay’s co-founder and director, was at a church service. The pastor asked for an offering. As a 20-something, Eliot didn’t carry cash or checks, and he didn’t want to write down his credit card information. (Consider recent the Target and Wal-Mart data breaches.) He asked a key question: Why couldn’t I — in the moment — give as I was compelled to do? Our mobile giving app model has unquestionably proven itself. For example, at a recent denominational conference, people were asked to give by cash, check, or using Pushpay’s revolutionary platform. The result was an increase in the offering over the year before of 84 percent! The only difference was Pushpay! At a different and subsequent denominational conference, the offering doubled.
One of the platform’s biggest selling points is the fact that people can give in less than 10 seconds. A person only needs to enter their details once during a first gift or registration — a process that normally takes about 45 seconds. From that point forward, they’re able to download the app, have all their details pre-populated, and be ready to give in 10 seconds wherever or whenever they choose. So, it’s simple. And, because it’s app-based, it accommodates spontaneous, in-themoment generosity. In fact, our data shows that 40 percent of people who give using Pushpay do so on days other than Sunday. The platform’s design also cuts down on processing requirements, which benefits church staff members. What I mean by that is, Pushpay integrates with church databases so that gifts can be easily reconciled with their giving profiles, making accounting easier for church administrators. Are there any other takeaways about the state of church giving you’d like to share? I want to talk a little bit about giving habits. One thing hasn’t changed, and won’t: People give when they see God doing incredible things with their gifts. That drives a culture of generosity. We want to catalyze that generosity. n Tim Abare is president of eChurchGiving in Redmond, WA. He has served the church for more than three decades in senior leadership, is the founder of the Epoch Awards, and serves as a board member for a handful of non-profit organizations. Under his leadership, the team at eChurch is rapidly expanding the Pushpay opportunity to churches across America and partnering with church leaders to ensure simple engagement and adoption of the digital giving process.
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New-school giving options Strategies and advice for accommodating the next generation of generosity
Designed as a fast, simple, secure, tactile — and fun — new-school giving option, Pushpay is distinct from other solutions in how it draws givers into the mobile experience, according to Chief Marketing Officer Fraser Clark. “We realize that it’s mobile giving which is encouraging a lot of the increase in a church’s budget,” Clark explains. “So, we’ve designed our entire platform to move givers in that direction.” Because givers expect simplicity, Clark says user engagement and ease of use have been the targets for every step of the tool’s development. “We understand that a person’s desire to give shouldn’t be overcomplicated with sign-up or sign-in procedures,” he points out. “With Pushpay, new givers can make an initial gift and get set up
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very quickly, no matter which digital entry point they start with.” When you hear the term “newschool giving,” what technologies and platforms come to mind? Clark: There are many “newschool” giving options available through a range of platforms. People expect simplicity in their everyday lives, so Pushpay’s approach has been to create a simple and uniform experience across all the giving touch points of a church. Our online and kiosk platforms feed straight into the mobile experience. And, after a fast initial setup, church members are then able to give in 10 seconds. It’s a little like iCloud in that you can expect to engage with the same experience across all your devices.
For churches, how critical is it to make giving easy? Clark: The importance of removing barriers to give is vital. We’re seeing a generation of givers coming through who’ve never written a check before. And, though they’re less likely to carry cash, they always have a mobile phone on them. It shouldn’t matter if you’re in church or at home; you should be able to give whenever and wherever you feel moved to do so — without having to jump over barriers. We’re seeing a remarkable statistic that shows 39 percent of giving through Pushpay happens on days other than Sunday. This is where our church partners are seeing dramatic increases in generosity from both new and existing givers.
Are there any hard-data figures or research that speak to the giving opportunities that could be lost if the giving process is too complicated? Clark: If mobile giving takes longer than 30 seconds, 85 percent of people will abandon the transaction. That’s why we’ve designed our mobile solution to take just 10 seconds to complete. Furthermore, a recent survey showed that the average online giving experience for the 50 fastest-growing churches across America took more than three minutes to complete. This astounded us! We figured we could tackle this problem and achieve two wins in the process. First, we could transform online giving so that it takes less than a minute to complete. Second, we could migrate those who give online into the world >>
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of mobile generosity. This is accomplished via an invitation text, which is sent after an online gift is completed. This approach has been a gamechanger. In fact, we’ve found that 35.4 percent of all people who give online will go on to download the app and give to their church that way.
do that first, and then fill in a minimum of details after the fact. It has to be a pleasant experience. For an example of how simple it can be, see this giving page. Here, Pushpay seamlessly integrates with ONEchapel’s online presence. Have one solution at each touch point of a ministry. This makes sense for both the church and the giver. So, What’s holding some churches whether you prefer to line up for a back from offering new-school kiosk, give online, or engage with a giving options? mobile app, your congregants’ needs Clark: There’s sometimes a are catered to. resistance to something new. But most Implement well. This last step times, there’s a is vital — our perception that implementation it’s going to cost a teams are all We’ve seen our online transaction count lot to implement ex-church staffers double since switching to Pushpay, compared all this new and understand to the previous year [without the tool]. technology. what it takes That’s a lot less internal processing to do, While there to implement which is valuable for the time it saves us. are some fees a new program — Pastor Joshua Reeve, The Cause associated with in a church. Community Church (Brea, CA) implementing They work with a ministry-wide our partners to program such as provide an optimal Pushpay, the true value comes with a launch, continued support and tasteful reduction in administration time and promotion of the platform. costs (through our integration with church databases) and the considerable Any other thoughts to add about increases in giving. new-school giving options for churches? So, the investment in this tool is a Clark: There’s no doubt that the very small fraction of what a church sees giving landscape is changing. We back in cost savings and giving increase. believe churches should be positioning If you could prescribe a recipe that themselves in such a way that they’re drives optimal giving in a church, what ready to encourage and support the would it include? next generation of givers. n Clark: Make online giving simple. Simplicity is king. When somebody — Reporting by RaeAnn Slaybaugh wants to give, they should be able to
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WHAT COULD $250 PROVIDE FOR A CHURCH OF 1,000 PEOPLE?
P/MONTH
Pushpay provides a digital giving solution that is designed to draw people into a 10-second mobile giving experience. Once people have our mobile app, they can give whenever they feel moved in a fast, simple and secure way. Increased generosity from both new and existing givers is leading to dramatic increases in the budgets of our church partners and allowing them to better fund their ministry.
*The benefits outlined in option B are based on feedback from an actual church partner. While results differ from church to church, some church partners are reporting even greater benefits. We work with churches of different sizes from all over America, so whatever your church size we have pricing plans to suit your needs. To learn more about what Pushpay can do for your church, speak to the team at eChurch.
Bringing Pushpay to Churches www.echurchgiving.com