But a well-organized database is the “backbone” of any thriving parish. It can help your team identify areas for improvement, enhance member relationships, and explore other outreach opportunities you might be missing. But this can only be achieved when your data is clean, clear, and consistent!
Perhaps you’ve fallen off the beaten path, and your parish database is a hot mess. Don’t let it get you down! Here are seven practical tips to help you create an action plan for organizing your data and getting you back on the bandwagon.
Organizing a parish database is no small task! Having someone on your team who can serve as an official “decider” when questions arise about naming conventions or how information should be tagged and formatted can help move things along smoothly and keep your team laser-focused on updating their section of the database. Later, when the work is complete, you can determine which staff members or volunteers are responsible for maintaining the data going forward.
With that in mind, let’s also not forget to encourage administrators to utilize strong passwords (and employ these basic security tips) as another crucial step to protecting your data.
Keeping your data secure shouldn't be difficult! With just a few clicks, our church management software makes adding, removing, and updating user roles quick and easy. So whether it’s the pastor, a parish staff member, or a volunteer, you can grant access to only the data they need based on their parish role.
If you think cleaning data in one system is hard, managing it across two, three, or more platforms is a recipe for disaster! Keeping your staff and volunteers committed to using a single system for storing parish data will ensure it remains accurate and secure and make future maintenance a piece of cake.
And if you absolutely must use a third-party app to extend your ChMS functionality, always look for one that integrates easily with your primary software to keep your workflow intact and your data perfectly synchronized in its original place.
With hundreds (if not thousands) of parishioner records on file and changes frequently occurring in the parish community, your member data can quickly get out of hand. Reports are ideal for spot-checking your database to locate empty address fields, invalid email addresses, or missing phone numbers. This can be especially effective after conducting a parish-wide mailing or email blast to see what correspondence was delivered or returned so you can make the necessary corrections in the system.
Here are some other practical ways to track and update missing, outdated, or duplicate information with the help of your ChMS reporting system:
We like our database management quick and easy! Our software's Family Explorer offers advanced filtering functionality to help you quickly track down missing information. Simply set up your search query to target the main contact fields (i.e., phone number, email and mailing address) that should be populated and fill in the blanks.
Formatting issues are a challenge for many church databases. As a staff member or volunteer you’ve probably run into a few of these yourself:
The goal here is to pick a standard for your data and be consistent. Over time, this will result in consistency in the database, reports and mailing labels. And let’s face it, it just looks prettier that way!
A straightforward solution is to create a small reference sheet for your team with examples of the desired formatting to keep everyone on the same page and your data in tip-top shape. And when it comes to formatting for mailing addresses, be sure to use the USPS Zip Code Look-up tool to help validate your records so you’ll be ready for that upcoming parish mailing!
Custom tags are a great way to segment your data into manageable bite-sized groups based on a parishioner's membership status and level of involvement at the parish. Similar to the way hashtags work on social media, you can assign specific keywords to families in order to create a segmented list based on specific criteria. So whether they’re an usher, a member of RCIA, or serve on the parish finance council, tags help you identify members on the fly. For this reason, keeping tags spelled correctly and preventing duplicates is essential.
While you can create an unlimited number of tags, we strongly advise you to be strategic and not make more than you can feasibly track. This is where your decision-maker can step in to help decide and set the standard for properly labeling your data going forward.
Use data tagging to up your organizational game! Our software's Family Tag function lets you create subcategories for families to make tracking and maintaining parishioner data a breeze while simultaneously creating a fast and more efficient way of communicating with your members.
Enlist the help of your parishioners! In your parish bulletin, email newsletter or social media channels, we recommend publishing a link to an online form on your website so parishioners can submit their updated contact information or simply ask them to email the parish administrator directly. A quick announcement after Mass is also an easy way to direct parishioners to the website and do their part to help keep their information up-to-date. And more importantly, they’ll never miss another parish mailing or email blast!
What other strategies do you use to keep your ChMS up-to-date? We’d love to hear your feedback! Share any tips or tricks with us in the comments section below.