The FaithX Project

Strategic Missional Consulting

Who Are The People In Your Neighborhood? From Market Analytics to Missional Context Reports

This post is the last of a seven post series on MapDash Analytics

by Ken Howard

One of the many features of MapDash for Faith Communities that makes it unique among other faith-based demographic tools is an analytic report that we call a Missional Context ReportTM. MCRs were developed by FaithX as a way for faith leaders at the congregations and judicatory level to better understand the lifestyles of the people in their neighborhoods in order to better engage them. 

MCRs are one-page reports that translate market segmentation data into ten areas of key information and practical programmatic and ministry opportunities that congregations can use to better target their engagement strategies to the unique lifestyles of the dominant population segment in each of the neighborhoods that form the community they serve. These areas are:

  1. Communications and Technology
  2. Education and Formation
  3. Hospitality and Fellowship
  4. Leadership/Doership Skill Set
  5. Midweek Involvement
  6. Neighborhood Characteristics and Issues
  7. Outreach Opportunities 
  8. Stewardship and Finance
  9. Theological/Political Orientation
  10. Worship

You can find a sample MCR here

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An Introduction to MapDash Analytics

To fully understand location-based data we need to organize and examine the data in four different ways. We have to:

  1. Visualize – Get your faith community’s data on an map, so you can explore it visually.
  2. Contextualize – Find your faith community’s place in the data, so you can examine its missional context.
  3. Analyze – Interrogate the data, to reveal what it means for your faith community.
  4. Socialize – Share your data, with leaders, members, the community, funders, and other stakeholders

Today’s post is about step 3, and the analytic tools MapDash for Faith Communities provides that help you reveal what demographic, lifestyle, and other data mean for your faith community or judicatory.

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MapDash™ for Faith Communities to Go “Live” at TEC Convention Expo

Work continues apace to ready MapDash™ for Faith Communities for its public debut at the Weekend Expo at the Episcopal Church’s triennial General Convention.

MapDash™ for Faith Communities is an interactive, data-grounded, map-based tool for missional analysis and planning. It was developed by Datastory Consulting, in collaboration with The FaithX Project, and beta tested by diocesan and congregational leaders in five Episcopal Dioceses.

MapDash™ for Faith Communities enables dioceses to assess congregational health, identify missional opportunities, and promote collaboration among congregations. It gives congregations the capacity to better understand and engage the neighborhoods they are called to serve. And it empowers faith leaders at all levels to make better and faster decisions with objective data that augments natural intuition and wisdom.

MapDash™ for Faith Communities will be available on a subscription basis, primarily through dioceses and other judicatories. The standard bundle will include five dashboards: one Executive Dashboard and four Congregational Dashboards:

  • The Congregational Dashboards will allow congregational leaders to define their neighborhood in different ways, then select data maps that will help them understand their neighborhoods’ population characteristics, community issues, and community resources.
  • The Executive Dashboard is built on top of the Congregational platform and includes all of its features, plus important additional diagnostic features: a Congregational Health Assessment map layer and a Missional Opportunities map layer.

Our work on the Congregational Dashboard is nearly complete, with about a week left in our final beta test.

We have a little more work on the Executive Dashboard. The Congregational Health Assessment is a little over a week away from completing beta testing, while a couple of weeks remain to complete the Missional Opportunities map layer.

So if you are planning to attend the 2018 General Convention, come by, visit us, and get a demo at booth #837.

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Missional Planning for Congregations: Where Do We Go from Here?

by Ken Howard

This is the fourth of several posts in the multi-part series on Missional Planning
Click here to read the previous post

Step 6: What Does This Say About Us? (Sustainability).

The data about your communities not only teaches you about your neighborhoods and the people, they also can teach you something about the internal sustainability, external sustainability, and vitality of your congregation.

  • External Sustainability. Data trends on things like population growth, diversity, and generational balance, along with the number of same-denomination congregations located within your MissionWeb, can tell you something about whether the community has the capacity―in people and resources―to support a congregation.
  • Internal Sustainability. Examining similar trends in your congregation, such as attendance, diversity, child-to-adult ratio, and income, can tell you something about whether your congregation has the capacity―in people and resources―to support itself.
  • Vitality. Examining whether your congregation has sufficient desire and will to adapt to the characteristics, needs, and aspirations of the communities and people around it can tell you something about your congregation’s vitality.

For a free resource to help you dive deeper into the question of sustainability and viability, go here to download a copy of our Congregational Vitality Assessment: http://bit.ly/FaithXCVA

 

Step 7 – Where Do We Go from Here? (Making Plans).

This could be a blog post all by itself, but suffice it to say that if you include the following information, you are on the right track:

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Missional Planning for Congregations: Who Are Our Neighbors?

by Ken Howard

The third post in a multi-part series on Missional Planning.
Click here to read the previous post.

Step 2: Who Are Our Neighbors?

The next step is find out as much as we can about the characteristics of the people who live in your neighborhoods. We say neighborhoods (plural) because the community in which God has planted your congregation is actually a collection of communities: a neighborhood of neighborhoods, each of which have their own character and characters. And marketing research shows that there are definable subgroups within the general population that share similar demographic characteristics, values, and behaviors.

There are several kinds of data you can study to develop a clear picture of the people in your neighborhoods.

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