I don’t love that only 1/3 of my parents are opening my emails. Why can’t it be half or 2/3? However, I’m getting 300-400 people open my email every week. That’s still a lot of people.

As soon as I started doing this, I was barraged by emails of parents thanking me for keeping them in the loop. I don’t get nearly as many emails with general questions anymore. Even when I have silent weeks where no one emails me back or sends a question, I’ll overhear people talking about things I wrote while in the check-in line on Sunday. Or a parent I hardly know will ask a specific question about something I blogged. I love it!

Sure, only 1/3 of people are opening the email every week, but these are the people who when you don’t communicate are the ones who will beg for information. I’m giving them what they want. Sometimes I’ll have a parent come up and ask me a question on Sunday morning. I’ll answer their question and then say, “did you know I have a Kids Quest blog with answers to questions just like you asked? If you’d like, I’ll put you on the email list this week.” I’ve found that when there is no communication, people get frustrated. When there is communication, people may have to ask where to get it, but once they know, they’ll be good from that point on.

TIP: Oh, just in case you wondered. Every week my admin adds the emails of new parents who attend each week. She does this in addition to updating this information in our church database as well. My Constant Contact will always be a copy of the data that is already in our church database.