"When should we start planning for Christmas, Emily?"

Now. Like, right now.

(Okay, you can finish reading this email first. But then start.)

Yep, it's October 7 (happy Feast of Our Lady of the Rosary!) and I want you to beat the stores by figuring out your Christmas plans before they even start playing all the Christmas music.

​In my newsletter to Catholic businesses and ministries today, I focused on Q4 marketing plans. October-December is considered Quarter 4 in business, the last quarter of the financial and calendar year, and is typically the most lucrative, if done right.

And for churches? You have a Q4 too — but ours is about getting people into the pews for Christmas.

And it can be your most lucrative — in souls won for Christ of course — if you plan it right.

But there's one key piece of advice that I gave to the businesses on my list that's the exact OPPOSITE for churches right now:

For businesses, they needed to focus on building relationships, getting more followers and people on their email list, etc. over the past three quarters. I advised them to now focus on the people they already have in this last quarter.

For churches though? Now is the time to go ALL OUT on getting more people into your parish.

I don't have to tell you that Christmas increases your Mass attendance — just try to get in the door at your 4 pm Christmas Eve Mass.

I think the anecdotal evidence (though this would make a super cool case study!) shows that people are most open to evangelization and religion in general around the Christmas season.

Even though the world attempts to secularize the holiday, the love and peace of Christ have easier cracks to slip through in the joy of the season.

But the work that you do between now and Christmas is what will determine who shows up December 24 and 25 (and who stays beyond that, but we'll talk about that in the coming weeks).

So what should you focus on right now in your Christmas preparations? Here's just a few ideas:

Get your schedule out.

Figure out your Christmas schedule now and share it early! It doesn't have to be anything all that fancy, but start planting seeds in your parishioners' minds now about who they can invite to come to Christmas Mass with them (and get ahead of all the craziness).

Look for local advertising opportunities.

Are there any fall festivals or parades you can have a presence at?

Any secular Christmas-themed events you can offer to have a priest come to kick off with a prayer or nativity scene blessing?

What about volunteer opportunities that aren't necessarily Catholic-branded, but you can send some parishioners to assist with?

Can you even get a (gasp) billboard near your church that you can encourage people to just stop by for quiet prayer during the season (and then obviously have lots of follow up materials for when they get inside to try to get them to engage further)?

We want to do everything we can to get a positive name for the parish out now. Even newspaper articles or local radio interviews can go a long way. We want to give the church a personality, a face to the name so to speak.

Reengage with people.

You don't necessarily have to reinvent the wheel here! You've probably encountered hundreds of people this year that now is a great time to reengage with.

For example, if you had an Alpha earlier this year, try to host a "friendsgiving" reunion in November to get them back to the church and remembering the great experience they had (same for RCIA/OCIA participants).

What about all the couples you had marry at your church or the baptisms? Could you have a gathering or mini retreat for them as they approach their first Christmas as husband and wife or parents?

You could even do this for people who have had funerals at your parish — how they can work through their grief during the holiday season and how your parish can help them with that — those who received Confirmation, the possibilities are endless.

Our goal here is just to get the church back on people's radar before the bustle of the Christmas season.

Don't worry — we'll talk a lot about how to invite people to Mass and keep them coming back post-Christmas as we get closer — but for now, for this week, I just want you to focus on one way you can try to reach outside of your parish this month to simply build some positive awareness about the church and start to plant those seeds now before it gets too "loud" in the bustle.

You never know which ones will fall on the surprising good soil.

For His greater glory,

Emily

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