Evan Courtney » Creativity/Innovation

Who Are You Going to Be?

Evan Courtney — Thu, 27 May 2010 19:09:20 +0000

I had the opportunity to spearhead this year’s Baccalaureate for Mattoon High School.
I feel like it’s a dying trend.
So to counteract that, we did a lot of direct mail.

Every year Seniors get asked the question “What are you going do after high school?”
Which isn’t a bad question, but probably not the best question.
So we challenged students to answer “Who are you going to be?”

Each student then was encouraged to fill out a “Hello, My Name is _____” name tag, saying what they wanted to “BE” in life.
Real. Compassionate. Reliable. Honest. Caring. Trustworthy.

Video we showed encouraging the students.

{Watch embedded video here.}

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Photos from The Fields – May 16

Evan Courtney — Mon, 17 May 2010 14:00:27 +0000

Every church needs a great photography.
Here is some photography magic by Joey Bright.

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Easter Creative Element – Rescue

Evan Courtney — Fri, 09 Apr 2010 15:31:47 +0000

For our main creative element for our Easter gathering, we started with our artwork for Easter.

We wanted to make it come to life, so we put 900lbs of concrete blocks on the stage, to create the same look.
Then we put an actor on the stage frozen in a pose for a majority of the service.

We wanted to take a couple minutes in the service to explain what happen at the cross, so that we could appreciate the resurrection.
So, we scripted a bunch of monologues that readers could perform, that talked about sin they were involved in, and then would blend scenes of the crucifixion.

It turned out, as I was finding individuals to do the monologues, and as I gave them the scripts, many of them, came back saying they had their own personal story they could share.

Real stories are more impactful than scripted ones.

Here is what we came up with.

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Easter Marketing: Offline

Evan Courtney — Thu, 11 Mar 2010 22:20:58 +0000

Our offline marketing stragety for Easter.

Week of March 8: Send Medic Kits to regular attenders
Week of March 15: Send Postcards to entire database. (everyone and their dog that has even thought of coming to those who have attended for 25 years)
Week of March 22: Send Postcards to regular attenders

Today we sent out our “Medic Kits” to attenders of The Fields.

Included in the kits.
Coloring Pages & Crayons for Kids
Media Cards with links to music, videos, and games for Teenagers
5 Invite cards, 1 Prayer card, 1 Postcard, 5 Stickers
Roll of lifesavers.

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Invitation Tools for Easter

Evan Courtney — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 19:37:37 +0000

At The Fields Church we feel that Easter, is an opportunity for us to tell the greatest story of humanity.
I don’t think anybody would disagree.
Easter is when churches have the largest crowds.

Our question each year has been, “Are we reaching new people?
Or is it just a Sunday when everybody ’shows up’?”
The greatest marketing tool that the church has, it peer 2 peer.
Yet, only 2% of attenders people invite someone to church in a given year.
That means 98% of attenders never invite anyone to hear the greatest story of humanity. – Thom Rainer – The Unchurched Next Door

Is it because they don’t care others?
No, I genuinely believe they do, they just don’t know how to invite.
So, as a church, we looked at how we could help our attenders to invite others.
What can we do as a church to help them invite their family and friends?
82% of the unchurched are at least somewhat likely to attend church if invited.

Our theme for Easter this year is “Rescue.”
We’ve created “Medic Kits”.
Cute right.
Two weeks before Easter our families will receive these “Medic Kits,” which are an envelope that will include items to promote Easter, and to provide offline tools for them to invite their family and friends.

Front

Back

6 x9 Folded Envelopes (VistaPrint)
Invite Cards (GotPrint)
3 Pack Crayon Boxes Bulk (Ebay)
Bulk Lifesavers (Ebay)

I was able to purchase all of these thru Bing with cashback.

//This was a post I did for Planning Easter//

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Living Like A Champion

Evan Courtney — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 16:43:09 +0000

Artwork for our new series at The Fields.

More designs.

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Many Voices

Evan Courtney — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 02:49:45 +0000

Allow others to speak to your students.
It keeps them well rounded.
It keeps them engaged instead of hearing your voice for 52 weeks.

One way of doing it without all the costs of travel is video chat.
My friends Aaron and Kelly were able to speak briefly to our students thru Skype.

Aaron and Kelly were students at our first youth ministry.
I had the privilege of being with them all of their jr. high and high school years.

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Track Pad Usage

Evan Courtney — Fri, 22 Jan 2010 03:45:24 +0000

My track pad usage today.
The black circles aren’t clicks, but how long my mouse stayed in that spot.
The huge dot, was my lunch break.

Java applet.
You can take it here:
dl.dropbox.com/u/684632/mousepath.exe.zi(PC)
dl.dropbox.com/u/684632/mousepath.jar (Mac).
Run it and leave in background. “S” – save image. “R” – restart.

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Hand Bell Hero

Evan Courtney — Thu, 24 Dec 2009 11:00:38 +0000

I love genius marketing ideas.
Marketing agency VML created Hand Bell Hero for the holidays.

VML Hand Bell Hero

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Christmas Stage Design 2009

Evan Courtney — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 17:35:06 +0000

For The Fields Church in December, we are doing three different stage/environment designs.
Because of this I have to make each one adapt to the other.
I didn’t want to have to do three completely different designs.

This is our design for our sermon series titled Christmas Chaos.
Because of our low budget, I did everything for under $100.

How I do a design
I start in the room. I stare at it.
I envision what it could be.
Then I draw out the design on paper or with Google SketchUp.
Get all of the material and go at it.

Designing on a small budget
Use elements you already have.
Your same lighting you use week to week can go a long way, get creative with how you use it.
The smaller the budget the more room for innovation.

What the design is
Converted our 30′ video wall into two separate screens by hanging a black curtain (borrowed) in the middle of it.
Hung a couple metallic snowflakes ($20) from the truss.
Put a riser (already had) in the center of the stage and put a christmas tree with white lights on it.
Put a couple Chauvet LEDspalsh200 (already had) shining directly up at the snowflakes, and a couple pointing out towards the crowd.
Then I tricked it all out with some snow.
I purchased some quilt batting ($50) (the stuff that goes into a quilt to make it warm), and I tore the edges of it to make it look like layered snow, and placed it on the front of our stage and all over the riser.
Underneath all of the quilt batting I ran some string of white christmas tree lights. ($14).

Time Lapse created on the main development of the design, before the snow was installed.

{view embedded video here}

I got ideas from Matt Knisely, Oprah and Planning Christmas

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