July 24, 2009 – When it comes to reaching Christian consumers, burritos and baseball just might work better than boxing gloves.

In recent years, businesses have tried to capture the faith-based market that created blockbusters like The Purpose Driven Life and The Passion of the Christ. While some companies have connected with the church crowd, more have fallen flat.

Consider the Rocky loves Jesus campaign, used to promote the 2006 Sylvester Stallone film, Rocky Balboa. Marketers created church study guides for the film and mailed thousands of boxing gloves to church pastors. They even held conference calls with Stallone, in which he talked about his spiritual journey. The message didn’t work.

“I remember being on the conference call with Stallone and wondering, what does this have to do with Jesus?” said Brent High of the Third Coast Sports Foundation, which promotes faith nights at sports events.

High is featured in Faith-Based Marketing, a new book aimed at helping businesses reach the church market. Authors Greg Stielstra and Bob Hutchins say that, in a fragmented media environment, churchgoers offer great opportunities for businesses that want to reach a large audience.

Stielstra, who ran the marketing campaign for The Purpose Driven Life, says businesses have failed to take the faith-based market seriously. Instead, they’ve slapped a Christian label on their products and expected them to sell.

“The mistake they’ve made is being superficial in their attempts, saying, ‘Hey this faith stuff works, let’s do it’ instead of investigating what people of faith are really interested in,” Stielstra said. “Until you’ve done your homework you can’t expect your marketing to succeed.”

That preparation should include learning some basics of Christianity and understanding the Christian landscape.

Avoid hot-button topics

To help companies, Stielstra and Hutchins compiled a database of large churches, Christian media companies, and parachurch groups in their book and at www.faithbasedmarketing.com.

Successful faith-based marketers also know what hot buttons to avoid, Hutchins said. Some companies have offended potential customers by making small but painful mistakes, he said. Hutchins points to ads from Lowes, the home improvement centers, which relabeled Christmas trees as “Family Trees.”

That prompted an angry response from some church groups. “There are companies like Lowes who got the message,” Hutchins said.

In recent years, Hutchins, who runs an online marketing company called Buzzplant, has helped companies like General Motors and Ford make inroads in the Christian market. That includes sponsoring Christian music tours and Christian festivals. The point is to be present at large gatherings of believers, where businesses can build relationships with potential customers.

Stielstra says that even smaller business can make those kinds of connections. He suggests that they start by meeting with local ministers, and asking how their business can help a church achieve its goals.

“They’d be happy to act as consultants for the cost of a lunch,” he said.

Sponsorships make sense

Blue Coast Burrito also cultivated the church market by taking a relationship-driven approach. The Brentwood-based restaurant company is a sponsor at Christian events, in part because faith is important to the company’s owners, said Karin Hensley, director of administration for Blue Coast Burrito. But sponsoring faith-based events also makes good business sense.

“It’s a way to target churches and youth groups, who turn out to be an important demographic for us,” Hensley said. “We’ve got a lot of youth groups that we see on Wednesday nights. Sometimes, we’ve stayed open a little later to accommodate them.”

Companies that want to reach the Christian market also do well when they employ believers, said Kris Fuhr, a vice president for Provident Films, based in Franklin. She’s helped market movies such as the 2008 surprise hit Fireproof. Most of the marketers Fuhr works with are churchgoers. That gives them an advantage in reaching similar consumers.

“We are part of the market we are trying to reach, so we look at things in an authentic way,” she said.

Fuhr said that reaching faith-based markets takes time. She and her staff will work for a year to promote a film, working with churches, parachurch groups, Bible studies and religious media.

“It’s not something you can throw out there a few weeks ahead of time and hope that it sticks,” she said.

Source: Tennessean