Tech Stuff

COMMUNICATION: TECH STUFF

EXPAND YOUR REACH TO THE WORLD! ... or at least to the members of your church! Here are some of the Dioceseʻs favorite "Tech Stuff" links that will help you with your online communications. Develop informative websites and pages; send out weekly e-newsletters; create surveys, collect responses, and analyze results; share files and photos on the "cloud"; set-up a community calendar; start a fundraising campaign, and more. Don't forget the power of social media too! Is there one you use that doesn't appear on the list, but you think others would find helpful? Send the information to Communications to be included on this page.

Click on the company logo links to check out the websites of some popular and useful communication tools to learn more.

Canva gives you everything you need to easily turn ideas into stunning designs. Create designs for Web or print: blog graphics, presentations, Facebook covers, flyers, posters, invitations and so much more. Search and drag to create beautiful designs without ever leaving the Web. Canva takes care of the boring bits so you can spend more time creating. Start with a custom layout or a blank page. With all the tools in one place, there's nothing holding you back.

The Diocese of Hawai'i utilizes the wide range of features that Constant Contact offers, including e-mail marketing for the E-News and E-Chronicle, creating event pages and registration, surveys and polls, all with the capability to print out reports and data sheets in a variety of formats. E-mail contacts can be categorized into lists and saved as a database resource.

Custom Ink is a great way to print shirts and other items with your church logo, no order too big or too small. Fundraise without ever having to collect a dime--- just wait for the check to arrive!

Are you trying to schedule a meeting or coordinate calendars and don't want to play e-mail or phone tag with everyone? Use Doodle.com, an online meeting scheduler poll. It's free and easy-to-use. You select the date options and the time options. Opt to send the poll yourself and you'll receive a link that you can then e-mail to the meeting attendees. Attendees check off their availability (yes, no) and you'll find the date/time when most people can attend your meeting. Don't want all of the attendees to see what others have selected? Make sure to check "Hidden Poll" in Step 3 (under Settings), as well as "Yes-No-Ifneedbe" if you would like that "if need be" response.

Share large files and photos with others easily from the device of your choice through this user friendly program; sync your work across all your devices that are automatically backed up and available on the cloud from anywhere!

Election Runner was introduced at the 54th Annual Meeting of Convention as a way to reduce time and waste of counting paper ballots. During the COVID shutdown, online voting was held through Zoom and was proven to be accurate and effective. When we finally held our first post-COVID in-person meeting, the choice was made to use Election Runner.

Need to collect information from members or create a survey? Planning an event and need a registration form? Formstack helps you to create a form designed especially for your needs in a simple format.

With Google Forms and its free online calendar, many of your office and online needs can be organized and handled easy over a broad platform with a far reach. With Google forms (purple logo), easily create and share online forms and surveys, and analyze responses in real-time. With Google calendar, keep track of important events all in one place. Create color-coded calendars to share with others and post on your website. Set-up notifications and never forget another task or event with reminders.

Jotform is another handy way to build forms, collect data, track tasks, and collect online payments. With scams and phishing rampant, the Diocese has removed email addresses on their websites and replaced them with Jotform contact forms.

This is an online mapping software application that allows users to visualize their thinking and share it with others. Great for committees and groups creating organizational charts and planning structures.

Do you want to stop using paper polls? A nifty, easy-to-use online tool to help you create surveys and polls. The free basic version lets you create surveys of up to 10 questions and obtain up to 100 responses. You can create multiple-page surveys and selection from a list of question types (multiple choice, ranks, essay, comment, etc). Once you've completed the survey, hit "send" and you receive the link to the survey that you can then e-mail to those you are polling or post on your website. The results analysis allows you to view responses quickly and easily.

Forward Movement offers the Venite app for creating your Sunday Bulletins with the greatest of ease! No more copying, pasting and trying to fit everything properly. Readings and Rites are already built-in and there are a variety of templates to choose from.

Weebly is our platform of choice to create a great church website without having to hire a programmer or web designer! Weebly offers those with basic computer navigation skills to build a great website from a variety of templates. If you can click and drag, you can build a website with Weebly. You can use your current domain name and upgrade your site with features to suit your needs. Most of the Diocese's websites are now built with Weebly including this one!

Zoom is our choice for video conferencing, meetings and group chats with built in collaboration tools. The Diocese uses Zoom for its monthly governance meetings and ministry meetings, and is especially useful when participants include neighbor islanders. With Zoom you can also set up blogs, webinars and more!