Over the years, I’ve had a lot of
jobs besides ministry, to help pay the bills.
When I was young, I sold meat from a freezer off the back of a pickup
truck, door to door. It was a tough
sell, and often quite sketchy. The guy
who trained me showed me how to know your target audience and sell your meat in
different ways, depending on who your customer is. He told me, “If it’s a married man, you sell
the steaks, you sell the sizzle.” I
tried it, and I was surprised that it worked.
He told me, “If it’s a married woman, you sell the marinade chicken, you
sell the convenience.” I tried it, and
was impressed that it worked. He told
me, “If it’s a single man, you sell the seafood, you sell the romance of a
preparing dinner for his date.” I tried
it, and was astonished that it worked. “What
if it’s a single woman?” I asked him. He
told me, “Flirt.” I decided that
wouldn’t work, because I didn’t have much to sell, and this meat was off the
market.
When you’re selling something, it’s important
to know your customer base. You don’t
change the product, but you change the way you market it, to appeal to
different potential buyers. Over the
past weeks, we’ve talked about catching a dream for new ministry, finding
friends and partners to help make it happen, and making capital investments in
entrepreneurial ministries to make them successful. We’ve looked at how Kickstarter[i] connects
inventors with investors and funds new business ventures. The church needs to be in the same business
of promoting people with ideas for innovative ministry, matching them up with those
who can partner with them in terms of help and funding, and assisting them to
launch their new endeavors. But no matter how good the product of the Gospel
is, or how helpful your ministry, you’ve got to know your target audience in
order to get buy-in from both partners and investors on the one hand, and your
ministry recipients on the other.
For example, the inventors of the
Fidget Cube[ii] used
Kickstarter to get them in touch with their customer base. They didn’t market their product as a toy,
but as a solution to a problem for people who constantly fidget. They knew their target audience, and tailored
their sales pitch directly to them. In
the same way, BauBax chose not to advertise their travel jacket[iii] as
the height of fashion. Instead, they
knew their audience valued comfort and practicality over fashion, so they had
no issue with creating four kinds of jackets full of pockets—even a blazer with
a hood. As weird as that is, customers
are buying them up. Knowing your target
audience makes all the difference in a successful venture.
The same is true in ministry. When Jesus sent His disciples out on mission,
He knew that the Gospel isn’t one-size-fits-all. He sent them to a variety of audiences, each
of which would take a different approach. In Matthew 28:19[iv],
Jesus says, “Go and make disciples of all
nations.” Following up on that Great
Commission in Acts 1:8, Jesus says, “You will
be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to
the ends of the earth.” All
nations. All people groups. All kinds of folks, from all races, all
orientations, all languages, all socioeconomic backgrounds, all levels of
education. Every little subculture you
can imagine—bikers, Rastafarians, school teachers, white supremacists, people
in the fitness culture, soccer moms, heavily-tattooed and pierced people,
pagans, gamers, liberals and conservatives—take the blessing of God to them. Remember—the Gospel never changes, but the
way we present it certainly changes, depending our audience. When Jesus ministered to different people, He
knew that some people needed physical healing, while others needed a word of
grace, and still others needed to be told to quit being so religious. Some needed to be challenged to live
differently, while others needed no challenge, but simply needed to be lifted from
despair. Jesus understood that knowing
your target audience makes all the difference in a successful venture.
The problem is that the church often
takes a cookie-cutter approach to ministry. “Who’s your target audience?” we
might ask, and the church answers, “People.”
And when you ask them what they want these people to do, their answer
is, “Come to church.” But Jesus’
commission to go to the ends of the earth means more than putting “Y’all come!”
on the church kiosk. It means finding
the specific problems that are in your neighborhood or society, and offering a
solution. Fidget too much? Here’s a solution. Traveling uncomfortably? Here’s a solution. Need a little more meat in your diet? Here’s the solution. What if the church understood our target
audience and offered solutions and approaches to real needs that are around
us? Illiteracy? The church offers an after-school
program. Poverty? Why doesn’t your church offer a clothes
closet or food pantry? Racial
tension? Let your church be the one to
bridge the divide and promote reconciliation and real relationships. To follow Jesus’ commission, you’ve got to
know your target audience and offer a solution to meet those needs.
Now, I’ve heard it said, “They won’t
listen to the Gospel if their bellies are empty, so you’ve got to feed them to
get them to listen.” While this may be
true, this smacks at a disingenuous kind of marketing strategy, where
Christians do good things so that people will listen to them, so that
Christians can convert them. Instead, let’s
think of it this way: It’s not until you begin living out your faith that
anybody’s going to be interested in hearing what you believe. So instead of clothing the naked for the sake
of drawing in a target audience, offer them clothing because it’s the right
thing to do. Go ahead and shelter the
homeless or offer English-as a-Second-Language classes or A.A. meetings. That’s what the church should be doing. But not so that you’ll look like you care, so
that they’ll come to you, so you can evangelize them. Instead, start with actually caring about
your community, learning the needs of your target audience, meeting those
needs, and then maybe, just maybe, you’ll have an opportunity to tell them
about Jesus. Because only then will you
really be living like Him. Rather than
having a conversation with your Buddhist, Muslim, atheist, Jewish, or Hindu
neighbor so that you can give your personal testimony and win them to Christ,
how about having an open conversation with them because by doing so, you’re acting
like Jesus? And then, when there’s a
true relationship, you can have faith-based dialogue based on mutual
respect. That’s knowing your target
audience—because kickstarting ministries doesn’t mean you’re selling
something. It means you’re giving something
away—the love of God and hopefully the love of Christ-followers who act like
the One whose product they represent.
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