QR codes for churches

Codes worth printing this Sunday

• Connect card. Link to a short first-time guest form on your website: name, email or phone, how they heard about you, and one optional box for questions.
• Online giving. A website QR code that opens your church's own giving page. The code only carries the address. Your giving provider handles the gift, so it works with whatever system you already use.
• Sermon notes and slides. A page with the outline, scripture references and any fill-in blanks. People follow along on Sunday and find it again on Wednesday.
• Events and small groups. One page listing what's coming up, with a sign-up link for each group, class and serve team.
• Prayer requests. A private form that goes to your prayer team. Say plainly on the form who will read it.
• Kids check-in. A code at the children's area that opens a page explaining check-in, pickup and allergy notes, so a new parent knows what to expect before they hand over their kids.

Where to put them

• The bulletin, next to the welcome note, at least 2.5 cm (1 in) square
• Lobby signs and the welcome desk, 15 to 20 cm (6 to 8 in) wide so people can scan from a couple of steps back
• Seat-back cards, for the connect card and giving
• The coffee station, with a WiFi QR code on a guest network kept apart from your office computers
• The children's check-in counter, at a parent's eye level

Codes on the projector screen

A code on a slide only works if it stays up long enough. People need to notice it, find their phone, open the camera and hold it steady from row twelve. Leave it on screen for at least 30 seconds, longer if you mention it from the stage, and say what it does: Scan this for today's notes.

Make it big. A code that fills a third of the screen's height reads from most seats. Use a dark code on a white panel, even if your slide theme is dark, because light-on-dark codes trip up some phones.

Print the same code in the bulletin. Anyone who missed the slide can still get there.

What to avoid

Don't point a printed code straight at a giving platform's long address. Churches switch providers, and every bulletin and pew card in circulation would point at the old one. Use an address on your own site, like yourchurch.org/give, and send it wherever giving lives today.

Keep forms short. Every extra field is a reason to stop halfway. And keep paper connect cards and the offering box. Some of your people would rather not use a phone in church, and that's fine. The code is for the ones who would.

Start with the connect card

If you make one code, make this one. Build the form, give it a stable address like yourchurch.org/connect, make the code, and test it on an iPhone and an Android phone. Then put it in next week's bulletin with one line above it: New here? Scan to say hello.