Faithlife Church Services Evolving. (Attn. Vick)
I apologize for the duplicate post, but the Church Services forum doesn't have much traffic and I would very much like to see someone from Faithlife speak to my concerns.
Yesterday, I had conversations with Faithlife sales and customer support. I called in because my present church is continually having problems with Facebook copyright issues, they've taken our stream down twice in the last two months. The latest one they cite a copyright violation during my sermon....I wish! I called Faithlife because I wanted to go from streaming on Facebook as our primary platform to streaming on our Faithlife Sites web site. I was told that Faithlife was no longer accepting new customers for the streaming service and was directed to some options (Restream, Castr, Resi). While I had someone on the phone, I thought I'd better check on some of the other Faithlife products we use. Apparently Faithlife Sites is no longer under active development. I was given a list of vendors (Wix, Squarespace). A year after migrating from Squarespace I'm now looking at migrating back? Faithlife Giving is no longer being offered as a standalone service. Apparently it is only available bundled with ServantKeeper. The person with whom I spoke didn't know whether I would be grandfathered or forced into ServantKeeper.
All of this is none of my business, other than I subscribe to the impacted products and need to know where Faithflife is going so I can figure out where to take my organization. I bought into the vision that Faithlife would make it easier for people like me (solo pastor who does the vast majority of the tech work). That has been my impression with both our web site and Faithlife giving. I'm sorry to see Faithlife retrenching itself in the church services area and would like a road map so I can chart a path ahead. I was taken aback; I would have expected Faithlife to reach out to effected customers and explain where they were going. Admittedly, I may have missed something, the Lent / Easter season is intense so if something was said or such roadmap has been produced, I missed it entirely. My bad?
The last few years have been brutal for churches (at least churches our size), and I doubt they were any easier for the vendors who try to offer support to churches. We're all retrenching and reinventing. Let's do that together?
Comments
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Bump.
It would be good to hear if what sales and customer service told you was accurate and if there is a change of direction at FL.
Pastor, North Park Baptist Church
Bridgeport, CT USA
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Agreed!
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Mark Smith said:
It would be good to hear if what sales and customer service told you was accurate and if there is a change of direction at FL.
But we need to expect an answer that takes into account the merger ... in that context this is less alarming.
Orthodox Bishop Alfeyev: "To be a theologian means to have experience of a personal encounter with God through prayer and worship."; Orthodox proverb: "We know where the Church is, we do not know where it is not."
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MJ. Smith said:
in that context this is less alarming.
Not sure what you mean by less alarming. I acknowledge I don't know about all FL has been doing with their all-in-one approach, but some of Clint's questions seem to go beyond the FL/Servantkeeper union. However FL chooses (and I hope they will) to address this, it seems like a bit of back-pedaling if what Clint reported is true.
Pastor, North Park Baptist Church
Bridgeport, CT USA
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Mark Smith said:
it seems like a bit of back-pedaling if what Clint reported is true.
I don't follow your logic here. Not continuing development on one product most likely means that the other product will become the base for future building -- and that until they have a smooth bridge between the products, they are not apt to announce the change. Yes, it is desirable to have as much notice as possible regarding available functions but I suspect that Customer Service is a much in the dark as the users. Okay, Customer Service may have a better understanding of where they will be in two years.
What I find interesting/worrisome is that with the WordSearch conversion, the ServantKeeper integration, and L10 anticipated release, the resources spent on cleaning up L9, its data, its undelivered resources shows the strain of being stretched very thin ... new releases are fixing fewer and fewer issues.Orthodox Bishop Alfeyev: "To be a theologian means to have experience of a personal encounter with God through prayer and worship."; Orthodox proverb: "We know where the Church is, we do not know where it is not."
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Mark Smith said:
some of Clint's questions seem to go beyond the FL/Servantkeeper union.
I Concur.
Under my direction, our church has adopted many of the Church Services tools, but not gone all-in with Equip. The "all-in" does not add the value [to us] to justify the cost. BUT many of the pieces have been beneficial to our overall ministry and if we are going to need to find replacements for those pieces, it would be helpful to be able to move methodically, rather than in a reactionary hustle.
The pieces we (church account) are using are Ministry Tracker, Proclaim Presentations, Proclaim ProMedia, Digital Signage & Faithlife Giving (My Faithlife Social Media is primaily in the background tying the pieces together, but our people are not buying in). We have not found sufficient value in Faithlife Sites, Faithlife Streaming, Faithlife TV or a group subscription to Logos Bible Software.
Personally, I do have a Faithlife Connect subscription so my Logos9 and FaithlifeTV are accessible.
Making Disciples! Logos Ecosystem = LogosMax on Microsoft Surface Pro 7 (Win11), Android app on tablet, FSB on iPhone & iPad mini, Proclaim (Proclaim Remote on Fire Tablet).
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Bump
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If there are any changes it would be nice to be informed of them ahead of time with room to research and switch over smoothly. We use Faithlife for our website, online giving, and digital bulletins. Being a small church with one on staff, if we have to switch over it is going to take a lot of work. Changing all the giving records would take even more time. I trust Faithlife will let us know if these reports are accurate.
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I'm really bummed about the silence by Faithlife. In the old days, I would have simply emailed Bob. I might not have liked his response, but I always felt he listened. A week and not so much as a peep! Those who have ears to hear, let them hear.
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Clint, note you said you would email Bob - you didn't expect him to notice it in the forums although once in a great while he would. Email Vic if you truly want an answer.
Orthodox Bishop Alfeyev: "To be a theologian means to have experience of a personal encounter with God through prayer and worship."; Orthodox proverb: "We know where the Church is, we do not know where it is not."
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MJ. Smith said:
Clint, note you said you would email Bob - you didn't expect him to notice it in the forums although once in a great while he would. Email Vic if you truly want an answer.
MJ,
What I said was "in the old days I would have emailed Bob" realizing that we're in something of a new context. I may or may not email the new CEO, but I suspicion I know everything I need to know at this point with respect to FL as a service provider for my particular organization.
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A very similar question was recently posted in a Faithlife Equip group. Below is the response provided to that post.
We are evaluating the state of Faithlife Equip and during this process, we are not actively adding new customers to the platform. Our evaluation is focused on finding the best way to deliver a high-quality church management solution to our Equip customers - and to provide a solution that meets their needs for feature breadth, performance and more. I recognize the concerns this evaluation raises – particularly for our early adopters, who have been with us for years. We value your trust and the faith you have placed in us, as well the trust your congregants have placed in you. We do not take any of this lightly, and our aim is to be a good steward of your investment in us.
As we work through our evaluation, the needs of our customers, and the churches they serve, are front and center in our minds. We are committed to three pillars: (1) We will ensure that you can continue to utilize Equip in its current form and any customer support needs you have will be addressed in a timely manner. (2) We will not make any rash decisions, will provide ample lead time around any future product changes, and will offer transparent communication as information becomes available. (3) Future product changes will prioritize providing you with a church management solution that serves your needs and offers a fantastic experience.
We will share an update with our Equip customers when our evaluation is complete - likely in late Spring. In the interim, please know that we take your concerns seriously, and that we are dedicated to serving and supporting our Equip customers, and the churches they serve.0 -
Hey folks – first off, Clint, let me apologize for the lack of a response to your post. I’ve shared this with our team, and we will be better in responding to questions such as this in the future. To your questions/comments – you (and others) should absolutely feel free to reach out to me directly. My email address is vik@faithlife.com – and email is the best way to reach me (as I don’t check these forums nearly as often as I do my email). I also want to share that I very much understand your feedback on how difficult the last few years have been for churches – as I hear this directly from the pastors in my family – and we at Faithlife are committed to supporting you and your peers as we navigate through this period.
As Don noted, a similar question to yours was posted recently in another group, and he copied over our response. I don’t have anything to add to Don’s post – as it captured our approach at Faithlife – but I would like to reaffirm our commitment to serving and supporting each and every customer using a Faithlife product. We appreciate the trust you have placed in us, and will continue serving you even as we work through the evaluation process noted in his post.
Again, please feel free to reach out to me directly with questions. You can also contact Kerry Wendel, our Head of Customer Experience, at kerry.wendel@faithlife.com.
Thanks!
Vik
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