When I launched the Church Candy podcast, I knew the very first episode had to cover the strategy that started it all. The Plan Your Visit Playbook is the exact system we use at Vibrant Church in The Woodlands, Texas, and with churches all over the country to consistently bring in 20 to 50 new guests every single month. I want to walk you through how it works and why it matters.
How Church Candy Got Started
Before Church Candy existed, I was running the marketing side of Chiro Candy, a digital marketing agency for chiropractors that my dad built from the ground up. I was also the COO there. But as much as I respected the work we did for chiropractors, my heart was always with the church.
I was attending Christ for the Nations Institute (CFNI) in Dallas, Texas when God gave me the vision for Church Candy. During a class that had nothing to do with marketing, our professor said he felt led to pause the syllabus and have us pray about what God was calling us to do. I figured it was an easy one. I was going to be a youth pastor and let Chiro Candy fund my ministry.
But the Holy Spirit had a bigger plan. Right there in that classroom, I heard it clearly: “Everything you’re doing for chiropractors, helping them get new patients, the church needs that.” That moment changed everything. What started as a side plan became the foundation of Church Candy Marketing.
From Bible College to Church Planting
After graduating from CFNI, I saw a Facebook post from my wife’s former student pastor, Michael Scoby, saying his church was planting a new campus. My wife Sarah and I packed up and moved from Dallas to The Woodlands to help launch Vibrant Church. We served as student pastors, led the host team covering greeters, parking lot volunteers, and first impressions, and I managed all the digital marketing including Facebook ads.
We launched Vibrant in 2019 and six months later, the pandemic hit. But here is the thing: we actually thrived and grew during the pandemic because of our digital marketing systems. While other churches struggled to get people back in the building, we were already reaching people online and converting that attention into real visitors. That experience confirmed everything I believed about the power of digital marketing for churches. It is the same playbook that helped Pastor Ken Bennett grow Connect Church from 150 to 600 in just six months.
What Is the Plan Your Visit Strategy?
Think of a funnel. At the very top, you have a wide opening where tons of people can enter. The bottom is much narrower. Your goal is to get as many people into that funnel as possible, knowing that the numbers will shrink as people move through each step.
The Plan Your Visit model adds a powerful next step before someone ever walks through your church doors. I first learned about next step culture from Brady Shearer at Pro Church Tools. The idea is to track meaningful milestones in someone’s spiritual journey: How many baptisms? How many people joined a life group? How many are serving on a team?
The Plan Your Visit form is one of those critical next steps. When someone sees your church ad on Facebook, the next step is clicking through, landing on a page, and filling out a form to RSVP for your Sunday service. They give you their name, email, and phone number. Then your follow-up system kicks in.
Understanding Hot Leads vs. Cold Leads
Here is something most pastors miss. There are two types of people who plan a visit to your church:
- Hot leads are people who already have a connection to your church. Maybe a friend invited them, they checked out your website, and they are already a little bought in. Their show rate is around 90%.
- Cold leads are people who saw your ad for the first time. They do not know you. They have no personal connection yet. Their show rate is closer to 20 to 30%.
A lot of pastors run Facebook ads, get a bunch of leads, and then feel discouraged when only a handful actually show up. That is normal. Those were cold leads. But here is how I look at it: if you were a baseball player and you could get on base 30% of the time, every team would want you on their roster. That is a great number. The key is getting more warm leads into the funnel.
How to Turn Cold Leads Into Warm Ones
This is where the strategy gets powerful. Instead of just running one Plan Your Visit ad and hoping people show up, you build a content engine that warms people up before they ever plan a visit. This is the same approach I discuss in my article on why social media is the greatest opportunity for church growth.
Here is the process:
- Create felt-need videos. Have your lead pastor record one to two minute videos on topics people actually care about: loneliness, anxiety, purpose, relationships. These are not sermons. They are short, relatable, and human. See how Pastor Alex Suber used this approach to grow to 18,000 TikTok followers.
- Promote those videos with ads. The goal here is not to get people to plan a visit right away. The goal is to build an audience of people who have watched your content.
- Retarget that audience. Once someone watches your video, you can show them your Plan Your Visit ad. Now they are familiar with your pastor’s face and voice. They feel like they already know you. That is a warm lead.
- Keep the cycle going. As more people watch your content and engage with your church online, the retargeting pool grows. You build a turbine effect where people consistently see your church across their social media.
Eventually, someone walks into your church on a Sunday morning and says, “I just felt Holy Spirit calling me here because every time I turned around, I kept seeing you guys online.” That is exactly what happens when this strategy is running well.
Why Organic Reach Is Not Enough
I saw a study that the average Facebook page only reaches about 6% of its followers organically. So if your church page has 100 followers, only about six of them will see your post. And most of those people already attend your church. If you want to reach people outside your four walls, you need to invest in paid promotion. Organic reach alone will not get you there.
Follow Up Is Everything
Getting someone to plan a visit is only half the battle. Your follow-up strategy is what actually gets them through the door. I always say: automate what is important. Just like you automate your mortgage payment so you never miss it, automate your guest follow-up so no one falls through the cracks. Pastor Brandon Holmes used a similar follow-up approach with his “Coffee With a Pastor” ads to build trust and convert leads into loyal members.
Here is what I recommend:
Related Articles
If this breakdown of the Plan Your Visit strategy resonated with you, here are a few more conversations and articles worth exploring where pastors share how they are putting these principles into practice:
Want to see all the different types of ads that work for churches? Read our complete guide to church ads.
For a deeper look at all the strategies that work together to grow a church, check out our complete guide to church marketing.
- How Pastor Ken Bennett Grew Connect Church from 150 to 600 in 6 Months Using Facebook Ads — A real-world case study of the Plan Your Visit strategy in action with ChurchCandy.
- How Brandon Holmes Grew His Church with “Coffee With a Pastor” Ads — How one pastor used personal invitations and follow-up to build trust with cold leads.
- The Future of Church Media: My Conversation with Brady Shearer of Pro Church Tools — Brady Shearer shares insights on short-form video, church social media, and building trust with your audience.
- How Joe Angelo Grew Vivid Church with Social Ads and Personal Invitations — A church plant story that combines Facebook ads with personal relationship-building.
- How Pastor Sammy Gomes Planted Fray Church and What You Can Learn — How a pastor used social media and authentic community-building to plant a church in a college town.
- How Pastor Alex Suber Grew to 18,000 TikTok Followers — Why short-form video content is a powerful tool for churches looking to warm up cold leads.
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