The term "people" generally refers to a person of the database.
The term "members" generally refers to a type of person and is used as a type of people attribute called Church Member Type. This identifies a person's relationship with the church. There is also a default group role called member which simply indicates the individual is a part of the group or member of the team. Context will help you distinguish specific use of the term.
PEOPLE SETTINGS
Default terminology for attributes based on common terminology is provided.
Go to People > Settings to customize the following:
- People Attributes (the fields you see on the person profile and information pages)
- Pinned Attributes (the fields you see just under a person's name on the profile page)
- Family Attributes (customizable attributes shared at the household level, e.g. anniversary)
- Church Member Type (distinct to your Church - you'll often use this field as a filter)
- Age Categories (a date range helpful for filters, which can be used in place of exact birthdate)
- Note Types (helpful for categorizing notes on member pages)
- Import / Load (this is the place to import member data from another database)
Click here for more details on these.
ADD PEOPLE TO THE DATABASE
Churchteams offers multiple ways to populate your database. If you are just beginning to use the software, please notify our team, data@churchteams.com. We will set up a time to determine the scope, cost and date of the import. An overview of the conversion process can be found here.
Once the bulk of your people data has been added, you will want to have ways to regularly add people to the database. You can also enter people data yourself or create a registration form that allows people to enter it themselves from a link on your website, social, or sent in an email or text.
MERGE PEOPLE
Periodically you will find people listed two or more times in the database. Click here for detailed instructions on how to merge them into one. The Possible Duplicate People Report is a great tool for discovering and fixing duplicates. We recommend having an admin plan to do this once a month or more.
Be careful to use the MERGE FAMILIES not the Merge People feature when you are wanting to combine people into the same family. If you accidentally use Merge People for a husband and wife, you will lose the one you chose in the From column completely.
Finally, when you merge, ALL OF THIS INFORMATION IS RETAINED from both people profiles:
- Contributions
- Email addresses
- Current and past group enrollment / attendance.
ARCHIVE / DELETE PEOPLE
Databases have a way of getting bloated over time. This makes them feel cumbersome and no longer useful. We recommend keeping people in the database with whom you actually have some sort of relationship or potential relationship. Since your subscription is based on number of people in the database, it can also help keep your cost down.
We call this archive/delete because while you are deleting people from the database, you are simultaneously creating an Excel spreadsheet with all their information. Save or archive this spreadsheet. It could potentially be used in the future to import data back into the database.
There are decisions you will have to make about how long to keep things like group attendance or contributions in your active database. Our monthly group report provides an overall attendance history automatically and your accounting records should include overall income for previous years. But individual attendance or giving will be archived when you delete people. You will have to decide on what this means for your situation, but here are some resources to help you.
- Overall process for cleaning up your database.
- How to use groups to collect and to manage inactive members.
- Use last activity date to discover who should be deleted.
SHARE ACCESS
Click on Settings > User to add other staff and highest level organizational leaders as Account Users in Churchteams. As you add user accounts, you will determine their security access level. They will each create their own password. Lay leaders and volunteers will access their account in other ways.
Use Settings > Accessibility to see different access options for coaches, leaders and members. You will customize your member directory on this page as well.
VIDEO RESOURCES
People Academy Webinars - Introduction to the basics including the dashbaord and people part of the software.