How would Toyota, one of the top car manufacturers, run a church?

While we will probably never have a definite answer, we can look at five principles that have shaped their success in the automobile industry and learn how those same principles can be applied to create a better church. These five principles published by Business 2.0 are:

1. Know the limits of your brand.
   Toyota launched Scion because it recognized the limitations of its existing brands. The average Toyota driver is 50, and buyers of the company’s big Lexus sedans are even older. But Scion is attracting an entirely new cadre of customers with a median age of only 35, extending Toyota’s reach to the 63 million-strong “echo boomer” generation. “You have to be who you are,” says marketing consultant John Winsor, author of Beyond the Brand. “If you’re going to switch directions, you’d better start fresh.”
   For Churches: You can’t be something you are not. Your church will not appeal to everyone. Know who you appeal to, and if you need to reach an additional audience, know what must be done in order to reach them. For instance, some churches have discovered that they can appeal to a broader scope of audiences by offering multiple venues each with its own unique worship style while delivering the same message via video feed.
2. Making great products mean going the extra mile (or 53,000).
   An old Toyota proverb goes something like this: To make a better product, get off your rear end and experience the marketplace. Charged with revamping the Sienna minivan for 2004, Toyota chief engineer Yuji Yokoya did just that. To improve on the previous Sienna—small and underpowered—Yokoya embarked on a 53,000-mile North American minivan road trip that included five cross-continent treks, visits to every Mexican state and Canadian province, and loops around Puerto Rico, Hawaii, and the Virgin Islands.
   For Churches: The church experience for the staff is quite different than the church experience for the congregation and especially for first-time guests. Experience your church like someone would for the first time. Test drive it. Forget all of your familiarities with your church and its culture, and simply ask the “why” behind everything you experience.
3. Study their mistakes - and your own.
   Mining niches pioneered by others is a Toyota specialty. In 1989, Toyota introduced its high-end Lexus line, which within three years outsold BMW and Mercedes-Benz to become the No. 1 luxury import. The company’s family-oriented Camry sedan out-Taurused the Taurus in quality and function and is still a perennial chart topper.
   For Churches: You don’t have to reinvent the wheel. Learn from other churches’ mistakes and successes. Learn what works and what doesn’t and build upon it. And of course, don’t stop there! Always learn from yourself.
4. To export quality, first export company values.
   Toyota has long manufactured cars outside Japan. But to do so for Lexus, the company had to export the brand’s culture of perfection—a level of expectation that surpasses even that of the exacting mother brand. On a Toyota, for instance, a 1-millimeter gap between hood and grille is acceptable; on a Lexus, the separation can’t be thicker than an eyelash.
   For Churches: Communicating your church’s vision, mission, and values will increase the quality of your workers. It will also help you better reach your goals. Purpose unifies and directs.
5. Act. Improve. Repeat.
   Toyota president, Fujio Cho, shares the following wisdom:
   - “Rather than dealing with problems neatly in our heads, we execute. If our solutions don’t work, we try something else.”
   - “It’s a focus on results, where action is key.”
   - “Good managers never say, ‘Do what you’re told,’ because that tells subordinates that it’s OK not to use their heads.”
   - “Some people think that if they just implement our techniques, they can be as successful as we are. But those that try often fail. That’s because no mere process can turn a poor performer into a star. Rather, you have to address employees’ fundamental way of thinking. At Toyota we start with two questions: ‘Where are we wasting resources like time, people, or material?’ and ‘How can we be less wasteful?’”
   For Churches: The best ideas are worthless without action. Learn to think while acting. And as you do, strive to become more efficient at it.

Those are the principles that have brought Toyota success. It’s nothing revolutionary. They simply need dedication and consistency to work.

Lois Boyle wrote a September ‘05 article for Target Marketing Magazine regarding questions to ask when critiquing your mailer. So the next time you church plans a postcard, ask yourself these 15 questions before applying the postage:

1. Is your offer simply stated and easy to understand?
2. Is it clear what you are asking the reader to do?
3. Is your headline incredibly compelling?
4. Is your copy short and easy to process?
5. Does your copy specifically tell the reader what he or she is going to get by responding?
6. Have you repeated your offer more than once?
7. Are you speaking appropriately to your audience?
8. Have you included a strong, visible, call-to-action?
9. Does your imagery reflect the end benefit?
10. Does the overall look closely reflect your brand?
11. Have you included key components on the address side of your postcard?
    The back side of a postcard typically is read before the front simply because people tend to read who it is mailed to first.
12. Is there an opportunity to use bright colors?
    The eye naturally gravitates toward warm colors more than dark or dingy colors.
13. Is your type easy to read, using only one or two fonts?
14. Have you considered the value of mailing “large”?
    While postcard size will affect cost, consider the trade-off of increased response because your postcard stands out in the mail.
15. Are you consistently testing to find your most effective and efficient postcard possible?

Despite adults caring less and less about reality TV, ratings show that kids are loving it! Among kids ages 2-11,

• “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition” ranks #1
• “Survivor” ranks #2
• “America’s Funniest Home Videos” is tied for #4

Media Life Magazine states two reasons for reality TV’s popularity among kids,

1. Most reality shows are family-friendly and parents can watch them along with their children, no matter what their age.
2. Reality shows fill the void left by the lack of family sitcoms on the broadcast networks.

Special thanks to YPulse for highlighting the trend.

Sometimes the biggest innovations are from the simplest ideas.

Cape Times recently published a story about Vignella, Italy, a quaint town with a unique problem:

Each year, on November 11, the sun would disappear behind a 1 600-metre high mountain to the south, leaving it in near-total darkness for 84 days in a row.

But that problem was solved with the simplest idea when Pierfranco Midali decided to use mirrors to redirect sunlight back to his village. Using an 8 meters wide by five meters tall mirror powered by a “altazimuth” computer to move it, Midali’s simple idea is now able to provide eight hours of sunlight to Vignella’s town square each day.

Ministry is full of problems to solve. You don’t have to wait for a technological breakthrough to provide a solution. Often God has already provided you with the resources to fix it, and you just need to realize the simple solution.

The Journey (New York, NY) is offering a free church planting conference called Launch Conference on January 22-23, 2007. Nelson Searcy and Kerrick Thomas will share their insights on starting a new church from scratch.

Special thanks to Mark Batterson for highlighting the conference.

Chris Tomlin is launching a free online worship resource center called Frequency. Freebies include:

• Instructional Videos
• Bible Studies
• Thoughts and Articles on Worship
• Resource Links

It is members-only so sign-up for free today.

Special thanks to Monday Morning Insight for highlighting the resource.

Heads up, youth pastors!

According to Trend Hunter, PlayStation 4 has already been planned but will not launch until at least 2010.

Church on the Move (Tulsa, OK) has launched a podcast for its 2007 Dream Children’s Ministry Conference.

Jim Wideman, Stephen Posey, and Yancy host the podcast, and the first episode features Willie George’s Dream 2006 keynote address about strategic thinking. It is some valuable teaching for anyone in ministry, not just children’s ministers.

You can subscribe to the podcast via iTunes.