This, Not That — Are You Making These Common Church Website Image Mistakes?

At LPi, we work with churches across the USA to  help them design and maintain their websites . In doing so, we’ve discovered how the inclusion of sub-par photography can significantly negatively impact a parish’s image/reputation when it’s used in their website design. To help you avoid this, we’ve collected the most common mistakes we encounter and also provide some alternatives to help you enhance your parish’s web presence.

1. Photos of the parish building and grounds  — Instead of making your  hero image  a photo of your parish building, feature photos of the people in your parish community. When people thinking about visiting your church navigate to your website to see what the church might be like, they will feel much more welcome and enthusiastic about visiting if they see images of people living their faith. Church websites who focus primarily on the building and pictures of empty sanctuaries miss out on the opportunity to showcase the same beautiful spaces, but with members of the parish included in the photo. Remember, your parish is the people, not the building. Making sure to include community members in your building and sanctuary photos will foster that sense of a community when people visit your site.

2. Photos of statues and other art  — We hope that every church has art in their sacred spaces that they feel proud of. This being said, filling your website with pictures of your statues of Mary or images of your Stations of the Cross carvings can make the website feel a little impersonal. Instead, feature the beautiful art and culture of your parish with images of parishioners interacting with the art. For example, does your parish celebrate Our Lady of Guadalupe? If so, take some photos of the celebration that feature people as well as the statue of Our Lady, during the celebration! Do you have special days during Lent when your parish prays the Stations of the Cross? Include images of those prayer days to showcase the vibrant life of your parish alongside your artwork.

3. Blurry, pixelated, and incorrectly sized images, especially of staff members  — We are big fans of having photos of staff members and ministry leaders on your parish’s website under a “Meet the Staff” or “Contact Us” link. One mistake we encounter, though, is that parishes sometimes use blurry, outdated, or incorrectly sized imagery for these staff profiles. Often, some staff members will have professional head shots while others have what looks like a badly scanned image from the 80’s. Solve this problem by setting up a date every year — maybe during a staff meeting or your staff retreat for example — to take updated photos of everyone specifically for the parish website. Hire a professional photographer, or just take them with your cell phone using our  layperson’s guide to smartphone church photography ! The important part is that everyone gets a nice, updated photo for the website.

4. Outdated images  — Speaking of badly scanned photos from the 80’s, don’t fall into the habit of always using the same old images of your community over and over again every year. Encourage different ministries to provide the parish office with updated imagery of the work they do and don’t forget to get images of important holidays and other celebrations. As a bonus, families often love seeing themselves featured on their community website so be sure to share the images being used to your church’s social media profiles to make sure your parishioners know that you’re featuring them! 

5. Photos only featuring one age group or demographic  — Lastly, it’s pivotal that the imagery of your community featured on your website includes images that correctly portray the entirety of your community. Don’t forget to feature young families, youth, young adults, single adults, married couples, and the elderly! Do you have a variety of cultures represented at each Mass? A variety of abilities and disabilities? Be sure to reflect that diversity on your website! This way visitors to your site will be able to see themselves reflected in your community and may feel more comfortable choosing your church as a place to visit and, possibly, join! 

We’ve been publishing a lot of tips for creating the best parish web presence recently. Dive deeper by visiting the "Web and Social Media" section of our blog. Don’t have photos of your community just yet? We also have a  growing collection of beautiful Catholic stock photography  in  WeCreate  to get you by. 

Updated on 03-18-2024