7 Creative Ways To Use AI To Build Your Website

In the good old days (were they good?) of church website building, you had to hire an experienced web designer to create a website for you. The process took a long time, cost a lot of money, and usually involved too many people.

Then drag-and-drop website builders like Squarespace came on the scene and tremendously simplified the process of building a website. What used to take months could be done in days, or even hours. 

Now, AI is taking website building to a whole new level. Creating a website has been simplified even further, so that just about anyone can do it.

Let's look at some creative ways to use AI to build your church website.

Ideation

Even before you get down to the nitty-gritty of building your church website, you can use AI to help you. If there's one thing that AI tools are particularly good at, it's generating a LOT of ideas very quickly.

So, for example, you could ask ChatGPT, "What are the key elements that should be included in every church website?"

When I did it, ChatGPT immediately began giving me loads of ideas about what pages to include and what to include on those pages.

You could also use AI to give you color palette ideas for your website. For example, you could ask ChatGPT, "What colors are associated with peace and joy? How can I use those colors on my church website?"

In addition, you could use AI to help you decide on the type of imagery you want to use on your website. You could use prompts like, "What sort of images convey grace?"

Building Your Website

When AI gets involved, putting flesh and bones on your website is much easier. Based on your ideation, you can then use a drag-and-drop website builder to create your website in a very short amount of time. 

First, pick a professionally designed template as the starting point for your site. Don't worry, you can easily change colors, fonts, and text.

Then start adding the information from your ideation sessions, almost as if you were editing a document. Upload your images, enter your text, etc. With Tithely’s website builder, you can add events, upload sermons, and set up online giving.

And all of it is mobile-friendly. People can visit your site on their smartphones or their desktops, and it will look beautiful on either.

Content Writing

One of the best ways to use AI to build your church website is to have it help you create the text you'll use.

Tools like Jasper, Writer, and ChatGPT can help you create the first draft of your website's content.

For example, if you're struggling to come up with a motto for your church, you could use the prompt, "Give me a slogan/motto that reflects our values of Value 1, Value 2, and Value 3." Or if you're struggling to describe your children's ministry, simply tell the AI tool, "Describe our children's ministry as if you were talking to a first-time visitor."

Here’s what ChatGPT gave me from the prompt, “Give me 5 church slogans/mottos that reflect our values of faith, hope, and love.”

And don't forget tools like Wordtune and Grammarly to help ensure that everything you write is flawless.

If you want to write blog posts for your website, Jasper and ChatGPT can help you at every step of the process. Struggling to create an outline? Simply tell the AI tool your topic and let it develop one for the post. 

Need help with writing headlines or introductions? Let the AI tools generate a few options for you to choose from.

You could upload a set of bullet points from a sermon and ask the AI tool to expand each bullet point into a whole paragraph. You can edit these paragraphs together to create a well-written blog post.

Repurposing Sermon Content

Many hours go into preparing a sermon, so trying to get as much mileage out of each one as possible makes sense. There are several AI tools that can help you repurpose material from a sermon into other formats.

For example, you could use a tool like Otter.ai or Descript to transcribe your sermon and edit it into a blog post. You could also take snippets from the sermon and turn them into social media posts, which, while not actually part of your website, can drive traffic to it.

Veed.io allows you to upload text and then turn that text into a podcast, which you can host on your website. Those who prefer to listen rather than read can also access your sermon content. 

You could use an AI tool like Canva or Gamma to create visuals for your sermon by simply inputting the main points or themes and letting the tool generate relevant images or graphics. This could be particularly helpful for sharing quotes or key takeaways from the sermon on your site or social media.

If you have a diverse congregation or engage with people from other countries, you can also use AI to translate your sermon into other languages.

AI Chatbots

If you want to really experiment with AI on your website, you could use AI chatbots to interact with visitors and answer their questions. 

You could provide information about your church's beliefs and service times or even accept prayer requests. Instead of having to search your site for the information they're looking for, people can simply ask the chatbot.

If you're interested in implementing an AI chatbot on your website, check out platforms like Chatbase.

Visual Design

You've probably seen images generated by AI at this point. Sometimes they're amazing. Sometimes they look extremely odd. But if you're looking for a very specific type of image and can't find one anywhere, AI tools can be extremely helpful.

Both Canva and Picsart have their own image-generating platforms, and you can then use the images you generate directly in your designs.

So, for example, let's say you want to create an image of a turtle drinking a can of soda for a children's ministry lesson (don't ask why).  With Canva's AI image generator, I was able to create this image in just a few seconds. Pretty impressive, right?

Website Speed and Performance Optimization

You want your website to run as fast as possible. People have incredibly short attention spans and won't wait around if your site takes more than a few seconds to load.

To optimize your website's performance, you can use AI tools like NitroPack, which automatically speeds up your site with just a few lines of code.

You can also analyze the behavior of visitors to your website with tools like HotJar. HotJar will show you how far people are scrolling on pages, where they're clicking, and where they're dropping off. You can use this information to improve the layout of your site and make it more user-friendly.

For example, you notice that hardly anyone scrolls past the oversized hero image on your homepage. That could indicate that the image is too large and that a smaller one would better serve visitors. 

Final Thoughts

AI can't completely design your website for you, but it can certainly help you along the way. It's also important to note that AI isn't intended to replace creativity or diminish the creative process. Instead, it's intended to supplement the creative process and help you take it further than you normally could.

If you find yourself hitting a creative roadblock while creating your website, why not use one of the AI tools mentioned above to help you? You might just be surprised at the results.

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