Our City Gates blog covers news, updates, feature announcements, and anything else we think ministry-minded web folks should be aware of.
As a follow-up to yesterday's announcement, here is a video walk through of setting up the customization of a church iPhone Web App:
The church has complete control over the look and feel of their app. Here are all the things you can customize:



We hope that you think the iPhone App is cool (we sure do), but more importantly that it will help the church better impact their community by enabling them to reach them in the technology spaces they already are.
What do you think? Can the Kingdom spread through iPhone Apps?
Posted by Nathan
Here's a big new feature announcement: every church now has its own iPhone web app. Yep, if your website uses City Gates, then you've got a brand new mobile site that's customized for Apple iPhones, iPod Touches, and the forthcoming iPad. We love making these kinds of big announcements, so pardon us while we do a little endzone dance:
iphone! ipod! ipad! iphone! ipod! ipad!
OK, ok. Here' s a little video to show you what's up:
Just take out your iPhone or iPod Touch, and navigate to your website. Look for the little banner at the top, and click to go!
The new mobile version isn't just a rewrapped version of your current site - it's a full rethinking of what information users want and need when they're on their mobile device.
If your church isn't running on City Gates already, Sign Up For a FREE 30 Day Trial today and check it out!
Update: Check out the customization of the iPhone App video.
Posted by Matt
We're excited to announce (we get excited a lot here) a new series for the blog - The City Gates Dossier. We’ll be showcasing cool stuff that happens on websites powered by City Gates. These are the things that make us proud to be serving your churches and ministries.
First up: First Baptist Church of Lakewood. 1BL, as we like to call them, are a vibrant church in Long Beach with a rich history of community. They’ve got a sharp-looking City Gates theme - with some stellar photography - but they’ve also done some great work extending what City Gates can do.
A good example here is 1BL’s use of embedded video. City Gates has automatic video encoding for sermons, but if you’re looking to plant video anywhere else it’s best to use a 3rd party service. 1BL has gone to town with this, shooting lots of fun videos, and then embedding them in the page. One of the coolest innovations is their weekly sermon wrap-up - Lead Pastor Brent Eldridge shoots a short ‘debriefing’ after each week, reinforcing the main points of the service and helping cement those ideas.
They’ve also shot great promo videos focusing in on the church’s ministries - and then embedded those along with the ministry’s page on the website.
We’ll be posting more cool sites using City Gates in the near future. If you’re already running a CG site, Email Us and tell us how awesome you are. And if you’re not using City Gates, give it a try for free.
Posted by Matt
We're excited to announce the next big step in City Gates development - lower-priced plans. Our mission here at City Gates is to make it possible for every church to have a great website, and our new plans are another step toward that goal.
You can now sign up with at different levels of service - so you can find one that matches your church's budget. As before, the first month is totally free (you don't even have to enter your credit card info), and you can test drive any of the plans. They all offer the same great tools, but with little extras thrown in for the larger plans.
You can check out the pricing page for full details, but here's the basics:
And there's even a limited Free Plan for longer test drives.
Questions? Let us know.
Posted by Matt
This week we rolled out a new way to invite new users to edit your website. It's a much smoother process, and it allows you to initiate the process. Here's how to do it:
Oh, first thing: you'll need to be an Administrator to invite a new user.
The person you invited will get an email with a link; when they click the link they'll get to choose a password and be directed straight to the dashboard.
It's pretty simple! If you've got any questions or recommendations, let us know.
Posted by Matt
Our City Gates blog covers news, updates, feature announcements, and anything else we think ministry-minded web folks should be aware of.
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City Gates is a church content management system that makes it easy to run an awesome church website. It's full of super-simple tools, and streamlined for ease of use. You can take a tour of features, see our portfolio, or sign up now.