REACHRIGHT Podcast

Thomas and Shiloh sits down with Mike Signorelli, lead pastor of V1 Church and #4 on the ReachRight Pastor Influence 100 list, whose online teaching now reaches millions every month. This episode is for pastors who want their online reach to turn into real people in the room. They talk about what most pastors misunderstand about fast-growing churches, the challenges that come with rapid growth, and one practical step a church of 150 could take this month without a big budget. Mike also shares about his new book, The Unoffendable Heart, and what it means for leaders who want to shepherd wisely.

The person visiting your church for the first time in 2026 isn’t the same person who visited twenty years ago. This episode is for pastors and church leaders who want to understand who’s really walking through their doors now. We talk about why so many new visitors are coming out of loneliness and spiritual curiosity rather than tradition, how most of them research your church online before Sunday, and why they need a clear next step and real community to stay. If your church assumes it already knows who’s visiting, this conversation might change your mind.

Church tech is a crowded space, and everyone has something to sell you. This episode is for pastors and church leaders trying to figure out which tools deserve their time and budget. We rank the biggest church tech trends of 2026 with a green, yellow and red light system, from website chatbots and hybrid livestreaming to church apps, AI-generated worship music and automated visitor follow-up. Along the way, we draw a clear line between tech that strengthens community and tech that quietly replaces it.

Every year, Outreach Magazine publishes a list of the fastest-growing churches in America, and buried in that data are clear patterns most pastors never notice. This episode is for pastors and church leaders who want to know what growing churches are actually doing differently.

We break down why they invest heavily in kids and students, how they mobilize volunteers instead of only hiring staff, and why home groups and a clear discipleship pathway matter so much. We also wrestle honestly with what's correlation and what's causation, and which strategies fit every church versus only some.

AI has changed the rules of church marketing again, and this time the shift is moving faster than most churches can keep up with. This episode is for pastors and church leaders who know AI matters but aren't sure what it actually changes for their church. We talk through why content creation is no longer the bottleneck and how small churches can now personalize communication at scale.

We also cover how AI search is changing the way people find a church, and why the bar for authenticity went up, not down. AI didn't change what good church marketing looks like; it changed who can afford to do it.

Most churches are active on social media, but almost none of them are reaching anyone beyond their own congregation, because 95% of the people who see their content don't attend their church. In this episode, we break down the single biggest mistake churches make online, creating content for members instead of strangers, and run through the rest of the list, from broadcasting instead of engaging to avoiding video to spreading thin across too many platforms.

This episode is for pastors and church leaders who want their social media to actually reach new people instead of just reinforcing what current members already know. We also unpack why chasing followers is the wrong goal, why consistency between Sundays matters, and why even a small amount of paid promotion can change everything about who sees your content.

Most churches pour nearly all their energy into attracting new visitors while ignoring the fact that only 10 to 20 percent of first-time guests ever come back a second time. In this episode, we make the case that retention, not acquisition, is the fastest and cheapest path to a growing church, and we break down what a real connection sequence looks like in the critical first 30 days after someone visits.

This episode is for pastors and church leaders who want to grow but feel like they're constantly refilling a leaky bucket instead of building something lasting. We also dig into why much of today's church growth is really just redistribution between churches rather than new conversions, and why small churches often have a quiet advantage when it comes to relational depth and follow-through.

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With 93% of pastors now using or exploring AI, the question for churches is no longer whether to use it, but where the line actually is. In this episode, Thomas goes through a long list of real AI use cases happening in churches right now, from sermon research and discipleship chatbots to pasting giving records into ChatGPT and posting AI-generated prayers without disclosure, and calls each one in bounds or out of bounds.

This episode is for pastors and church leaders who know AI is already showing up in their ministry, whether or not they've officially addressed it. Along the way, Thomas and the team unpack why intent and transparency matter more than the tool itself, and why only 5% of churches currently have a written AI policy even though most leaders say they need one.

Every pastor has been handed a book, framework, or five-step plan promising to fix their church's growth problem, and most of the time it wasn't built for their context. In this episode, we rank the most common church growth advice out there, from genuinely effective to advice that should probably be retired for good. We look at real numbers behind kids and student ministry investment, home-based small groups, the attractional preaching model, multi-site campuses, and whether strong leadership is really the deciding factor in growth.

This episode is for pastors and church leaders who are tired of copying what worked somewhere else and want to figure out what actually fits their own church and community. Along the way we talk honestly about the strategies that get oversold, the ones that quietly work, and the mindset shift that matters more than any single tactic.

Most church teams know AI is supposed to help but have no idea what a real workflow actually looks like in practice.

In this episode Thomas and Shiloh walk through the specific AI-assisted workflow that is saving church staff teams real hours every single week, starting with the Sunday sermon as the content engine and working through every repeatable task that follows. From generating a full week of social captions, email copy, bulletin recaps, and short-form video clips in under an hour, to using Claude Code for deep multi-step sermon research that compiles commentary insights, cross-references, historical background, and congregation-specific preaching prompts into a single PDF in about seven minutes, every piece of this workflow is concrete, practical, and ready to implement starting Monday.

This is not a conversation about whether churches should use AI. It is a step by step picture of how the ones saving the most time are actually doing it.

Your church website is the first impression for thousands of people who will never tell you they visited it. Seventy-five percent of people judge a church's credibility based on its website alone and 61 percent leave within five seconds if they cannot find what they need.

In this episode Thomas and Shiloh break down the specific patterns that separate high-performing church websites from the ones quietly losing visitors every single week. From answering visitor questions immediately and designing mobile-first to serving two audiences without confusing either, repeating one clear call to action, and making the site actually feel like the church behind it, every pattern comes with a practical and honest take on what most churches are still getting wrong and what to fix first.

TikTok is stable, it has 1.5 billion monthly active users, and it is now functioning as a real search engine where people are looking for churches and spiritual content every single day. The question for most churches in 2026 is no longer whether TikTok is worth paying attention to. It is whether their specific church should be on it, what a realistic strategy actually looks like, and how to use it as a genuine ministry tool rather than just another platform to feel behind on.

In this episode Thomas and Shiloh address the TikTok ban drama honestly, break down how the algorithm shifted in 2026 toward value-first watch time and authentic short-form content, lay out what a realistic church TikTok strategy looks like in practice, and give a clear framework for which churches should treat TikTok as a serious growth tool and which ones will see better return investing that energy elsewhere. The closing challenge is one every church leader can do in under two minutes and what they find might be the most important thing that happens before their next content meeting.

Sixty percent of Protestant churches are plateaued or declining and most of the conversations about fixing that focus on what churches should add. This episode flips that conversation entirely.

Thomas and Shiloh walk through five specific things that growing churches have intentionally stopped doing and the shifts they made instead that actually moved the needle on growth, discipleship, and community connection. From walking away from the copy-paste attractional model and cutting programs that exist out of tradition rather than impact, to building multi-door digital strategies, investing in intergenerational ministry, and replacing passive hope with real follow-up systems, every shift in this episode is practical, honest, and immediately applicable.

The closing question is one every pastor and church board needs to sit with seriously before they plan their next season of ministry.

Most churches invest significant time and energy into creating a great Sunday experience for first-time visitors and then do almost nothing with that investment after Monday morning. Only 10 to 20 percent of first-time guests return without intentional follow-up. Churches that reach out within 24 to 48 hours see three times higher return rates than those who wait a week or more. And 29 percent of church dropouts say they left because they never felt connected, which means follow-up is not an administrative task. It is a ministry responsibility.

In this episode Thomas and Shiloh diagnose what broken church follow-up actually looks like, lay out the simple three-part timeline and multi-touchpoint system that actually works, and issue a practical challenge that every church can act on before next Sunday. You do not need a complicated system. You need a consistent one and this episode shows exactly what that looks like.

If someone searched "church near me" in your city right now would your church show up?

For most churches the honest answer is no and this episode is the practical fix for that. Thomas and Shiloh break down every new rule of church SEO in 2026 including why your Google Business Profile is now more important than your website for local search, how AI tools like ChatGPT and Perplexity are directly answering church search queries and leaving invisible churches completely out of the results, why Google reviews are a direct ranking signal most churches are ignoring, how Instagram and TikTok are functioning as search engines for younger audiences, and why one outdated listing across the web can quietly suppress your rankings without you ever knowing.

Every rule in this episode comes with a specific action any church can take this week regardless of technical skill or budget. SEO is not a technical problem. It is a findability problem and this episode makes it completely approachable for every pastor and church leader who has ever tuned out the moment someone said the word optimization.

Most churches treat social media like a task to check off and hand it to whoever has a little free time. A volunteer, an intern, the pastor's kid who knows how to use Instagram.

But seventy percent of people engage with a church online before they ever visit in person, which means this is not a side task. It is a ministry role that directly shapes whether new people ever walk through your doors.

In this episode Thomas and Shiloh make the honest case for why the intern does not count, what a real church social media manager actually does, what the role costs in different forms, and what it is genuinely costing churches that leave this position unfilled or underfunded. The conversation also gives fair pushback on the budget reality most churches face and discusses part-time, freelance, and AI-assisted alternatives that can close the gap without a full-time hire.

By the end of this episode every pastor and church leader should have a clear picture of what form this role needs to take for their specific size and budget.

Most churches have a social media presence. Very few have a social media strategy and that gap is exactly what this episode closes.

Thomas and Shiloh break down the complete playbook that high-performing churches are running on social media right now in 2026, including why consistency always beats polish, how to turn one Sunday sermon into a full week of content, why Instagram should be the primary hub for most churches, and why authentic content is outperforming produced graphics on every major platform according to Buffer's analysis of over 50 million posts.

The episode also covers why most churches are writing for the 5% already in the seats instead of the 95% they are still trying to reach, and why follower count is vanity while reach and click-throughs are what actually matter. The closing challenge is one every church social media team should sit with honestly before they plan their next week of content.

The AI tool landscape for churches in 2026 is overwhelming and most church staff do not have the time to figure out what is actually worth using. In this episode Thomas and Shiloh go category by category and give an honest and practical breakdown of where AI is genuinely delivering time savings for ministry teams and where it is still more hype than results. From sermon prep and church communications to social media content, volunteer management, and the tools that are simply not ready for real church use yet, every major category gets a clear and actionable take. The goal is simple. By the end of this episode every pastor and church staff member should know exactly which one task to hand to AI this week and which tools they can stop feeling guilty about ignoring.

Every year a new wave of social media trends hits the church world and most ministry teams do not have the time, budget, or bandwidth to chase all of them.

In this episode Thomas and Shiloh go trend by trend and rank every major social media move for churches in 2026 using a simple and honest three-tier system. Hot means do it now. Worth Trying means good if the bandwidth exists. Skip It means stop feeling guilty that your church is not doing it. From short-form vertical video and long-form YouTube to AI-assisted content, pastor personal branding, user-generated content, and social search optimization, every trend gets a real grade based on what is actually producing results for churches today.

This is the most practical and opinionated social media episode of the year and every church communications team needs to hear it before they plan their next quarter of content.

Gen Z is already showing up to church more than any other living generation and most churches are repelling them with the exact strategies designed to attract them.

In this episode Thomas and Shiloh unpack the Barna data that completely reframes the young adult conversation, name what chasing looks like and why it consistently backfires, and give pastors a clear and practical picture of what Gen Z actually wants from a church community. From the mentorship gap that no programming can fix to the surprising growth happening in high-liturgy and historically rooted congregations, this episode challenges every assumption most churches are still operating on when it comes to reaching the next generation. The closing question is one every pastor and church board needs to sit with honestly before they approve next year's young adult budget.