The Influence of E-Marketing Promotional Tools On Church Membership Growth during the Covid-19 Lockdown in Calabar Municipality

Abstract

This study assessed the influence of e-marketing promotional tools on the growth of churches in Calabar Municipality. Specifically, this study sought to establish the extent to which the use of e-advertising, social media, direct marketing, e-images, and e-videos enhanced church attendance/growth during the COVID-19 lockdown in Calabar Municipality. A cross-sectional survey design was adopted whereby structured questionnaires were personally administered to 376 purposefully selected Pentecostal church leaders identified from the list of attendees to the regular monthly meetings organized by the Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria, Calabar branch. A final sample of 261 respondents was used to test hypotheses after conducting the necessary preliminary data checks. Results of hypotheses testing using multiple regression analysis techniques show that while the use of social media and e-videos significantly enhanced the growth of churches during the COVID-19 lockdown, e-advertisement, e-images and direct marketing had no such effect. The study also found that relatively, social media handles are more powerful in enhancing church growth than e-videos. Based on the findings of this study, it was concluded/recommended that churches could improve their membership strength by increasing their use of social media and e-video tools as the primary channels of engaging their audience when conditions make it impracticable for physical face-to-face assembly, while e-advertainment and direct marketing tools may be used as supplementary tools because of their marginal benefits.