Assessment-Led Marketing: Church Tech Check & State of Church Tech
I led web marketing campaigns for Pushpay's State of Church Tech report launches and was a key stakeholder in launching the Church Tech Check; an interactive maturity model assessment that gave church leaders a personalized benchmark for technology adoption. I later created a Linnworks Commerce maturity quiz from scratch as a pilot interactive asset, applying the same assessment framework to a new vertical.
The Problem
Pushpay had a significant content marketing asset in the State of Church Tech report, but a PDF download is a one-way experience. Church leaders could read industry benchmarks without knowing where their own organization stood. The question wasn't just "what is the industry doing?" but "how does my church compare, and what should I do next?"
Separately, the company needed a lead-generation mechanism that would deliver more immediate, personalized value than a static download. Something that would qualify intent, segment by maturity level, and trigger tailored follow-up.
The Hypothesis
If we could translate research benchmarks into a self-assessment tool, we could increase engagement time, generate qualified leads with richer segmentation data, and give sales a conversation starter based on a prospect's specific maturity profile — rather than generic industry averages.
The method
- Designing and building the landing page experience at hub.pushpay.com/state-of-church-technology/
- Building the modal form and gated download flow to maximize conversion while capturing segmentation data
- Coordinating with Demand Gen, Product Marketing, and Design on launch timing, CTAs, and post-download email sequences
- Optimizing the experience for both evangelical and Catholic audience segments
The assessment:
- 7-minute quiz spanning 5 dimensions: giving, communications, managing, serving, and engaging
- Three maturity levels: Beginner, Intermediate, and Leader
- Generated an 8-page custom benchmarking report personalized to each respondent's results
- Enabled sales to segment outreach based on maturity level and specific dimension gaps
My role was instrumental in getting it launched, I contributed to shaping the product and owned the web marketing and launch execution.
The Outcome
The Church Tech Check launched to strong engagement as the first assessment of its kind in the church technology space, earning coverage in Church Executive and other industry publications. The maturity model framework gave sales a structured way to qualify prospects and tailor outreach based on operational maturity rather than company size alone. My stakeholder involvement and launch ownership helped ensure the product reached its audience effectively.
The State of Church Tech campaigns generated gated downloads across both launch years, with the landing page and modal form optimized to balance friction with lead quality. The multi-segment approach (evangelical, Catholic, mainline) provided sales with segment-specific conversation starters.
The Linnworks Start of your Commerce quiz, a companion lead magnet to the the State of Commerce Ops Report which I designed and built from scratch, established the foundation for an ongoing interactive content program and demonstrated the maturity model format's applicability outside the church tech vertical.
Reflection
The most interesting part of this work wasn't the technical execution, it was translating a research framework into a diagnostic experience that felt personal to the respondent. A maturity model only works if the person taking it sees themselves in the results. Getting that right required understanding both the research data and the psychology of the audience reading their score.