Passport captures every first-time guest, sends the first text on Sunday and gives a named person on your team the follow-up within 48 hours. Then it shows you who came back.
Church guest follow-up software is a tool that records every first-time visitor, contacts them soon after their visit, gives a named person at the church the job of following up, and shows whether the guest came back and joined a group, class or ministry. It turns a stack of Sunday cards into a schedule someone owns.
A church management system keeps the records. Follow-up software runs the first weeks after someone visits: it decides who contacts each guest and when, and it shows you any guest who has slipped through. You can run it alongside the database you already have, such as Breeze ChMS or Planning Center.
Guests decide quickly: in a 2023 Lifeway Research survey of churchgoers who had switched churches, 71% decided to attend regularly within three visits. Meanwhile a guest fills out a card on Sunday, and by Tuesday it is in a stack on someone’s desk. Here is what else research on people choosing a church says about those first weeks.
Source: Lifeway Research, 2023
79% say the welcome shaped their decision
79% of church switchers say the way their current church welcomed visitors positively influenced their decision to attend regularly; 49% strongly agree.
Source: Lifeway Research, 2023
85% attended a service first
85% of Americans who searched for a new congregation attended a worship service at one they were considering, and 69% talked with its members.
Source: Pew Research Center, 2016
21% were contacted by a welcoming team
Only 21% of church switchers say a welcoming team contacted them when they visited their current church, down from 28% in 2006.
Source: Lifeway Research, 2023
80% use printed guest cards
Most U.S. Protestant churches (80%) ask guests to fill out a printed card so they can follow up; only 38% offer an online form.
Source: Lifeway Research, 2025
Each household that stays is people who belong, and on average $2,738 a year in giving. Put your own numbers into the guest retention ROI calculator, or read every sourced figure on the church visitor retention statistics page.
Six jobs, in order. Each one is worth doing with paper and a phone if that is what you have. Here is what good looks like, and how Passport does it.
What good looks like
Every first-time guest is recorded on the day they visit, with a name and a way to reach them, in one list everyone can see.
How Passport does it
The connection card, QR welcome card, Visit page and staff guest intake all put guests into the Guests hub.
What good looks like
A short, warm thank-you reaches the guest on Sunday, while the visit is still fresh.
How Passport does it
A Guest Journey sends the first text on the schedule you set, written in your church’s own words.
What good looks like
One person, by name, owns the follow-up for each guest, with a due date the rest of the team can see.
How Passport does it
Every first-time guest gets a care assignment for a named person within 48 hours of the visit.
What good looks like
Someone calls or texts, listens for what the guest is looking for, and writes it down for the next person.
How Passport does it
Replies land in a shared guest inbox, and the follow-up task holds the call and what was learned.
What good looks like
The guest is personally invited to one specific next step, and someone checks that they got there.
How Passport does it
Guest Journeys keep going until the guest is connected to a group, class or ministry.
What good looks like
The church knows who returned, who has been contacted, and who still needs a call.
How Passport does it
Attendance from Passport, Breeze or Planning Center marks each return, and retention reports count it.
One family’s first week, from the welcome card to the Sunday they came back.
The Alvarez family fills in your connection card on a phone. Passport adds them to the Guests hub.
Their Guest Journey sends a thank-you while lunch is still on the table. Nobody had to remember.
A care assignment lands with a named person on your team, inside 48 hours of the visit.
Maria calls, hears they are looking for a kids’ ministry, and logs it in one tap.
Her reply arrives in the guest inbox, where anyone on the follow-up team can answer it.
Attendance from Passport, Breeze or Planning Center marks the return, and your retention report counts it.
Names and times are examples. Text timing and who gets each assignment are set by your church.
Real Passport screens. Open the live demo to click through every one of them yourself.
Use it this Sunday, with paper cards and your own phone. It works whether or not you ever use Passport.
In Passport, each line is a step you set once in a Guest Journey, and the timing runs itself. Everything that needs a person still goes to a person.
Want the wording too? Borrow from these church visitor follow-up email templates.
Sunday, during the service
Ask for a name, a mobile number and whether it is their first visit. Keep it short: a QR code on the seat back or a card at the welcome desk.
Sunday afternoon
Sign it with a real name and ask one easy question they can answer from the car.
Monday morning
Put the name and a due date where the rest of the team can see them.
Within 48 hours
Listen for what brought them: a move, children, a friend, a hard season. Write it down.
Midweek
Whoever answers should see what the guest has already told you, so nobody asks twice.
Before next Sunday
A time, a place and a person to meet: coffee at 9:30 before the service, ask for Maria.
The next Sunday
A second visit is the moment to introduce them to one more person.
Weeks two to six
Check in every week or two until they are in a group, class or ministry, or tell you they have found a church home.
Passport does. Your staff keep the system they know, and Companion, the follow-up plan, is $49 a month. Most churches are live in under 30 minutes.
Not on either? Passport runs on its own too. Compare plans on the Passport pricing page
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The Church Assimilation Process: A Practical Guide for Growing Churches8 min readChurch guest follow-up software is a tool that records every first-time visitor, contacts them soon after their visit, gives a named person at the church the job of following up, and shows whether the guest came back and joined a group, class or ministry. It turns a stack of Sunday cards into a schedule someone owns.
Send a short thank-you the same day, ideally Sunday afternoon, and have one named person call or text within 48 hours. Before the next Sunday, offer one specific next step. Then keep in touch every week or two until the guest is connected to a group, class or ministry.
One named person for each guest, usually a volunteer on the connections or welcome team, with a pastor or staff member watching the list. A guest who belongs to a whole team tends to belong to nobody, so each guest needs a single owner and a due date.
Automation gets the first text out on time; people do the rest. In Passport every guest has a named owner who calls or texts personally, and replies go to a guest inbox that real volunteers answer. The texts are written by your church, in your own words.
Most church management systems are built to keep records, and follow-up becomes a tag or a workflow someone has to remember. Guest follow-up software runs that week for you. Passport works alongside Breeze and Planning Center. Keep your church database where it is: your staff and volunteers go on using the system they know, and Passport handles follow-up with your guests.
Passport’s Companion plan, built for guest follow-up, is $49 a month or $470 a year, with unlimited staff seats. Texts and emails are billed per message. It starts with a 30-day free trial, with no charge today.
For each guest: the date of the first visit, how to reach them, who owns their follow-up, every contact and reply, what they said they are looking for, whether they came back, and whether they joined a group, class or ministry.
Start Companion free for 30 days, or open the live demo and follow one guest from the welcome card to their second Sunday.
