Hamilton Park United Church of Christ Website Design

As a Lancaster PA website designer, I recently had the privilege of partnering with Hamilton Park United Church of Christ (HPUCC) to create a brand new website that fully communicates who they are, what they have going on and invites the community to join in their work.

HPUCC is an incredibly warm, inclusive, and active community. They needed a digital front door that matched their real-world hospitality. They love serving their community and have a lot of active groups, but their current website didn’t communicate or display that. When they came to me I was so excited to get to work creating something as wonderfully welcome and vibrant as their community.

Here is a little bit about how I created an engaging and intuitive layout, optimized for strategic local SEO and brought their new website to life.

Organizing a Vibrant Community

One of the most common hurdles in small church website design is information overload. Active churches like HPUCC have a lot going on: Sunday worship, multiple ministries, a choir, several study and small groups, and extensive local outreach programs. They often don’t have someone who knows how to layout all of the information so it’s user friendly and intuitive to a new visitor.

When I audited their content, I found nearly a dozen individual community outreach initiatives—from a local CROP Walk and park picnics to spontaneous special collections. While this is amazing for the community, creating a separate web page for each single-sentence initiative creates “thin content” that actively harms SEO and frustrates mobile users who have to constantly click back and forth. They also had many ministries happening but no clear description on what each is, how to join and how often they meet.

They needed a cohesive church website design that organized this massive amount of information into an intuitive, scannable, and engaging user journey.

Creating an Exceptional Church Website Experience

I built the new site using WordPress and the newest Divi5 theme, focusing heavily on user experience (UX) and narrative flow.

Clarifying the Message with StoryBrand

Church terminology can often feel intimidating to newcomers. I applied the StoryBrand framework to rewrite their copy, shifting the focus away from internal jargon and toward the visitor’s experience. For example, rather than a heavy theological document, the Membership page was framed around “Taking the Leap of Belonging,” and the Men’s Breakfast page emphasized low-pressure community over formal study. Every page—from the choir to the “Beer Buddies” women’s group—was written to ensure visitors felt invited and welcome to try it out.

Creating Strong Content

Instead of scattering their incredible outreach efforts across ten different weak URLs, we consolidated them into a single, high-impact “Outreach & Missions” page. Using alternating layouts, image-led blurb modules, and parallax backgrounds, we gave each local ministry breathing room. This created a rich, authoritative page that search engines love and users can easily scroll through to find volunteer opportunities.

Enhancing the Worship Experience Digitally

It was important to HPUCC that being able to find their live Sunday morning worship online was easy for visitors. I made a secondary menu into a clickable link where someone can visit their website and instantly go to watch it live. I also made it incredibly welcoming and inviting to new visitors by answering all of the questions they may have about visiting for a worship service. I added several pictures of their actual gatherings to give visitors an idea of what they can expect, and added FAQs.

Making Finding Ministries and Happenings Easy for Users

It can be difficult to figure out how to display all of the happenings a church has. To organize their offerings I placed them in categories of ministries. Each Ministry has its own page and each is categorized. So a user can easily visit and see either all ministries offered or sort by the category they are interested in (like women’s groups for instance). The church also found much value in a church calendar. So they are using Events Calendar Pro where each recurring and one-time event can be seen on a calendar view and then opened up to see more details.

Local SEO for Churches

A beautiful site only works if the local community can find it. Because HPUCC is deeply rooted in its neighborhood, I utilized a robust local SEO strategy targeting Lancaster, PA. Every page has content regarding Lancaster, PA so people not only looking for a church, but even for fitness groups (like they offer) in Lancaster, PA can find their offerings.

A Beautifully Designed, Highly Functional Church Website

Hamilton Park UCC now has a custom, easily manageable WordPress website that accurately reflects their heart for the Lancaster community. It serves as a true digital front door—welcoming newcomers, equipping current members, and beautifully showcasing their extensive local outreach. Visit their new website to see it in action and if you’re looking for community see all of their offerings you can be a part of.

Not Left Without Support

Another bonus of utilizing my services to build your website, is that I’m always here to make content edits or additions after you launch. I never leave a client without the support they need to maintain their website. So whether they need a new event added, changed or want to introduce a new ministry, I’m always here to help. That can be a huge asset to small churches that may not have a web designer or someone savvy with WordPress on staff. 

Visit the New Hamilton Park United Church of Christ Website

Visit the new Hamilton Park United Church of Christ Website to see it in action!

See how beautifully branded and cohesive it is, how inviting all of the language and layouts, and how easy it is to navigate and find what you’re looking for. It’s everything a small church could want in a website!