WorshipTeam.com Review by DanWilt.com
I’m bringing up this review of WorshipTeam.com because there has been significant buzz about it, and because at the time of its writing, Kim and I were not working together so closely. It was a privilege to write then – and it continues to be an even greater privilege to re-post now.
Finally someone did it. Let me start this way.
I don’t feel a need to be nice anymore about worship leader software or web tools. For years, I’ve been searching hard for a worship leader’s song/admin/organizing program that really, really worked for me – and for the thousands of worship leaders with whom I’ve connected around the world.
I just needed something to work, darn it. My peers did too.
Friends and developers have promised great software packages or online tools with which I could (on the road and at home) create songs, transpose keys, integrate mp3s (and change their keys for rehearsing), spit out PowerPoints or MediaShout, create my own songs, integrate my other worship leaders and musicians, build schedules, etc. – and do it all legally when it comes to copyright issues.
Many came close, but were missing things I needed, or had too many things I didn’t need, or were locked into publishing issues with music labels.
While valiant efforts have gone out all around, I finally found the tool that works for me. I’ve been using WorshipTeam.com for a few years now, and developer and founder Kim Gentes and his team have absolutely nailed it.
Every worship leader I’ve spoken to who is using it for his/her worship organizing life is having the same response. If you need melody and lead sheets, this isn’t for you. But if chord charts drive your worship planning and music, and you need a tool that will do the job – WorshipTeam.com is the workhorse.
It is simply the best tool I’ve found, and finally someone scratched my itch for a great tool, on the Internet, available on Saturday night before a set, or wherever I am in the world doing a conference or event.
I’ll leave the details for you to explore in the tutorial at the site.
Point is – it just works. That’s the way I like it, and that’s why I can recommend it to worship leaders and teams everywhere.
It will make short work of your worship leader workload, and it’s perfect for artists and songwriters as well.
Give it a spin if you’re looking for a solid tool – www.WorshipTeam.com
17 Comments
Interesting stuff. I use Planning Centre (www.planningcentreonline.com) for our worship organising but will have to have a look at this and see if it’s any better / easier to use. I’ll get back to you!
Thanks Dan.
I just want to second Dan on this. Gone are the days of spending an hour flipping through my binder or through files on my hard drive (and then ultimately through various corners of the internet) to gather my set together. 5-10 minutes and I’m organized for the week – a setlist is built and emailed out to my team along with (correct) chord charts and the ability to hear (legal) mp3s of the songs. Woot. Woot.
I agree. I’ve been using it for a year now and it’s revolutionized the way we do worship planning. There is nobody I know that doesn’t love this program. Also any time I reported a bug or had a suggestion for improvement they have addressed it in one or two days! That in itself is incredible tech support. I highly recommend it.
Mark, that’s also been my favorite part. I’ve had 2-3 tech questions since we started using it, and within a day or two it’s addressed. Kim is conscientious about the functionality because he’s a worship leader who uses it – i.e. the felt needs are felt on the other end.
Dan, we built our own website and there is so much upkeep to doing it that way. We did this years ago before there were really good alternatives. I’ve never used PCO or this one but wondered if you have used them both, if you’d be willing to compare them for me from a user’s standpoint. I’ll look at both of them online but wondered what someone who has used them both would have to say. That’s a bit different from reading the websites!
From what I can see they both look similar (Planning Centre & Worshipteam), with similar features. What I noticed on Worshipteam’s video on their site is that you seem to be able to transpose songs within the program, which would be amazing! (Haven;’t been able to do that since using Vineyard’s own Songsmart here in the UK – but that’s not an online tool and you have to manually type in each song and all the chords whic is tedious to say the least!).
At the moment I have to download any songs I want from Songselect.com, save them in the keys I want and then upload them to Planning Centre. This is fine as long as I have lots of time to get all the required keys worked out and printed (to PDF).
I would have to pay an extra $6 p/m to use Kim’s site, which isn’t too bad, so I may try the program free for a month and see how it goes…
Sorry, but I just wanted to say that I’m not knocking Songsmart or Planning Centre. They’re both great resources and tools to have as a worship leader, but if there’s something out there that is easier to use and saves time when preparing a worship service then I’m all for it!
Here here. I love it. I know some folks who rave about Planning Centre, so I’m curious to hear the comparison. I think Planning Centre is great for larger churches who have to coordinate a lot of volunteers for their services, and worshipteam.com caters more to the worship leader and the stuff he/she needs?
But yeah, I’m loving worshipteam.com, and my other worship leaders love it too. Not sure if this is a good thing, but one of my worship bands stopped rehearsing during the week because they could so easily share the mp3’s ahead of time. I’ll have to pray about that one…
Just did a set for my time here in Kelowna.
Exactly 3 minutes.
Selected 3 songs.
Changed keys.
Printed charts.
Made a PowerPoint.
Done.
Happy worship leader.
Hey, coming the Abbotsford way at all??
I wish.
Simply the best product on the market. We’re a smallish church with many beginning musicians. Worshipteam gives us all the tools we need to not only provide quality worship on sundays, but also to develop musicians and teams as well as handle all the administrative tasks that go along with the job. Thanks Kim for being faithful to the calling God has given you. Your obedience truly has had a global impact.
and oh…did I mention it’s legal/morally right too?!…Not so sure about planningcentre…hmmm…does anyone have any further info on this topic for planningcentre? I’d hate to put something out there that’s incorrect.
I have most of the planning done though. ,
That’s a good question. I’m going to connect with Kim Gentes on this.
The legal issue, it seems, is actually important to worship leaders. We feel a slight twinge of guilt when we consider forwarding an .mp3, or doing anything that feels like the writer (or even the non-descript ‘industry’) might be upset if they knew we did it.
Not that we’re all perfect altruists in these matters, but we are Christians who believe that our followership of Christ demands some attention to this detail.
What Kim has built in WorshipTeam.com, I know is the legal one out there. It would be good to hear from the others on this.
I’ll see what I can do friends.
I researched every product on the market to replace my homebrewed FileMaker Pro/hundreds of PDFs system almost 2 years ago. No other product could meet our requirement/desirements list. The legal audio playback is huge along with the ability to upload our custom arrangements, usually built on pre-existing ones. One of the biggest pluses, pleasantly discovered after we signed on, is Kim & company’s responsiveness to our input. It’s like “man, I wish this worked THIS way” and they come back “no problem” and BAM! it’s implemented. They have been really patient with walking some of through workflow until we “got it.” I can’t imagine worship planning without this tool and can’t say enough good things about how it’s changed how our worship teams work together.
P.S. If they implement SamePage support, we’ll just have to buy a system. That will radically change how we conduct worship I think
Larry, great thoughts on this. It really is a quick turnaround, how they keep the product upgraded and ready to role according to customer requests.
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