Questions to Ask Your Rock Partner

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What to learn before retaining a Rock Partner.


Finding a Rock Partner is the first step in many churches' journey to Rock. Having an established set of options shows the power and stability of the Rock ecosystem. But sometimes having choices can be overwhelming. To help with that we've put together this guide to get you started.

Your Strategy

Getting your Rock environment right is critical to the mission of your church. You'll not only be investing time and money in the process, but you'll also be investing your church's momentum. To find your perfect partner we suggest you consider the following:

  1. Be sure to interview 2-3 partners in the community. Investing time up front can greatly improve the success of your project.
  2. The Bible tells us "You will Know Them by Their Fruits". Use this same wisdom when selecting a partner. Look at their current work. Ask to speak to a reference church.
  3. Do your homework. The more you can learn ahead of time the better off you'll be. Don't worry, this doesn't need to be difficult. We've provided questions to ask the partners below.
What to Ask

Questions For Partners

Below is a list of questions to ask partners as you research which will be the right fit for your ministry.

General Questions

These questions are great for any type of project.

  1. Are you an official Rock Partner that contributes to Spark?
  2. How do you determine our needs and improve our current processes, then tailor Rock to meet our needs?
  3. What skills does your organization specialize in (implementations, websites, mobile apps, etc.)?
  4. How do you charge for your work? Is it retainer based, time and materials, other? How about change orders?
  5. How do you store my sensitive data like passwords?
  6. How is your staff trained and assessed in terms of their technical and Rock knowledge?
  7. Do you keep track of the changes made to my Rock instance?
  8. What type of ongoing support do you offer?
  9. Do you follow the best practices outlined by Spark? (not changing core functionality or UI using JavaScript and CSS, etc.).
  10. What does your training look like for your new and seasoned staff? How do you keep up with the latest features in Rock?

Implementations

The questions below are specific to implementations and data conversations.

  1. What is your process around data conversations from my current platform?
  2. How will my data be stored while doing an implementation?
  3. How do you handle training?

Development Work

Below are a set of questions for partners who will be doing development work for your organization.

  1. Who owns the intellectual property of the projects we hire you to work on?
  2. Who is responsible for maintaining my code going forward?
  3. Will you change the core blocks on my site? I understand that is not a best practice and can break my instance when I upgrade.
  4. Do you use source control to ensure my work is backed up?

Websites, Mobile Apps & Apple TV Apps

Below are the questions for projects related to websites, Mobile Apps and Apple TV Apps.

  1. How do your digital Rock projects work?
  2. What types of mockups will I received before the site or application is developed?
  3. What Rock features can I expect to be implemented in my new site?
  4. What personalization strategies have you employed with other sites?
  5. How do you test the performance of the site or application you build for me?

About Rock

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Going Deeper

Rock is a project of Spark Development Network