NO KEYNOTES • NO BREAKOUTS • NO VENDOR PITCHES • NO CANVA TUTORIALS • 30 SEATS • SAN DIEGO • FEB 2027 •NO KEYNOTES • NO BREAKOUTS • NO VENDOR PITCHES • NO CANVA TUTORIALS • 30 SEATS • SAN DIEGO • FEB 2027 •NO KEYNOTES • NO BREAKOUTS • NO VENDOR PITCHES • NO CANVA TUTORIALS • 30 SEATS • SAN DIEGO • FEB 2027 •NO KEYNOTES • NO BREAKOUTS • NO VENDOR PITCHES • NO CANVA TUTORIALS • 30 SEATS • SAN DIEGO • FEB 2027 •NO KEYNOTES • NO BREAKOUTS • NO VENDOR PITCHES • NO CANVA TUTORIALS • 30 SEATS • SAN DIEGO • FEB 2027 •NO KEYNOTES • NO BREAKOUTS • NO VENDOR PITCHES • NO CANVA TUTORIALS • 30 SEATS • SAN DIEGO • FEB 2027 •

// Who's behind this

Not a company.
Not a church.
Not an agency.

It's built by Chris Mefford.

Chris spent years leading marketing for The Rock Church — one of the 15 largest churches in the nation — managing a $3 million budget across multiple campuses. He learned what works at scale. More importantly, he learned what works without the budget.

He's the author of the Amazon bestseller Leadership Is Overrated, served as VP of Marketing for Dave Ramsey, and now directs SEO for one of the largest websites on the planet — 1.1 billion pages. Most of his time now goes toward how people find things through ChatGPT, LLMs, and the new Google — the AEO/GEO shift that's rewriting how churches get discovered.

His church marketing course on Udemy holds a 4.7-star rating across 45 reviews — 71% five-star — with hundreds of completions. His focus isn't helping churches market more. It's helping them become impossible to miss — so the message about Jesus actually reaches the people looking for it.

// About

Church marketing conferences are still selling you last year's toolkit.

That would be a shame for any industry. For the church, it's worse — the stakes aren't market share. The whole point of the work is helping people find Jesus, and you can't do that with a playbook written before AI search existed.

A room full of booths. A bag of pens. A breakout on "Five Canva Hacks" sponsored by the template shop. A main-stage "case study" that turns out to be a funnel-template pitch. By lunch you've been sold three content calendars, two hashtag strategies from 2019, and a "game-changing" volunteer recruitment tactic your church already tried in 2021.

The tools changed. Search changed. The playbook changed. But the conference floor is still full of vendors who need you to believe the old way works.

We didn't invite them. We don't take their money. We don't owe them a stage.

What we deleted

  • Keynotes
  • Breakout sessions
  • Vendor booths
  • Beginner content
  • Swag bags
  • An audience

What's left

  • One room.
  • Thirty practitioners.
  • Laptops open.
  • Real websites on the big screen.
  • AI search, schema, AEO, GEO.
  • The work, done before you fly home.

// The room

Torrey Pines Church, San Diego.

February 18–19, 2027. One room, thirty seats, laptops open. No expo hall, no lobby full of booths — just a church that was generous enough to hand us the keys for two days.

And the location isn't lost on us: we're within a half mile of the Pacific Ocean and the world-famous Torrey Pines Golf Course. Come do the work, then go watch the sunset.

Illustration of a group of church marketers presenting and working together around a table

The other 29 people are the conference.

You've been the best marketer in the room at every church conference you've ever attended. For two days, you won't be. That's the gift.

APPLY TO BE THERE

// Next step

Think you belong in the room?

Take the 2-minute Findability Audit and see how your church scores.

30 seats · Application only · Feb 18–19, 2027

Take the audit →