Creating search categories allows you to define how people will search for groups. The cool thing about search categories is that they apply to all groups that are searchable regardless of group type! This is a powerful concept that will allow you to create very detailed or very broad searches.
One option is to create a broad search category such as one that will look for all groups that have a marital status preference of Married. Or, you could create a more specific search category such as one that will look for all groups that have a marital status preference of Married and an age range preference of 30 to 40.
ACTION: Think of some search categories that might work for the groups you want to make available on your church website.
| Search Category | Criteria |
|---|---|
Note: You do not need to create search categories for campus. This is a setting that you can control in the Admin area of Fellowship One. See Group Type Admin for details. A Campus drop-down will appear in the website application so people looking for a group can filter search results by campus.
An example search category might be Singles Bible Study Groups. To configure this kind of search category, the Speciality custom fields could be used and the group would be flagged as a Bible Study. The search category form would look like this:
Another example search category is life-stage based. For example, Empty Nester groups, Divorce Care groups and so on. To configure this kind of search category, you need a custom field for life stages (like Divorced or Separated). The search category form would look like this:
Below is the Search Category view in Fellowship One (Groups› Administration › Search Categories):
As you can see in the image, Fellowship One users are first presented by the total number of groups that do not match any category. This view also provides a listing of all the search categories, the number of searchable groups within that category, and whether that category is published. You can further filter the list of search categories to only show Published or Unpublished categories.
Note: Searchable groups are those groups that the Group Type and the Group are both flagged as searchable.
When you click on the name of a search category, Fellowship One users can:
1. See all the groups that fall into that category whether searchable or not
2. Edit the details of the search category by modifying the name, description and the publish status of the category
3. Edit search criteria
4. Delete the category
In the Actions area, you have the ability to create a new search category. See Creating a Search Category for step by step instructions on creating search categories for your church.