Introducing the ServeHQ Brand and Our New Product, HuddleUp

TL;DR – We’re changing our company name and rolling out a completely new and innovative communications tool for ministry leaders. Read on for details…

From the day I started building TrainedUp in 2015, my focus has been equipping ministry leaders who lead volunteer teams to serve well. Serving has been and will always be the core of our mission. Today’s announcement is about us doubling down on that mission.

To date, our main focus has been an online tool that has helped ministry leaders train and equip volunteers and future leaders. To that end, we’ve helped leaders equip over 40,000 people for the work of ministry. We’ve produced resources that have been downloaded and read by tens of thousands of leaders. We’ve supported podcasts and leaders who help ministry leaders excel and thrive. And we’ve personally coached hundreds of ministry leaders through challenges they face in day-to-day ministry.

In late 2018 our team began dreaming about our long term future. We looked beyond 2019 to envision who we would be and how we would expand on our mission in 2023. In five years, what will we be doing to make ministry leaders more effective than ever?

Unanimously, we knew we’d be doing more than just training. We’d be working with ministry leaders to build thriving teams that are fully equipped, engaged with their leader and one another, and part of the engine that grows their team and church.

We collected and organized feedback from thousands of ministry leaders, and used those insights to guide our conversation about how we’d serve them in the future. In other words, we’re building what leaders have asked us for since 2015.

The outcome of that long conversation was the decision to change our company name and start building something new that would expand how we serve ministry leaders.

Changing Our Name

With all of these changes, it’s time to grow our brand presence as well. TrainedUp has been a great and simple name for over 3 years, but with the addition of a new product (more on that below) as well as some future things already in the pipeline, we believe it’s time to make a name change.

We are a business that serves the local church, and we believe in the people who serve their local church. Service is our mission, core passion, and fundamental purpose.

That’s why we are changing our name to ServeHQ. ServeHQ will be the digital headquarters for the people who serve on your teams and the brand that will forever be focused on serving you.

We are still committed to TrainedUp, and the TrainedUp brand will still be around. TrainedUp development will continue, but it will be one tool in a growing toolkit from ServeHQ.

Rest assured, nothing has changed in our company structure or our team. We have not joined another company or been sold. We’re still the same team of ministry leaders looking to help other ministry leaders thrive.

What’s coming next

We identified a few very specific pain-points that ministry leaders have and, if solved, would have the most significant impact on their ministry effectiveness.

• Leaders have to manage multiple communication tools and social platforms to keep their teams in-the-loop.
• Leaders are worried about safety when it comes to digital communication, especially for those who work with minors and members of the opposite sex.
• Leaders want to build engagement and community among their team members, but digital tools like social media or chat apps fall short.

With those challenges clearly laid out, we started to think about how we could serve ministry leaders even better. We’re builders, so when we see challenges we tend to think about what we can build to solve those challenges. Here’s what we came up with:

• A unified communication system (one tool) that doesn’t feel like it was built in the 90s and replaces the disparate tools you’ve hacked together for years.
• A safe communication system that enables effective digital ministry while holding every leader accountable through transparency.
• A social-oriented communication system that facilitates engagement and community without leaning on social media or creating an internal social network.

Looking Forward to HuddleUp

We’re rolling out a new tool called HuddleUp. It will bring together email, SMS text, social-style posts, as well as one on one and group chat in one unified communication platform. It’ll be media-rich from the start (videos, images, GIFs, etc), look and work like a modern communications tool, and bring in some familiar social networking elements that you’re used to from Facebook and WhatsApp. There’s nothing like it that we’ve seen before.

HuddleUp will be safe and transparent, enabling accountable conversations with volunteers, parents, and students. It’ll remove the concern about what conversations leaders are having with each person in their church by allowing church leadership to view all communications happening in HuddleUp. Each person can stay above reproach and avoid the temptation that comes from private digital communication.

HuddleUp will be a social space for your people without feeling like a “church social network”. You’ll be able to foster team engagement throughout the week, not just on Sundays, with social posts, comments, file sharing, and group chats. With HuddleUp’s unique design, you’ll be able to use it for whole ministries as well as small groups and teams, all in the same account.

Because we’re building HuddleUp in a shared space with TrainedUp, you’ll be able to use your TrainedUp account with your HuddleUp account and vice-versa. The two tools will be separate, but share people-data between them so your teams are always in sync.

Finally, we’ve expanded our development and support teams to keep up with growth in our customer base and product offerings. We’re committed to continue providing the same personal, real-time support you’re used to getting from us.

Sign up to hear when the HuddleUp beta launches and have a chance to use it before anyone else.