Should a small business use a Facebook Page instead of a Web Site?

Here's another question posted on Focus.com that addresses this topic.

“What is the downside to using facebook as your sole website?”
http://www.focus.com/questions/marketing/what-downside-using-facebook-your-so...

Absolutely not.

I think you need both. Facebook requires care and feeding. It is a way for your business to build up a community. Your website is much more of a static environment (don't be completely stagnant there) where people will come to learn more information about your business.

Quite frankly, this sounds like a cost question. Should I incur the cost of building a web platform or can I get away with just utilizing a Facebook page and get hopefully, the same thing at a lower cost?

Unfortunately, one must look at these items as part of a bigger picture and not in isolation. The web platform used to be something that could exist somewhat in isolation but even then Pay-Per-Click campaigns were recommended as a way to drive more traffic to the platform. Now with the explosion of Social Media, its ability to be completely self-sufficient is even less so. Just like you should not abandon your non-online marketing efforts in favor of only online efforts, you really should be considering all the tools. Maybe you cannot afford to roll them out all at once, but the game plan should include them in the strategy. Mobile marketing is becoming a very promising area, but once again it is another tool to market your product or service, not a standalone service. If appropriate for your business, it should be integrated into the total online and off-line marketing plan.

Jim, you need a website or website/blog combo first and foremost. All other social web activities including Facebook, Twitter and the others appropriate for your business can then use your site as the "foundation" for your business.

You do NOT control your domain name on social platforms, and is a must-have for your web/blog URL. You will spend considerable time in branding and recognition efforts to risk it all on Facebook changing how your page is named.

Use your website as the foundation for everything else you do. The deeper and wider your foundation the taller your business can grow.

I'm going to agree and disagree with Amy. You need to have both a website and a Fan Page. You need to think of it (Facebook) as another avenue to reach your prospective customers. Where I disagree with Amy is that your website is a much more static environment, although she says not completely stagnant. So I guess I only half disagree! People should be coming to your website through the search engines, social media and other marketing avenues to read your blog and to eventually convert from a website visitor to a lead.

A small business should have both effectively. Both have their place in creating revenue for the business.

To your Success,
Ken
www.kenvarga.com
…helping businesses increase customer acquisition by up to 32.7% in as little as 3 to 6 months, and increase customer retention by up to 90%.
FREE Ebook: "10 Marketing Mistakes That Steal Your Cash" at www.kenvarga.com

No! You website should not have a blog component and/or be built on a blog platform. It is your "Home" - your Core. It is where you build your subject matter expertise. Think of Facebook as the Chamber meeting - an introduction of sorts. Ultimately, you want them to go to your website. With Facebook you lose control and that it’s a saturated marketplace where messages can get lost or even hidden. Your website visitors are a captive audience Here is a post I did that addresses that exact topic.http://rickmorganconsulting.com/blog/2010/10/08/yes-you-still-need-a-website/

In today's business environment a website should be the destination for your business just like Chris said above. Other activities you pursue should be highways back to your business ( brick and mortar) and activities and a Facebook Page should definitely be one of them. ( see my colleague's post on Facebook Places http://goo.gl/br4RM )

Now on the other side you have to make sure you integrate the social components to your website using tools like the Facebook Like button. It helps your visitors know that should they ever need to look for you on Facebook where to find you. Any updates you post on your Facebook Page will appear on your fan's streams( handle that with with care) and also your website will get indexed in Facebook so you will appear in searches made on Facebook.

Hope this helps.

Hi Jim,

In most situations, you should NOT use a Facebook Page instead of a Blog/ Website.

If you have a small business or home business, you should first establish a blog / website. It is very easy to do. wordpress.com is a great solution for websites and blogs. It is a very popular and free to set up and host on the internet. You can build it yourself or find lots of other resources to help you get started... and make it fancy.

Once you have the blog / website going, you can set up a Facebook Page (and other social media services) to drive people to your own site.

Good to know: Facebook has a long history of making changes to their policies "at will" and without any notice to users and companies. Unfortunately, many of them have NOT been received very well. High Risk Privacy Policies have been a big issue. If you only have a Facebook Page, your company is at high risk to Facebook policies.

If you have your own Blog / Website, your content is your own and a company like Facebook can't take it away, give it away, sell the info to others or change how it is used without your approval.

Don't get me wrong. With 500 million members, most companies should have a Facebook Page for marketing. FYI... we have a Facebook Page for our Company and recommend them for our clients.

Final thoughts to my post above:

Do you want your business branded image to be tied to facebook and their platform design, style, colors, and sometimes annoying features? This is very restrictive - I don't care how many other features they add over time.

This is of course including the issue about the URL address, but I am mostly talking about standing out. How is someone going to distinguish you from the zillion crowd when your business page looks like everyone else's. The only thing different is the words on the page. If you aren't going to be different, don't bother being in business. In todays' world, you won't make it.

I guess the bigger question when you are deciding this is: Do you want to build your own company? You are either building up theres or building yours. It's your choice.

Facebook is a super platform to drive traffic to your sight, build a network, and share in real time. It's a good place to join groups, etc. There are lots of plusses to it for the business community, but with all these social/business platforms, you must always step back and put things in perspective and remember you are a serious business.

You want to be able to control as much as you can with your business. You don't want to add to the uncontrolled areas. So why leave the most crucial aspect of your business - your presence online - the one way you let the world know you exist - up to facebook to control?

You need both. Website is very critical to highlight you & your company.

Any social/ professional media tools are platforms to promote and highlight your company to a global audience. These are efficient techniques to help you leverage the power of web for marketing & branding initiatives.

Jim, I think that you should name and shame the web and PR consultants who are giving out that type of advice. It sounds to me as if their business model is based solely on providing Facebook development services.

A website is central to any online marketing strategy and all the efforts around it, e.g. Search Engine Optimisation & Social Media Marketing, are to drive targeted traffic to it. It is this traffic that you are trying to entice to become your customers and you can only do this on a platform that is under your control, i.e. your company website.

You can use the likes of Facebook to engage your customers and potential customers by engaging them in conversation and encouraging them to give you feedback on any number of things. You must remember though that you do not own the content on the likes of Facebook, that they are more prone to denial of service attacks and that they can close your account if they decide that they don't like you any more.

On-line marketing takes as much effort as any other type of marketing and you should really start by defining your strategy and building a marketing plan that you can assign a budget to and implement.

Advising that you can run your online business or concentrate your marketing efforts only on Facebook is just plain wrong.

Looks like I came late to this party, but no, absolutely not. Facebook is right for many, but not all - the main problem is that you don't really own the content (let alone have all the flexibility you need to modify it and are on a platform where you have less control over the entire experience). There's so much great information posted by people above, I'm not going to expand on anything already written, but want to leave one thought.

Google's single biggest threat isn't bing; it's facebook by a country mile. Facebook can bring a lot of exposure within it's own ecoverse, but it is in Google's self-preservation interests not to give their pages too much credit within their algorithm. Search engines bring a steady stream of buyers to businesses; if you rely only on facebook, you'll likely be greatly cutting off that avenue.

I agree with most of the previous posts -- NO! You need a website to look professional and an official company these days. You can then add a Facebook page that enhances the messaging in your website and draws people to more traffic for you.

If cost is an issue, it shouldn't be. You can build your own website on Wordpress for free! You just need a little bit of know-how and playing to get it to work! It can look how you want without it costing a fortune. You can always redo your website down the road when you have money!

Both your website and Facebook need to be nurtured constantly to give people a reason to come back and visit you (on both platforms).

Agree largely with Jim and others in here.

Instead of? No. Ultimately you need to have control over content and layout etc and not be constrained by someone else's format as others have mentioned.

As well as? Maybe. Depends on your business and target audience.

Vital that you own your own domain.

I think it is safe to say that you need both especially when reviewing previous comments. It is important to point out that a small business website is your portal to prospective clients, maintaining existing clients and needs to reflect your business inside and out. On the other hand a facebook page (company profile) or a fanpage serve very unique purposes and should be pursued after your website has been launched. The facebook page is a perimeter gate that when entered needs to bring them to a call to action. If the website isn't dialed in the facebook page will serve no real value.

Depending on your business you likely will need both but definitely a web site. A facebook page is more a social site where you can communicate with regular customers and perhaps attract a few new ones. It typically is more informal. A website is more formal and more business focused and I find often legitimizes your business. The website can be interactive too and communicative as well so it doesn't have to be static or staid. As a matter of fact I would encourage your website not to be static. I have seen people judge a business by the currency of their news, articles, updates, etc. However, facebook does cover alot of members so I wouldn't neglect it totally but would limit information to that which is public and you don't worry about from a competitive standpoint. The way I look at Facebook and other social sites is its just another means of advertising but not foundational to your business. The cost of maintaining a website and a facebook page are small and doing both can be very worthwhile.

Absolutely not, but having a Facebook page adds to your marketing and advertising and branding for your business. I am the owner of a home based golf business. I have both a web site and a Facebook page for my business plus a personal page. I have over 3800 golf friends through my personal page and over 1100 likes on my Facebook business page. I work daily on all of these. My sales come from all of the above. We received our largest order in August of this year from a golf friend I had met through my personal Facebook page. It was the largest order we received in the 4 1/2 years we've been in business! If done the right way you can really use Facebook for marketing and branding.

Breaking News! This could not be more timely in regards to this discussion: this supports my argument for lack of control:

http://www.bgr.com/2010/11/16/facebook-confirms-account-disabling-bug-claims-...

Here is what I learned from a great new company called Vitrue. People rarley if ever visit a company fan page more than once. They find it once. If they like it then they "Like" it. TAfter that, the business Fan page feeds to their personal page on the news feed and they almost never if ever visit the actual Fan page again. So, if you build the business Web site only in facebook, it is not used as a normal Web site, and you need to be a facebook user to find and use the site.

Does that ring true with all of you?

You need GOOD exposure, not JUST exposure. If you want to get on a social networking site to pump your business, go with linkedin. More business people are on it, it's just a better place for business. Having twitter is a good idea too, IF you add value. For instance, you might tweet every once in a while about something your potential (or current), customers would be interested to know. DON'T use it to simply talk. Use FB or some other social network for that.

AND you need a website! They are easy to put together and they are pretty inexpensive. You don't need high end, you need "business professional".

Facebook should supplement your website not replace it. That said, if you are one of those small businesses that have NO web presence, it is not a bad place to start. One big difference is the fact that you do not own your Facebook page. With a website you control your domain (xyz.com) an can use it in a variety of ways (e.g. websites, email) to enhance your reputation. On the other hand Facebook could make a change to its Pages that have no control of. Bottom line: You should have both.

Expanding on Richard's remarks about Facebook presence depending on your business or target audience, I am not sure I agree. I think a Facebook presence is rapidly becoming a business reality. When you consider that Facebook has approximately 500M active users, broad based demographics and that the average user spends some 56 minutes a day on Facebook, I think it is important that you have a presence there to keep you top of mind. Couple that with the fact that, according to a recent report, Facebook's low-cost, pay-per-click advertising is more successful than that of Google Ads and I think you will see why you need to be there. In my mind, the reality is that I don't care if a potential customer's curiousity is piqued by something I posted on my page, a Facebook ad that he saw while playing Farmville in his pajamas or some other form of business or marketing communications. I just need to attract his attention and Facebook gives me a platform to do that effectively at a minimal cost.

Just my two cents...

First, a website promotes your business to those who do not use social networking. Second, the trend is shifting on business use of social networking. LinkedIn would primarily be for business however others like Facebook are gaining ground. Who is your audience? How often do you want to communicate with your them? The type of service or product that you provide will need to be marketed according to the niche of each social networking that you decide to go with.

Website first, FB secondary (if at all).

A professional website (and blog) is a necessity, not only for existing customers but for REFERRALS!

My Very Own URL should pop up when anyone Googles me or my business name. My website has everything One Needs to Know to make that Initial Postive Impression. Ease of access to information matters.

My customers/clients may find me, contact me and quickly send my web URL to their networks, anywhere in the world.

Works for me!

Karen L. Fink
Organize 2 Harmonize, LLC
Eclectics Interiors
Portland, OR

No, you should have both a Facebook page and a web site to effectively promote your business to the online community. Social Media is utilized extensively for advertising, branding and building a social community today. However, the end game for businesses using Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and other social media services should be to actively promote their products and services via an opt-in service. In this scenario, a Facebook page becomes a vehicle to enable businesses to reach a broader demographic, while driving traffic to the company web site for additional information, resources and ordering purposes.

No!

There is a lot of talk about how companies don't really control their brands, how the users/followers control the conversations that are out in the webisphere. While there is certainly truth to that, you absolutely control what YOU say about your brand and how YOU position it in the marketplace. But, you really only control that on your own site. Facebook, as well as all of the other social media platforms, can change their terms at any time. They could even decide that you are no longer in control of your page's content. Then what?

What would happen if you only had a Facebook page and FB closed up shop tomorrow? Where would all your prospects and customers be then? You would be starting from ground-zero in trying to build your following.

Most importantly, you want traffic on your site - these people are your prospects and customers. So, even if you use every platform out there to promote your business, you want to direct traffic back to your site. You want to provide a home for your audience, a place where you can deliver value (products and services) your prospects and customers want and where you can ensure your brand is represented in a manner consistent with your overall business goals.

Bottom line, FB and all the other platforms are simply tools, marketing tools like direct mail and advertising (with the expection that SM tools provide the opportunity for social interaction that direct mail and advertising rarely did). You wouldn't turn your prospects and customers over to a magazine in which you placed an ad, so why give them to FB, Twitter or YouTube?

The main things we need are outlined in Maslows Hierarchy. After that, it's all wants.

And wants often are determined on our funds and time. So, if you had to have one, I'd go with a website.

IMO, for B2B's having a website page that takes you directly to facebook is tacky.

I just wanted to jump back in here for a few minutes and address some of the comments regarding the use of Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, etc. in terms of not being able to control your brand and lack of customization.

While I do not think these items should be replacements for your web platform, since I consider that to be the cornerstone of the entire building process, they can be very useful. They are also much more flexible than some have suggested and not necessarily a runaway train in terms of controlling your brand image.

Please refer to the following link to see what can be done with a professional fan page; I think you will be pleasantly surprised https://www.box.net/shared/k2o2ap6ltd With a look and feel like this you can control your image and brand very easily.

Please do not hesitate to contact us at The CB Group, LLC, cboykin@wsimarketing.com if you would care to have this type of look and feel for your company in Facebook

I would say that you need to have all of the social networking site like Facebook, Twitter, Linkedin, and Myspace part of your website strategy. Here are my reasons why
1. Your website is static no matter how much you update it you still need some one to search for it and when they find it they just get either raw data or simple reason to buy. They don't really know about you and your business on a personal level. Social networks can change that.

2. Updating with social networks you can interact with your customers or potential customers in real time to find out what they need from your product or service that you can not be done on a website.

3. I have been using social networking sites since 2002 with Linkedin is where I been getting most of my clients for the last seven years. I then added Myspace, Youtube, Facebook, and now Twitter. That my customers can use to see what I am doing. I also use the social networking sites to blog information about what's going on in my industry and see what my competition or potential partners are doing. In fact my last three clients contacted me because they were reading my post.

4. Making money from social networks. My last three clients although they had website they where not conveniced that social networking could help their business. Let take client 1. They did business coaching of all things showing other how to make business work better. I totld them that Youtube could make them better by open up their onsite seminars to a whole new audience. They said no and because they felt Youtube was for kids not or a business. Then about two years later I get an email from them saying they did one Youtube video and it increased their seminars that was $5000.00 for a weekend by 20% because they did a 10 min promo on Youtube that was linked to their website. I told then congraduation and welcome to the 21th century. I though that it was ironic that a business coaching company who job was to make a business better didn't use the one thing that could make business better.

My latest client had an exisiting website and a couple of social sites, but his last designer did not connect them together so people on his social network could not instantly visit his website to buy and any of the special on his site. Now that we have linked all of the sites together we have done analytics and found that the website visitors when up from 1000 per month to over 4000 views per month between the months of August to October. So if you think that not having social networks can't help your website or business. You don't really know what social networks can do for your business.

Howard Lee
CIO
Wirehead Technology

I have recently registered on a new site which combines the best of both. The site is www.abusyworld.com. They allow you to set up a simple site and invite people to view it and become contacts with you. My personal site is http://markparello.abusyworld.com. I honestly can say it works not just in attracting contact but in generating business. I have been contacted by a non member of the site because they were looking at who their friends contacts were! People can find you on the site and through the net. Please check out my site.