Are you trying to make a decision between using a website or Facebook page for business? While a Facebook page may be convenient and free, they don’t have the same long-term benefits as a business website.
There is nothing wrong with using Facebook for business but it’s important to expand your online presence and offer additional places for people to learn more about your company.
7 Reasons Why a Facebook Page Just Isn’t Good Enough
Facebook has a massive following and remains the largest social media platform to this day. Although it has a good amount of positive aspects, you’ll also begin to see the many disadvantages of Facebook for business the more you use it instead of a website.
1. Can’t Do SEO on Facebook
When done correctly, search engine optimization (SEO) opens up your website to a huge amount of organic traffic. The higher your search engine ranking on sites like Google, the better chance you’ll have at reaching the masses with your functioning website.
The best part is that this can often be done with little or no money depending on who creates your website content.
On the other hand, social media offers no chance for organic traffic because there is basically no such thing as SEO for Facebook business pages. If you want to reach large numbers of people and expand your social media following, the only way to accomplish that is with paid ads.
2. Facebook Advertising is Expensive
Once considered an affordable form of digital marketing, the price of Facebook ads has risen dramatically over the years. It has become highly competitive and also stands among the most expensive marketing options whether you want to do short-term or long-term campaigns.
The price for Facebook advertising varies based on the industry, products, or services you are trying to promote.
On average, the cost-per-click (CPC) with Facebook ads is around $1.72. It is about $0.45 per click for apparel and reaches as much as $3.77 for the finance and insurance industry.
Facebook ads are also becoming more restrictive due to new remarketing regulations with the iOS 14 iPhone update.
3. Competitors Can Advertise on Your Page
Facebook ads may be pricey but if your competition can afford it, there’s nothing stopping them from advertising their own products on your business page. Because they’ll be targeting the same people and similar demographics, other companies can reach out to visitors on your pages to promote what they have to offer.
This could include deals, discounts, and prices that undercut your own products or services.
4. You Can’t Always Control Comments
If something happens in your business that goes viral publicly, or you are a large front-facing company, the comments and messages you can receive on Facebook can be extremely negative and leave a bad impression to anyone who happens to find them. While you can generally delete negative comments, and ban people from commenting on your posts, you can’t stop them from posting negative things about that interaction as well to their friends list and potentially go viral.
When your website is the first thing a customer sees about your company, you control the messaging, imagery and tone visible. You are able to show them all the great things about your company first instead of trying to control the narrative on your own Facebook page.
5. Not Everyone Has or Uses a Facebook Account
While there are 2.8 billion active users on Facebook, that is out of nearly 4.4 billion people who have internet access. That means about 1.6 billion people have no way of finding your business or making a purchase.
This is easily one of the biggest disadvantages of using Facebook as a business website. You simply must have a presence online to ensure the billions of people who don’t use social media can still have a means of buying from you.
Even if someone has a Facebook account, that doesn’t mean they use it frequently enough to want to engage with businesses on social media. Often times, people are concerned based on the reputations these social media companies have for privacy and selling user information.
6. Less Authenticity & Industry Authority
Anyone with an internet connection can create a Facebook page within a matter of minutes. And without a high level of frequent promotion, they tend to look bland and disengaging.
Without a high-quality, responsive website, your business will have a difficult time being seen as an authority within the industry.
When you create a website that has a clean design and helpful content, visitors will grow to trust you more.
7. Lack of Ownership
Even though you made your Facebook page and added all of your business details, the reality is you have no ownership of the page or its features. The only thing that is yours will be any content you share on the page.
You also have little to no control over the features you have (or don’t have) on your business profile. Facebook is able to add or remove functionality at their discretion, which could mean you lose certain aspects that you like to have.
Facebook, like all other private social media companies, has even been known to suspend or completely shut down accounts if they don’t strictly follow the community guidelines and ad policies. If you don’t have a website and your Facebook business page is closed, you no longer have a presence online.
8. No Design Customization
The design limitations of Facebook can make it difficult for your business page to stand out among the billions of others exactly like it. Aside from setting your logo as the profile picture and changing your cover photo, there are very few ways to customize the design of your Facebook business page.
Unlike Facebook, a website is a blank slate that can be fully customized and tailored to your exact specifications. From colors and fonts to images, shapes, and beyond, there is nothing a dependable web design company can’t do to make your site look precisely how you want it to.
It’s Better to Have a Facebook Page AND a Great Website!
So should you have a website or Facebook page for business? The answer is simple; you should have both!
You’ll always find there are Facebook page advantages and disadvantages. Your business Facebook page can help promote brand awareness, provide engaging content, and offer a place for customers to share feedback. But its main use should be to drive traffic to your beautifully-designed website where visitors can be converted into sales.
If you don’t have a website yet, it is time to add one to your business online presence. The team at AWEBCO offers the best website design services around. Give us a call today at (217) 903-5999 or take a moment to try our website design calculator and get a FREE estimate!
One Response
Thanks for sharing this useful information! Hope that you will continue with the kind of stuff you are doing.