In this post I’ll address some things I have heard, or been asked recently by potential clients. Although other web designers might give somewhat different answers, most of this is pretty common knowledge for web designers in general.
Can I use Facebook instead of a website?
Put simply, no, that would be crazy. And here are some reasons why:
- Facebook is a social network, not a business network. While you can post specials and interact with clients and potential clients on Facebook, business should be done in a business setting. Use Facebook to start the conversation. Use your business website to finish it.
- Most people use Facebook to keep in touch with family and friends. While some people might be interested in doing business on Facebook, many other people will not.
- You do not own your Facebook page. If Facebook goes down, you go down with it. If Facebook cancels your account, or changes the rules, you suffer.
- Facebook isn’t an effective way to be found in search engines. Google uses the existence of a Facebook page to raise the ranking of your business website, not the other way around.
- Facebook business pages offer fewer features than personal pages. And if you try to use your personal page for business, Facebook can delete your account.
- The most important reason; it’s not a professional way to do business. If you don’t have a business website, you will not be seen as committed to doing business.
And the opposite; I hate social media! Why should I use it on my site?
As someone who got into the social media game a bit late, I have had to learn it on the fly. And still our own social media isn’t what it should be. I could use the old excuse, “A house painter’s house always needs painting”, but people don’t usually drive by that house painter’s house to decide whether to give him a job or not…
Some of these statistics are listed elsewhere on this website, but here they are again. A lot of this is courtesy of Hubspot’s Marketing Grader:
- Nearly 2/3 of US Internet users regularly use a social network
- 52% of 55-64 year old internet users have joined a social network
- About 46% of daily internet users read more than one blog every day
- Companies that blog get 55% more web traffic and 70% more leads than those that don’t
- Companies that use Twitter average 2x more leads per month than those that do not
- 79% of US Twitter users are more likely to recommend the brands that they follow
- More than 1/2 of active Twitter users follow companies, brands, or products on social networks
I know a guy who works at Radio Shack who can build my website for $800.00
Hey, good luck with that! Just because he builds it, that doesn’t mean that they will come. A few things that the guy at Radio Shack isn’t qualified to do:
- Create good SEO – keyword density, meta data, submission to major search engines
- Build an easy to use system to change your site content
- Format your digital media (slideshows, videos, etc.)
- Know what to watch in Google Analytics – time on site, individual page views, trends
- Configure e-commerce
- Build a navigation system that will guide site visitors through the most important pages of your site
I could have added at least ten more items to all of these lists. But I wanted to give you a taste of some things that I am asked about frequently. Hopefully it will give you a starting point for learning what a business site should be.