"Why do I need a website? My Facebook page is fine." We hear this all the time, especially from smaller, more relationship-driven businesses. It's a fair question. Here's the honest answer.
What social media does well
Social is genuinely good at things a website struggles with. It's the place to:
- Stay in regular touch with people who already know about you.
- Show personality and behind-the-scenes content.
- Run quick, low-cost local ad campaigns.
- Get found by people scrolling, who weren't necessarily looking for you.
Where a website does a different job
- Search discoverability. Social profiles and posts can appear in search, but a website gives you dedicated pages whose titles, content and local details you can shape around the questions customers search for.
- A stable place to compare. A website can organise services, prices, proof and policies without making visitors piece them together from a feed.
- More room for detail. Social captions and profile fields are useful but less suited to structured, long-lived information.
- More control and portability. A domain and website account can offer more control over presentation and migration, although control still depends on the platform, contract and access arrangements. Social audiences are generally harder to move between platforms.
Control is a practical difference
Neither route is risk-free. Domains can expire, hosting can fail and website platforms can change their terms. The difference is that a domain, content exports and accounts held in your business's name can make a website easier to control or move than a social audience. Check access, export and handover terms rather than assuming complete ownership of third-party software.
A balanced setup uses social for discovery and conversation, search for active demand, and a website for the information and actions that need to stay easy to find.
What "site + social" looks like in practice
When a simple page is enough
The fuller picture
We cover the broader question in this guide: The complete guide to small business websites. If you want a quote for a small, sensible site to sit alongside your social, our web presence service page covers how we approach it.