Do you need a website when you already have a Facebook page?

It is a question we are often asked, and it is a legitimate one. Your Facebook page is running, you post on it regularly, your customers write to you there. So why pay for a website on top of that?

The honest answer is not “you absolutely need a website”. It is rather: these two tools do not do the same job, and most businesses that hesitate confuse the two.

Your page does a job well that the website will never do

Let us start with what works. A Facebook or Instagram page is movement. You show a new delivery, a smiling team, a dish of the day, and your customers see it the same day. They comment, they share, they write to you in two clicks.

It is a fantastic tool for reminding the people who already know you that you exist, and for being discovered by their friends. No website does that.

So no, there is no question of abandoning your page.

But it has three limits nobody tells you about

You are not at home. Your page belongs to Facebook. The display rules change without warning you, the reach of your posts can drop overnight, and an account can be suspended by mistake. Everything you have built rests on ground that does not belong to you.

Everything disappears as you scroll down. A post lives for a few days, then it is buried under the following ones. Your prices, your opening hours, your story, your work: if it is in a post from March, nobody will find it any more. A website keeps every piece of information in its place, permanently.

People do not find you in the same way. When someone looks for a florist, a roofer or a guest house, they rarely type their search into Facebook. They type it into Google. And Google mainly sends people to websites and business profiles.

The right division of roles

The most accurate image we have found: your Facebook page is the shop window on a busy street. Your website is the shop.

The window catches the eye, it creates desire, it makes passers-by stop. The shop is where people go in, take the time to look around, and make up their minds. You would not install a shop window with no shop behind it. Yet that is what many businesses do online.

In practical terms, the page attracts, the website reassures and converts. A customer who discovers you on Facebook and hesitates will look for your website before calling. If they do not find one, the doubt remains.

A useful website is not a big website

This is where many give up, imagining a project lasting several months. It is not necessary.

A website that works for you, in its simplest version, fits on one well-made page:

• Who you are, in a few lines that make people want more.
• What you offer, clearly, without jargon.
• Real photos of your establishment, sharp and recent.
• How to reach you: phone, form, address, opening hours.

Nothing more. A page like that can be read in thirty seconds, displays correctly on a phone, and answers all the questions a customer asks themselves before contacting you. You can always expand it later, when you feel the need.

And if you have neither one nor the other

Then start with the page and with your business profile on Google. It is free, it is quick, and it makes you visible straight away. The website will come next, when you know precisely what your customers ask you most often. They are the ones who will write the content of your homepage, without knowing it.

What we can do

You know your trade. Putting online a clear, fast page that displays well on a phone is ours. We design websites and web pages for businesses and accommodation, from a single page to a complete online shop, with your photos showcased.

If you are wondering what would be useful in your specific case, write to us. We look at your situation and tell you frankly what is worth it, and what can wait.