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I am seeing more and more of a trend for business owners, especially small business owners in North Georgia and Western North Carolina to try and substitute a Facebook Page for a website.  You need a website in North Georgia and you need a website in Western North Carolina.  It is how the rest of the world competes, and it is how you need to compete.

In today’s economy I certainly see the reasoning behind wanting to substitute a Facebook Page for a website:  almost everyone knows how to create a Facebook Page, not many know how to develop and create a website, so from a cost perspective it “can be done by me”.  While I agree that a business just starting out may not have the capital to throw into the development of website, I would also say that a website should be at the top of the list for anyone who wants to have their business taken seriously and is looking to bring in new clientele.

Facebook and other social media sites should be used primarily to engage existing customers and help maintain and create a greater bond with those customers.  But how much can a Facebook page really say about your business?  You can put out a lot of information:  daily specials, pictures from a recent event, even a little about your company.  The problem lies in the amount or lack of information that can be given.  Other than a small blurb about your company, all information is given one post at a time.  This means the average consumer will have trouble “finding” the exact information they are looking for.  Research says on average you have 7 seconds to grab someone’s attention when they land on your web page, remember a Facebook page is still ultimately a web page.

There is also the question of how someone is going to find your page.  Yes, Google, Yahoo, Bing and other search engines index Facebook Pages, but with so little information, ranking highly on these sites would be difficult at best.  Search engines also look at “Back Links”, the amount of other web pages linking to your web page to determine rankings.  How many people or companies do you think will link to your Facebook Page, outside of Facebook? 

Don’t get me wrong, Facebook is a wonderful way to enhance and promote your business.  But don’t confuse that promotion with having an actual location online where current and prospective customers can find out more about your company.

I believe in testing these things out, so I did a Google search on “Restaurant in Blairsville GA”.  My results were unfortunately as I had expected.  The only non-franchise or chain restaurant in Blairsville, GA having an active website in the first seven pages was The Hole in the Wall restaurant.  The rest of the links were restaurant review websites and the like. 

Murphy, NC did a bit better when I searched “Restaurant in Murphy NC” with Brother’s Restaurant, The Chophouse, ShoeBooties Café, Gaston’s Fusion, and Doyle’s Cedar Hill Restaurant all making the first page.  However after that, there were only two restaurants in the next 4 pages.

Most important in all of this, not once did a Facebook Page show up in either search, through all of those pages!

So don’t just rely on a Facebook Page,  you need a website as well!