With the dominance of social media networks such as Facebook and Twitter in recent years, some individuals and businesses believe that maintaining a traditional website and blog is unnecessary. At Blue Zenith, we believe that a website should be the primary focus of the online presence that you develop for yourself or the company that you represent.
The Perceived Advantages Of Going Strictly Social
It seems like Facebook and Twitter are everywhere these days! With a user base numbering in the billions, Facebook has effectively cornered the social media market. Although Twitter has fewer active users, its reach extends into almost every aspect of media today, with Twitter usernames often replacing email addresses as the main point of online contact for many public figures, including celebrities, prominent members of the media and the business community. Instagram, a social media image sharing service, is quickly becoming a favored platform of young Internet users, while other services are becoming favored platforms among other subsets of the population keen on connecting online.
The Abandonment Of Websites
For some professionals, social media has become the primary focus of their online initiatives, and some are abandoning traditional websites in favor of making a Facebook or Twitter page the hub of their online presence and identity. For some, it’s a matter of cost – almost all social media services are free, and maintaining a social media profile requires no technical training to master. For others, they believe that a website is simply redundant – social media profiles and pages, especially Facebook Pages, allow static information such as contact information and hours of operation to be displayed alongside updates and other dynamic content.
Why Your Business Still Needs A Website
Before you consider dumping your website in favor of going “strictly social”, consider your relationship with social media networks such as Facebook and Twitter. When a service is free, oftentimes you aren’t the customer – instead, you’re the product. We don’t like to think of ourselves as anyone’s “product”, but the content we produce for social media networks can be perceived as a product, which the social media networks monetize for their own benefit through the use of advertising. When you own and control your own website, your content belongs to you, and you are free to present, modify and monetize it in any way you choose.
Social Media Constantly Changes
In addition to controlling your own content, social media networks offer other distinct disadvantages over traditional websites. As a user within user bases that number in the nine and ten figures, customer service for users on social media services is often non-existent, and social media companies are free to make changes to their platforms and services, often with little to no input from their users. Vital features can be removed without warning, user interfaces and page designs can also be altered with little notice and services can be discontinued and removed with no recourse for affected users. It is important to note that you do not own your social media profiles, and some social media networks even have issued ambiguous or conflicting public statements and policies in regards to content ownership and usage.
Stay In Control
When you own and control your own website, you are in the driver’s seat. You are in complete control of your own content, the design and presentation of your website, and you are free to make your website work for you through the use of SEO tools and calls to action. When there is a problem, your hosting company and your webmaster will respond quickly, and most importantly, you are in complete control of your branding and online presence.
A Balanced Approach To Your Online Presence
Although we believe that it is a mistake to replace your website with a social media page, we still strongly believe in using Social Media to build a well-maintained online presence. Social media services are invaluable tools for connecting with your target audience and building your brand online, and we recommend that every business should utilize at least one social media service. We simply believe that social media services shouldn’t be your final destination online; instead, they should be used to channel or funnel visitors to your website, which provides you with a greater opportunity to convert those visitors into paying customers or users of your own services.