Has the old website become a thing of the past

[JR1]

Ok I know they are not but........

I have had a website for many years, in fact I have been Into IT since sites were done by me in HTML, however, last year my son suggested that I do facebook.

As you can see I have facebook for my business and believe me, it knocks a webpage for me sideways.

I am linked to many of the riders and sports people, and when I do the Hill climbs and motocross this will be included too this year, so has anyone else found as I have that for business, contacts, promo the old website has now taken a back foot.

[Donald]

See also this thread that is closely related in subject matter and which would, broadly, be supportive of the sentiments expressed here.

I think the 'traditional website still has a place as a showroom. But you need to diorect people to it. And for that, various formsd of social media are indeed, as posts in that other thread I've referred to suggest, the marketing tools.

[Shadowman]

First, you have to get people to Facebook, just as you would with a website.

[flashback]

Jeremy, when I viewed your facebook page I saw a message that says join or login to facebook.
When I went to view your website I was immediately able to view your work.
I know which I prefer.

[LocalHero1953]

I don't see it as either/or: you need both. You can treat it as: website=showroom (and store), facebook=marketing literature. One is more long term, the other is ephemeral. This is not just a photography issue; most modern companies use physical shop fronts or offices, websites, facebook, twitter, email - whatever it takes to sell stuff. Even personal contact sometimes!

[JR1]

I don't see it as either/or: you need both. You can treat it as: website=showroom (and store), facebook=marketing literature. One is more long term, the other is ephemeral. This is not just a photography issue; most modern companies use physical shop fronts or offices, websites, facebook, twitter, email - whatever it takes to sell stuff. Even personal contact sometimes!

But that is not what I said

I said that facebook now offers more "front" than a webpage.

Take a photographic website, the main users are people getting married "Professional photographer stated last year". They actively "seek out" a site business in their area.

However with facebook you gat people looking for photographs, tags, sports, and so on which people can find without looking for a specific site, and therefore is better than an old website with minimal viewers.

I know many people who come to my facebook site because it is sports related then I shoot for them, people only come to my website when they need a photographer near them

[JR1]

I don't see it as either/or: you need both. You can treat it as: website=showroom (and store), facebook=marketing literature. One is more long term, the other is ephemeral. This is not just a photography issue; most modern companies use physical shop fronts or offices, websites, facebook, twitter, email - whatever it takes to sell stuff. Even personal contact sometimes!

But that is not what I said

I said that facebook now offers more "front" than a webpage.

Take a photographic website, the main users are people getting married "Professional photographer stated last year". They actively "seek out" a site business in their area.

However with facebook you gat people looking for photographs, tags, sports, and so on which people can find without looking for a specific site, and therefore is better than an old website with minimal viewers.

I know many people who come to my facebook site because it is sports related then I shoot for them, people only come to my website when they need a photographer near them

[drjuice]

As the various social media modes were announced to the world, I tried all of them out. What I concluded was that they all had tremendous security problems. I decided I would neither use such sites until they addressed the security problems, nor would I teach about them until they took care of the security issues (the latter was not such a big deal because mostly the software is supplied and it doesn't take a programmer to run, for example, a Facebook site). The last time I checked, the security issues are still outstanding and, in at least one instance, the "main dude" has announced several times that "all" security issues have been addressed in their particular software. He keeps announcing this by which I think he means that "all of the security issues we know about" have been addressed which is different from "all" issues known and unknown.

In my view, for non-programmers who don't have content that needs to be protected for some legitimate reason or other, these are perfectly fine sites. But, still not for me because I do too much work with Protected Health Information (PHI) in the US which can get me deep into funny smelling brownstuff very quickly.

v

[Nomadr]

my advice would be to use everything (inc social media) available and if its free then all the better, what you shouldnt do is rely solely on one site (ie facebook), you have no control over anything they might introduce that could harm your business,all it takes is a couple of reports for spam etc and fb will pull your account and you have no comeback whatsoever.they wont even tell you who reported you, I tend to use fb for networking but have my own website that i direct people to if they are interested,so basically never put all your eggs in one basket because one day fb will break them :-D

[dan marchant]

As mentioned above, social media is a useful marketing tool - but only for potential customers who are actually signed up to that particular platform. Millions aren't and so will never see what you post there. Many of the platforms are also quite shallow - good for little more than announcements. If you want more in-depth communications you need a website.

Websites are also far better than social media platforms because they give you direct access to your potential clients. Anyone who signs up for your email newsletter or RSS feed will receive it. Facebook, on the other hand, will only show business page posts to a tiny % of those people who Liked your page. Even if you pay FB the % is still small. In other words FB stands between you and your potential clients and actively blocks communications.

Lastly FB is opaque. It refuses to provide any third party verification of stats, many user accounts that Like business pages are fake (thus further reducing the number of real potential customers who see your posts) and the data available is less detailed that that available by free analytic plug-ins for websites. I recently posted some Rugby photos on my site and then posted a notification on my FB page (a couple of teaser shots and a link to my website). FB tells me 15 people saw my post yet (more than one analytic systems tells me 89 people visited that post via the FB link.