As of the second quarter of 2019, Facebook had 2.41 billion active users worldwide, according to Statista.com. It’s logical for some business owners to think in terms of big numbers like this when it comes to their online business reach. Billions of potential customers can’t be ignored, but unless you’re selling your products or services worldwide, you should adjust the numbers downward significantly. In 2018, Facebook estimated US users at around 219 million. There are 45 million UK users.
That’s still a lot of people, and if you’re selling and shipping things, it’s a big group of prospects. If you’re a local business, start carving off those prospects and shrinking the number a lot. However, it isn’t just about numbers. If you’re selling widgets, your target audience is only going to be made up of people buying widgets. And if you’re only selling locally, your customer base is only those in your area who want a widget.
You will get Facebook and Twitter eyes on your content you post at the sites, and you may get them to contact you or walk into your place of business. Today’s customers want to know more about your products, services, quality, and reputation before they buy. They can get some of that information from content on social sites content, but they may not be satisfied, and you could lose business.
Your own website should be your primary online business presence. You leverage the content there with social sites and posts to deliver visitors who become prospects and then customers. Even if your site is not as professionally presented as you would like, you lose credibility as a business if your prospect finds that you don’t have a website.
The good news is that you need not spend a dime to have your website up and ready for content within an hour or so. WordPress.com lets you set up a totally free website with enough bells and whistles to get ready for content about your business products and services. If you’re not a writer, and if you are terrible at spelling and grammar, you can buy pre-written content that’s original and SEO friendly.
There are content sites where writers post articles and blog posts for sale. Some sites have staff editors to make sure the content is grammatically correct. They also check to make sure the articles are original, so you get full SEO credit. You can buy ready-to post articles about your product or service for anywhere from $10 to $30 (£8 to £25) each depending on word count and writer.
Definitely build business profiles on the social sites, but use them to send traffic to your website. It’s not that difficult or expensive to get a site up and operating with forms for prospect lead generation and sales activities.