Answering Against My Own Interest
I build websites, so I have every reason to say everyone needs one. That is not true. Some businesses genuinely do not need a site yet, and selling them a build is just selling. The line runs through one question: do people who have never heard of you arrive, and do they search for what you do in words?
When Social Accounts Really Are Enough
- You are found through referrals, not through search
- The product is visual and lives in a feed: a nail artist, a baker, a photographer starting out
- You are working at the capacity you already have and do not want more
- Turnover does not comfortably cover a build plus its running costs
- You are still testing the idea and may be doing something else in six months
Social is where people who already found you get to know you. A website is where people arrive who were not looking for you at all — they were looking for what you do.
When Not Having One Is Already Costing You
- People google your service. If the query exists, a social profile does not answer it
- The basket is large and the decision is considered. Before spending thousands, people want to see you outside a feed
- You pay for ads. Sending traffic to a profile costs more: you pay per click and lose half at the jump into a messenger
- You need prices, terms and guarantees in one place. In a feed that sinks within a week
- You sell B2B. Company details, contracts and an about page look unconvincing on Instagram
- The account is not your asset. It can be suspended, and recovery is not guaranteed
A Five-Minute Check
Search for your own service the way a customer would type it, with your city. Look at what comes back: competitors with websites, aggregators, or nothing coherent. If it is competitors, you are absent from the place where the decision happens. If it is nothing, that is better news: a niche you can take cheaply before somebody else does.
If You Need One but the Budget Is Not There
- Start with one page: the service, prices or a range, proof, and a way to get in touch. That is from $600, not from $2,000
- Claim your map listing — for a local business it often brings more than the site and costs nothing
- Do not use a builder if you plan to grow: migrating later costs more than the difference now
- Keep the social accounts. A site does not replace them, it covers a different moment — the one where people choose
- Register the domain in your own name today, even with no site behind it
Conclusion
A site and social accounts solve different problems and do not compete. The feed warms up people who already follow you. The site catches people who searched for the service and had never heard of you. If that second stream does not exist for you and you do not want it, do not spend the money. If it exists and you have no site, every month you are handing it to whichever competitor does.