It is a fair question, and I hear it a lot. You post every job on Facebook, people like and comment, the odd one turns into work, and it costs nothing. So why pay for a website? The honest answer is that a Facebook page and a website do two different jobs, and if you only have one, you are only doing half of getting found. Here is the difference, and why most trades end up wanting both.
What Facebook is genuinely good at
Facebook earns its place, so keep using it. It is where your existing customers see your latest jobs, where a good before-and-after gets a few shares, and where someone who already knows your name checks you are still active. For staying in front of people who have already found you, it works, and it is free.
That is real value, and nothing here is an argument for dropping it. The point is only about its limits, because those limits are exactly where the work you are missing lives.
What Facebook cannot do
Here is the catch. Facebook shows your posts to people who already follow you, and, when its algorithm feels like it, a few of their friends. It does almost nothing for the much larger group of people in your area who need your trade this week and have never heard your name. And that group is where most of your future work is.
When someone’s boiler dies or their drive turns green, they do not scroll Facebook hoping a tradesman appears. They go to Google and search. If you live only on Facebook, you are invisible to every one of those searches, no matter how good your work is or how many followers you have.
You do not own your Facebook page
There is a second problem, quieter but real. Your Facebook page is not yours. It sits on someone else’s platform, under someone else’s rules. They decide who sees your posts, they can change how the page works overnight, and if your account is ever locked or removed, your following and your history can vanish with it. You are building on rented land.
A website is yours. Your own domain, your own site, your own home on the internet that no algorithm can bury and no platform can take away. Everything you put into it builds something you actually own, rather than something you borrow.
Facebook page versus your own website
They are not really rivals, they are two halves of the same job. Here is how they compare.
A Facebook page
Great for people who already follow you
- Reaches your existing followers, and a few of their friends
- Invisible when someone searches Google for your trade
- The platform decides who sees your posts, and can change the rules
- A great before-and-after scrolls out of sight within a day
Your own website
Gets you found by people who never heard of you
- Shows up when people search Google for your trade and town
- Yours outright: your domain, your site, no algorithm in the way
- Works around the clock, in front of people ready to book
- Keeps your best proof in one place instead of buried in a feed
The best answer is both
So the honest answer to whether you need a website when you have Facebook is: yes, if you want the work Facebook cannot reach, which is most of it. Keep posting your jobs on Facebook for the people who follow you. Add a website to catch the far larger number of people searching Google, ready to hire, who will never see your page.
That is what I build: a fast, findable site that turns up when local people search for your trade, on your own domain, live in seven days from £297. It does not replace your Facebook, it does the half your Facebook cannot, so between them you are found by everyone looking, not just the ones who already know you.