A website or Instagram: what a small business needs
Many small businesses start on Instagram because it is free and quick. The question of a website comes later. Usually it comes when you are typing your prices into direct messages for the tenth time in a day, or when the account gets blocked.
What Instagram gives you
- Photos and videos of your work.
- A line to regular clients.
- Recommendations: tags and reposts from clients.
Instagram works well for people who already know about you. It brings almost nobody who is searching Google for a service.
What a website gives you
- Clients from Google search: "manicure Obolon", "washing machine repair Dnipro".
- Prices, terms and answers to common questions on one page.
- Online booking or a request form without back-and-forth messages.
- An address that belongs to you.
The main difference: search
Someone searching Google for a service is ready to buy today. Instagram posts hardly ever appear in Google results. A site page with the service and the city does.
If competitors nearby have websites and you do not, the client from search goes to them.
The risk of one platform
An account can be blocked by mistake, and getting it back takes weeks. Reach changes with the algorithm, and you have no say in it. A website and a domain stay yours whatever the network's rules are.
When Instagram is enough
- Testing an idea while clients are few.
- Clients only by recommendation.
- A product that sells on its photos, with simple prices.
When you need a website
- The same questions every day: prices, address, hours.
- A need for clients from search, not only from followers.
- Online booking or taking requests around the clock.
- Business clients who check a contractor before signing.
How to use both
Put a link to the site in your Instagram profile. Put a link to Instagram on the site. Instagram then shows fresh work, and the site answers questions and takes bookings.
A reply in direct messages can be a single link: to the price list, to booking or to delivery terms. That saves time on the same answers.
Frequently asked questions
Can I make a website from my Instagram posts?
You can take photos and descriptions of your work from there. But a site also needs prices, an address and answers to common questions, which a feed usually lacks.
Is it hard to keep a website alongside Instagram?
No. A business card site needs no daily posts. Update prices and photos when they change.
What comes first: a website or a Google Maps profile?
The website. A map profile needs a link to send clients to. How to create the profile is set out step by step.
Where to start
Pick a template for your trade, move your prices and best photos from Instagram onto it, and add the site's link to your profile. What else to prepare is in a short checklist. How to choose between a landing page and a business card site is explained in a separate article.