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I read this article the other day on a web designer's blog:
<snip/>
It discusses the benefits of having a website over a Facebook page for your business. It says "Using a website, you can build up your company’s search engine results rankings more effectively. A Facebook page doesn’t get you the SEO that a well-maintained website does."
Is this true? Can anyone expand more on the topic of how a website and a Facebook page differ in terms of SEO?
Last edited by Mittineague; Sep 3, 2012 at 09:08. Reason: removing unnecessary link
Yes, it is 100% true. Most of the valuable visitors come through Google not via Facebook. And a Facebook page can't present more information & the value of a company like a website can does. So those lines are very true.Originally Posted by neil sherman
Last edited by Mittineague; Sep 3, 2012 at 09:36. Reason: tidying
On a website, you have full control over the on-page optimisation. You choose what goes in heading tags, you get to set the meta tags and title, you can use appropriate semantic tags throughout the content, you can organise the site and page structure to suit what you want, and you don't have to include anything that isn't needed.
For example, looking at a local business' page on Facebook, the <meta description> is
It's a generic bit of boilerplate that says nothing at all about the local business. The company name is in an <h1> but all the other heading tags relate to various aspects of Facebook and not the page contents. The code quality of the page is appalling, and what little content there is buried under mountains of scripts and extraneous Facebookness that does not in any way relate to the business itself.Facebook is a social utility that connects people with friends and others who work, study and live around them. People use Facebook to keep up with friends, upload an unlimited number of photos, post links and videos, and learn more about the people they meet.
I'm not saying that having a Facebook page is a bad thing, but for any serious business it can only ever be an incidental complement to a proper website, and is in no way a replacement for one.
Last edited by Mittineague; Sep 3, 2012 at 09:10. Reason: fixing quote
Any posts I write in Arial are on my mobile phone, so please excuse typos etc.
Any posts I write in Verdana are on a PC, so feel free to berate me mercilessly for any mistakes
One other disadvantage of relying on a Facebook page is that it carries advertising. Those adverts will be competing with your own sales message for your visitors' attention. That's not what you want.
Mike
A facebook page can never replace a website when it comes to a business. Facebook pages would be always supportive marketing material for the website/ business. Facebook page would be the best community to engage with your customers. In fact facebook pages could be used to promote your brand and get some target traffic to your website. Facebook pages are social media marketing parts for any website.
If you are considering Facebook page as a replacement to the Website, it cannot be! Facebook page can only serve the purpose of promoting your website/webpage and building visitors/brand. One of the best advantages of facebook is generating product/service awareness in people through networking.
What's wrong if you have both? facebook page will be indexed anyway with your brand or products on it.
Social Media and SEO go hand in hand. An active facebook page can get more visitors to your site and also boost your search engine ranking. Also, proper SEO is required to be done but that does not mean you ignore social media.
Last edited by Mittineague; Sep 3, 2012 at 09:10. Reason: fixing quote
Now I'm a bit confused because this is directly contradicting other feedback that I've been getting.
Stevie D for example said "The company name is in an <h1> but all the other heading tags relate to various aspects of Facebook and not the page contents. The code quality of the page is appalling, and what little content there is buried under mountains of scripts and extraneous Facebookness that does not in any way relate to the business itself."
Both can't be right...
Neil, if you look at the source code of any Facebook page, you'll see that Stevie's analysis is spot-on. More significantly, he says " ... for any serious business [a Facebook page] can only ever be an incidental complement to a proper website, and is in no way a replacement for one." That is absolutely correct.Both can't be right...
I would ask Alishapinto to justify the statement " An active facebook page can ... boost your search engine ranking". What evidence does he have for that?
Mike
Seo for a website and a facebook page are two entirely different things. Apart from a few very specific products, facebook pages will do very little for your business.
facebook is good for branding and some traffic, seo is just for traffic from se.
You say "just" there as though it's something minor and unimportant, but for most sites, search engines will still be the primary source of traffic. If people are looking for a site about something, the odds are that they will start with a search engine ... so you're getting people who have already decided to seek out a website like yours, which is a strong position to be in. Traffic from social media like Facebook is more likely to be a spur of the moment thing than someone who has set out with the intention of making a purchase.
Any posts I write in Arial are on my mobile phone, so please excuse typos etc.
Any posts I write in Verdana are on a PC, so feel free to berate me mercilessly for any mistakes
But that's the thing, most people aren't actively looking for your site. Search traffic is by design intent based and thus insanely valuable but also limited... you can't get more people than are searching and since you don't get complete marketshare, you can't even get them all. Clearly you want as much as that as you can have but it's a small slice versus the total audience that may be interested in what you're doing / offering.
This is why we're seeing social sites outranking aggregate traffic to site after site. It's not that it's better or worse traffic, but it's a new visitor and that's extremely important when you think about growth.
- Ted S
I said "just" because seo is only good to get traffic from se for certain keywords. of course it's one of the best targeted traffic you can get,
what I meant is that backlinks wont really bring you traffic directly, but will get you to the top of se. so seo is only for se traffic.
Well, you can't actually compare SEO and Facebook. Having a Facebook account can only help you in promoting a certain site on for your SEO tasks.
That is true,for me Facebook can only brings your website a natural traffics.But some SEO use facebook as a tool for their seo things.
Please read the thread carefully before replying. The question is:
We are not discussing how to use a Facebook page to drive traffic to a website. There are other threads on that subject, if that's what you want to discuss. Please keep this one on-topic.
If you're a bear made of mohair, ponder on the nature of a mo.
If you seriously want to run your business than you should make a website not a Facebook page .You can promote your website more easily than that of Facebook page.
People also feel easy to use the facebook and they can also find it easily in the search engines.
It's like you have a Facebook page with a Keyword "XYZ", Now consider "XYZ" is a keyword getting searched by users but somehow unable to find your website in search results.
Now, the chances of getting listed in search results for your Facebook page for "XYZ" is more as facebook.com is already an optimized website. This is how it will be beneficial for you in terms of SEO where frequently you can update your facebook page. And the same way you can change the content of your website on a daily Basis.
Although Google like fresh, unique and quality content more.
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