{"id":1334,"date":"2018-06-28T13:16:12","date_gmt":"2018-06-28T10:16:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/subsign.co\/stories\/?p=1334"},"modified":"2018-06-28T13:16:12","modified_gmt":"2018-06-28T10:16:12","slug":"why-do-you-still-need-a-website","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/subsign.co\/stories\/why-do-you-still-need-a-website\/","title":{"rendered":"Why do you still need a website?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"article__para\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">A few weeks ago we have encountered a very interesting question. <\/span><i><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Do I still need a website for my product\/service if we have other platforms that can do that?<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n<p class=\"article__para\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Our answer is <\/span><b>yes<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. And here are our reasons why:<\/span><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"article__heading\"><b>Total control.<\/b><\/h2>\n<p class=\"article__para\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">When having your own website, <\/span><b>implementing and managing can be easily done by following your own set of rules<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> (most of the time coming from UX and design). Going to sell mainly on other platforms can give you obstacles and policies that you haven\u2019t taken into consideration at the beginning. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"article__para\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Let\u2019s take into example Facebook. As you may or may not know, they now have the Marketplace section, where you can sell or buy different items. Well, before selling there you should also take into consideration <\/span><a class=\"article__link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/policies\/commerce\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">the set of rules the platform has<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. <\/span><b>You might be restricted<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> when selling specific products\/services. \u00a0The same idea applies to <\/span><a class=\"article__link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/policies\/commerce\/instagram_specific_policies\/services_on_instagram\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Instagram<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, <\/span><a class=\"article__link\" href=\"https:\/\/sellercentral.amazon.fr\/gp\/help\/external\/521?ref=efph_521_cont_200404870&amp;language=en_GB\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Amazon<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and so on.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"article__para \"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.juliaveldmanc.nl\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"article__img \" src=\"https:\/\/subsign.co\/public\/stories\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/giphy-1.gif\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"article__para\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Other than the specific rules for selling, there are the less-known-among-business-owners Facebook page rules. In the past 3 years, <\/span><a class=\"article__link\" href=\"https:\/\/subsign.co\/stories\/facebook-platform-or-publisher\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> has changed their reach and engagement policies for pages. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"article__para\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">If at the beginning they were encouraging businesses to engage with their audience just by posting and being active on the platform, nowadays you need to do more than that. Generating a significant amount of content is not enough for you to reach your audience. In order to do that, <\/span><b>you have to pay<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"article__para\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">For example, if your page has 1 000 likes, your post will organically reach only about 20% of those 1K people. To reach more than that you need to invest. This being said, with the changes and everything they add\/remove from the platform you might have unexpected costs. <\/span><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"article__heading\"><b>Fast and furious.<\/b><\/h2>\n<p class=\"article__para\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Another thing to take into consideration <\/span><b>is the fast-moving technology industry<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. \u00a0As products do, platforms can reach their peak or the maturity stage. From this, it all depends on the owners of the platform if they will last in the public space or not. \u00a0<\/span><b>They will either manage to change and adapt or die fast<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"article__para\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Therefore, when you choose <\/span><a class=\"article__link\" href=\"https:\/\/subsign.co\/stories\/instagram-still-king\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">a third party platform<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> you need to take into consideration the possibility of it going extinct. This is one of the main reason why having <\/span><b>your own website can be your plan B<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"article__para\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Let\u2019s say you sell notebooks on Amazon, but the platform goes down (which is very unlikely), you will have your back up store in your own website and you can direct your audience to it. \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"article__heading\"><b>Too crowded.<\/b><\/h2>\n<p class=\"article__para\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Taking into consideration the accessibility of the platforms mentioned above (and not only them), <\/span><b>many people have started to use them to sell products<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, especially second-hand ones. Therefore, you can imagine how crowded these digital selling spaces are.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"article__para \"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"article__img \" src=\"https:\/\/subsign.co\/public\/stories\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/339266-PAP72J-952.jpg\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"article__para\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Having your own shop means that people will get to see <\/span><a class=\"article__link\" href=\"https:\/\/subsign.co\/stories\/awareness-vs-sales\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">only your products<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, no competitors, no distractions. It also means that <\/span><b>your product will be at the center of attention<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. <\/span><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"article__heading\"><b>Your portfolio.<\/b><\/h2>\n<p class=\"article__para\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">As stated at the last point, by having <\/span><a class=\"article__link\" href=\"https:\/\/subsign.co\/stories\/digital-marketing-can-get-clients\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">your own website<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> you can better showcase your products and its specifics. In the same time, you can only have your <\/span><b>website as a portfolio for your products<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\"> and redirect people to buy from the platforms you are present on. This is a perfect way of combining the two.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"article__para \"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"article__img \" src=\"https:\/\/subsign.co\/public\/stories\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/06\/340665-PA97KW-912.jpg\" \/><\/p>\n<p class=\"article__para\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">On the website you can simply have more specific details about the products (how is made or how to use them), and for those who wish to buy add them direct links to the third party platform you are using as a shop. This way, <\/span><b>people will get to know your business more<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">, and start to trust you through the content you offer them. <\/span><\/p>\n<h2 class=\"article__heading\"><b>A final thought.<\/b><\/h2>\n<p class=\"article__para\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Just to be clear, the reasons we gave you above are just to make you think if<\/span><b> giving up on a website is the right thing for your business or not<\/b><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">. In no way, they are stated in order to bring negativity upon the mentioned platforms. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"article__para\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">My conclusion is if your business is at the very beginning then trying out different platforms might be the perfect thing for you. This way you can test how your product\/service does on the market and then invest in a website. Our assumptions are made solely by our experience in the market and through the clients we have.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"article__para\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">We even have discussed this matter in the third episode of the <\/span><a class=\"article__link\" href=\"https:\/\/anchor.fm\/subsign\/episodes\/Episodul-3-De-ce-sa-mai-ai-website-e1mint\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><b>Subcast<\/b><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"article__para\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">For any questions feel free to contact us at <\/span><a class=\"article__link\" href=\"mailto:hello@subsign.co\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">hello@subsign.co<\/span><\/a><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"article__para\"><span style=\"font-weight: 400;\">Thanks for reading!<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A few weeks ago we have encountered a very interesting question. Do I still need a website for my product\/service if we have other platforms that can do that? Our answer is yes. And here are our reasons why: Total control. When having your own website, implementing and managing can be easily done by following [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1339,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1334","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-marketing"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/subsign.co\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1334","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/subsign.co\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/subsign.co\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/subsign.co\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/subsign.co\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1334"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"https:\/\/subsign.co\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1334\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1352,"href":"https:\/\/subsign.co\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1334\/revisions\/1352"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/subsign.co\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1339"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/subsign.co\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1334"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/subsign.co\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1334"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/subsign.co\/stories\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1334"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}