It should come as no surprise as social media decides to expand, that more and more of them are offering their own marketplaces. Why then, should a business have more than a Facebook page, when it has marketplace component, appointment component, and posting component? I get that question a lot, and basically the difference boils down to appearance, target audience, and control.
Appearance
Facebook pages all look the same minus the content, so you have to pour a lot of effort into your content/posts etc to differentiate yourself from others. Also, I have seen some negative reactions when there is no website besides Facebook for a business. The main part of appearance though is just how much better a website looks, and how much more space you have to do what you want (though I am biased of course).
Target Audience
When it comes to getting your products shown to your target audience, the people you want to sell to, Facebook has some great ad posting abilities. But if you aren’t paying for their ads, your professional paintings, jewelry, and other products will go right in with the garage sales on the marketplace – which means instead of the lady looking for a beautiful painting to purchase at a reasonable cost, your traffic will be the lady looking for the best deals at a bargain, ready to haggle.
Control
I touched on this a bit earlier, but with Facebook, your address goes here, your content goes there, you want a background? Too bad. That might be okay for some, and there is nothing wrong with that. Either way though, you don’t get much say in what goes where, what pages you can have, etcetera. The main issue I have though is Facebook decides what is and isn’t posted…and what pages are allowed to be up. If some petty competitor decides they don’t like you, and report you enough, your Facebook page gets pulled for however long they want, and your reputation starts to deteriorate as people try to find you and can’t. Now, this may never happen, but for me the fact that it is possible is enough to make me want a different platform.
