can i just use facebook instead of a website? yes, with an asterisk you will not like

business · Oct 1, 2026 · 5 min read

yes, you can run a small business on a facebook page alone. people do it. some do it well for years. the page is free, the clients are already scrolling there, messages work, reviews work, even bookings work now. i am not going to tell you it does not work. i am going to tell you what you agreed to when it did.

the deal you made, in plain words

when you build your business presence on a platform you do not pay for, you did not get a free shop. you got a free stall inside someone else's mall, and the rent is not zero: the rent is control.

  • the landlord can repaint. the layout changes, the algorithm changes, the reach of a post changes. every small business owner has a story about the month reach fell off a cliff for reasons no one explained. your page did not get worse. the rules did.
  • the landlord can change the locks. account restrictions, automated flags, suspended pages. appeals exist, outcomes are not guaranteed, and while you wait, the shop is closed. a business that is one account flag away from being unreachable is not secure, no matter how many likes it has.
  • the mall is invisible from the street. people who are already on facebook can find you. people googling "your service + your town" mostly cannot. facebook pages rank poorly in search, if at all, and the stranger — the one who does not follow anyone, who just searched — never meets you there.

none of this is an argument that facebook is bad. it is an argument that facebook is not yours.

what the page does well, honestly

it does discovery inside the platform, it does reviews, it does casual updates, it does messages where people already live. for a local business whose clients are all local and already scrolling, it covers a lot. the posts that say "facebook is dead" are usually written by people selling websites. the true statement is narrower: facebook covers a slice of what a business needs, and the slice has walls.

the walls, specifically

  • no structure. a profile is a feed. your services, your hours, your price logic and your proof are scattered across posts the platform orders for you. six months in, your best information is buried under the six-hundredth post.
  • no data. the followers are not yours. you cannot take the list with you, you cannot email them directly, you cannot move them anywhere. you have reach, on loan.
  • no quiet. the feed is other people's content standing next to yours. your best announcement appears between a meme and an ad, and the context teaches people to skim you.
  • the exit is paid. the day you want a real site, all that content, those reviews, those photos: they do not come with you. you start from zero on your own land, years after you could have started from something.

the middle path that actually works

you do not have to choose a side. the setup that works for most small businesses is smaller than either extreme: the facebook page keeps doing what it does — discovery, reviews, messages — and one page on your own domain becomes the address you own. the name, the services, the proof, the contact. one page. the cheapest honest version, 0-300 euro a year, live in a weekend, written about plainly in how do i make a website without coding.

then every post, every card, every signature carries your own address next to the platform handle. the platform becomes one channel. the site becomes the ground. when the rules change, the reach dips, the flag happens — the address still answers, and the stranger on google still finds you.

the philosophy in one line

rented land gets you open faster. owned land gets you kept, longer. the businesses that last usually pay for a little of both, and know exactly which one they are standing on.

two related posts, if the ownership question itches:

and if you are near Parma or Emilia-Romagna and want the one honest page that anchors the rest:

so: can you use facebook instead of a website? yes. should you? only if you have read the asterisk and decided, on purpose, that the stall is worth more than the deed. some months it is. the point is to decide it, not to inherit it.