With everyone and their mom making money via TikTok these days, not to mention how AI is changing the efficacy of search engine optimization (SEO), do you still need a website in 2025? The short answer is yes. All it takes is changing the algorithm for your business to disappear. One of the best pieces of business advice I ever received is, “Don’t build your business on something you don’t own.”
You don’t own social media, unless you’re a billionaire, in which case, why are you reading this blog? So for you, a 99 percenter, a website is still valuable – not in place of social media but in conjunction with it. If you sell products or services, or if your growth depends on content and customer education, a website is worth the investment.
Why Your Website Still Matters
As a Charlotte web design company in business for decades, we’ve seen lots of web trends already. And what we can say is we’re not in an either/or situation. Using a website plus social media plus AI plus email marketing is what allows everything to work better. Besides the fact, large language models (LLMs) like ChatGPT and Claude are trained on, draw information from, and sometimes cite online content (especially Perplexity).
The more accurate, relevant, and fresh content you publish to your website, the more likely you are to become a trusted source for AI tools that many customers use in their purchasing journeys. And when someone asks Alexa or some other AI assistant for help/support, the answers are based on information coming from – you guessed it – websites. Carefully structuring your website with a schema markup (which we can help you with as a Charlotte web designer) makes it easy for AI to choose your website and get in front of more potential clients and customers.
Also, again, you own your website. You can control what information is presented and how. You create keywords and links. You create credibility and authority by doing so and a well-optimized piece of content can rank on search engines for years, whereas something on social media is here today, gone next week. That’s the nature of social media, but not websites.
How to Create a Great Website in 2025
The key to creating a website that’s still relevant in 2025 is to work with a recognized, modern content management system (CMS) that is easy to use and edit. We’re big fans of WordPress but there are also alternatives. (If you’re not sure what to choose, as a Charlotte website design company, we’re happy to chat with you.)
The main thing is to prioritize speed and performance. Use modern image formats and choose a great web host. You also want to create something that’s simple, has minimal load times, and mobile-first design. Remember that these days people are mostly accessing websites on their devices so a responsive website is key. By that, we mean something that looks good on a laptop, tablet, and smartphone. Sometimes content breaks funny on a smartphone so test, test, test. You can also specify how you want your website to look on mobile.
Because people are so used to apps, design your website with that in mind by creating content hubs (like a blog, case studies, shop, and more). And there are also automations that help you send out every new piece of content to all the social media platforms.
Use SEO from the Beginning
Gone are the days when you can slap up a website without much thought. Now you need to be intentional and think about SEO from the beginning. Use tools like Google Keyword planner to ID keywords that relate to your products or services. You’ll notice that we use the phrase “Charlotte web design company” a lot because that’s one of our major keywords.
Once you have your keywords, use them, and then link internally – i.e., link to your case studies page, your contact me page, etc. After that, then you can get into the technical SEO elements like metadata. Or hire someone to do that for you. . .
From there, create a social media strategy around your content. Post video clips to TikTok, summaries for LinkedIn, pretty pictures for Instagram. You can interact with folks on social media but you want them to be interested in your website. Once on your website, that’s where you start to convert them into customers and clients.
Social media can feel grueling so create a content calendar that works for you. If you can’t post every day consistently, don’t. Sometimes you get lucky and a post goes viral if you haven’t posted in months, but that’s pretty rare. Usually, it’s once you build a following and start attracting attention that one of your posts takes off.
So, in conclusion, do you still need a website in 2025? Yes, yes you do. But that doesn’t mean it’s either a website or social media. Use both! Use them all! Remember though, your website is your anchor so perpetually drive people back there.
If this all sounds complicated, never fear, Web Symphonies is here. As a Charlotte web design company, we can help you create a beautiful website that people want to actually visit. Reach out to us today.
Get in touch with us via email or call (704) 336-9113.
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