Why there’s no single price
“How much does a website cost?” is a bit like asking what a house costs. It depends on size, materials and what you want inside. A five-page site for a local service business and a 50-page site with online booking and a product catalog are very different projects, even though both are called a website.
What drives the cost
- Number of pages. More pages means more design, content and testing. A trade company with separate pages for each service and each service area will have more pages than a simple brochure site.
- Custom design or a template. A template is faster and cheaper up front, but it looks like everyone else’s and often carries extra code that slows it down. A custom design takes longer and is built around your brand and customers.
- Features. Contact forms are simple. Online booking, quote calculators, photo galleries, payments and member areas add work.
- Content. Who writes the text and supplies the photos? Professional copy and photography are separate costs, or time on your side if you do it yourself.
- SEO. A site built with SEO in mind (page structure, speed, schema, sitemap, Search Console) takes more care than one that just looks nice. It’s much cheaper to include it at the start than to bolt it on later.
- Integrations. Connecting your calendar, CRM, email tool or reviews adds setup time.
Costs after launch
A quote for the build isn’t the whole picture. Ask about the ongoing costs too: your domain name (yearly), hosting, any software subscriptions, and what it costs to make changes after launch. Some builders charge a monthly fee for a site you don’t fully own, which can add up over the years.
Questions to ask any web designer
- Who owns the website and the domain? It should be you.
- What exactly is included? Number of pages, revisions, forms, SEO setup, analytics.
- How long will it take, and what do you need from me to keep it on schedule?
- Is SEO included, and what does that include specifically?
- How will it perform on a phone, and how do you test it?
- What happens after launch? Updates, support and performance reviews.
- Can I see examples of your work? Real sites you can click through.
Red flags
- A guarantee of top rankings or page-one results.
- An unusually low price with vague scope. Ask what’s left out.
- Locking you into a service where you don’t own your site.
- No portfolio, or a portfolio of screenshots you can’t visit.
- Pressure to decide on the spot.
How I handle pricing
I don’t quote from a rate card. After a consultation call about your business, I send a written proposal that lays out the pages and features included, the timeline and the price, so you know exactly what you’re agreeing to before anything starts. You can read more about the process, or how I approach web design.