How much for a website?
We're often asked how much we charge for a website, and it's frustrating not to be able to always give a straight answer. Here are some reasons why.
“How much is it for a website?”
We’re asked this question often and appreciate it can be frustrating when we don’t have a straight, easy answer. In the past, we’ve built websites for £800, and we’ve built websites for £25000. How do we arrive at these figures?!
The problem is – there is no easy answer. If there was, we’d happily provide a simple pricing table right here on our website. Doing so would certainly be honest, open and transparent, no doubt improving our credibility to potential clients in the process.
So why no fixed price for a website?!
Why so tricky a question? Why can’t we provide a fixed price upfront here and now?
Here’s an analogy. Imagine asking an architect: “How much for a house?” It’d be impossible for him or her to give a fixed price there and then. So much to consider!
He or she would ask: “What’s your budget? What kind of location are you thinking of? What kind of materials would you like your house to be made from? How many people are going to live in it? Will there be any special requirements or features, such as under floor heating, or solar powered energy, etc?”
The architect’s job would be to find out the answers to these questions, consult carefully with you and help work out the best plan at the best price for your individual situation, taking into account the answers to all the above questions, plus many more besides.
Ok, so we concede that building a website isn’t quite on the scale of building a house but the analogy certainly goes some way to illustrating the problem. The point being: to provide an immediate fixed price would simply be impossible.
Where do we start?
Firstly, we ask questions. We ask lots of questions about your business, your aims, your objectives, your problems, your customers (and their problems) and your competition. We listen carefully and learn as much as we can in order to be able to recommend the very best plan of action.
While we know you’re looking primarily at the overall cost of our suggested solution, we’re also hope you’re as interested (if not more) in how cost-effective our proposed solution is; how much value for money you’re getting; how much time and money our proposed website will save you; and how much of a potential return on your investment you’re likely to see.
3 factors influence the price of a website
What factors actually influence the final price? There are 3 main interdependent factors:
- Urgency – if you need your website sooner, the price goes up to reflect the fact that we need to prioritise your project above all others. No real deadline? That brings the price down.
- Features – the more features your website will have, the more time it takes to develop, which therefore costs more money. We only recommend features that will help better achieve your objectives, of course.
- Budget – the amount of money you have available to spend can obviously drastically affect the solution we propose.
In fact, “what’s your budget?” is one of the very first question we ask. Why?
Here’s a quick example. Someone wanting an e-commerce site with a large budget, we’d most likely recommend a custom-built solution with lots of great features and a sizeable spend on ongoing marketing.
Someone with a smaller budget? We’d likely recommend a good off-the-shelf solution; help set it up and customise it; and advise on the best ways of maximising a smaller budget to make the greatest impact. Both would of course yield great results, and both would provide a terrific return on the original investment.
The point is: our proposed solution would be very, very different depending on the stated budget.
How much time do we have available?
Available budget also directly affects how much time is available. A higher budget equates to more time available to work on different parts of the process. Having more time available can markedly improve the finished product and increase its chances of success.
For example: we believe you can’t test your website with typical users enough, at every stage of development. More money = lots more time for user testing. Less money – we ask you to trust our experience and expertise in developing websites and test less with real people. More money also allows for more design revisions and options, or more prototyping, or more… you get the idea.
Be open and honest about your budget
The important thing to stress here is that you must be as open and honest about your budget as you possibly can be, right from the start. Any web agency worth its salt will only really be able to make worthwhile, quality recommendations when they know how much money is available. It fundamentally impacts on every other part of the process.
Don’t just shop on price
Once we know all about your business, objectives and budget we confidently provide a fixed price quote. Now, you’ll most probably be comparing other quotes from other web agencies, of course, and that’s great. Our advice – make sure you don’t just compare or shop on price. Take care to factor in the potential ROI (return on investment) promised by each agency, plus how each proposed solution will impact on your business in terms of saving time and money, increasing customer satisfaction, achieving your long-term objectives, etc.
What next?
We’d love to have a no-obligation chat about your business and how we can help it grow. Don’t hesitate to email me .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) or call 0792 0030077
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