EdmontonWebDesigner.com | Sunday, May 20, 2012

What Does a Website Cost?

Design & Development Time, and Unforeseen Costs.

It All Comes Down to Time

Web designers require a certain amount of time to build your website, and they estimate total project cost by the number of hours it will take to build your website.

If you plan on having a 1-5 page website with very little text and images, your website will take very little time to build. On the other hand, if you plan on having a 10-20 page website with a lot of text and images, your website will take longer to build.

In regards to pricing, building a website is much like building a home. Price depends on the size, urgency for completion, features, functions, and bells & whistles your project requires. The more specialty-items, and the more time required to build all other components, the more it'll cost you.

Spend some time researching the subject in Google, and you'll find web design fees ranging between $25/hour and $125/hour. Why such a wide price range? The same reason a computer can cost $300 or $3,000. Factor in what you're paying for, from who, the service, the support, the expertise and perceived value & quality of what you're buying. Go with your gut, and at the end of the day you'll get exactly what you've paid for.

No really, how much?

If you're serious about having a website designed, be prepared to spend some money. If your neighbors kids best friends little brother knows how to design a website and would love to help you out, run. If you know someone who knows someone who'll do it for, like, 500 bucks, run (no matter how appealing the prospect of a cheap website may be). Realistically, let's say you give a reputable, freelance web designer 3 days to put something together to the best of their ability. That should be enough time to construct a small, 5-10 page website, nothing fancy. If they spend 24 hours over those 3 days and charge $25 per hour (cheap!!), that's $600. But, chances are after you see what they've built you'll have some questions and comments that lead to a few minor changes - such as changing a color, moving some objects around and/or re-writing some text. If those changes take a few more hours you'll tab will be at $675. If you are happy with your website you now need to buy a domain name - most Domain Name Registrars charge about $20 per domain name. If you want mycompany.com, you'll probably want mycompany.ca, too. Then you'll need web and email hosting, which is by industry-standard a minimum of $360 per year. Your bill is now at $1075 for a pretty quick & dirty website. The opposite end of that spectrum is website that sells a product online, or contains special functionality like a shopping cart, online catalogue, online quote request form, or a content management system - or simply a website that is "big". A large website with more advanced features/functions usually requires the services of an experinced web designer who will not come cheap. Be prepared to see quotes upwards of $3,000, $5,000, $10,000 or higher. The good news is many web design companies offer ballpark quotes via their online quote request forms. You can usually request a quote from from several web design companies in a very short period of time with minimal effort.

Hidden and Unforseen Costs

Don't be fooled, your "website design" may only refer to one of many costs in the grand scheme of things. For example, a designer may quote you $1000 for a website (based on 20 hours of work billed at $50 per hour). What you may not know, is that this fee does NOT include your website hosting, photography of the products/services you're selling, or the design of your logo that needs to be on the website. When requesting a quote from a web designer, make sure you ask for a specific breakdown of what is and is not included in the fees. Most professional web design companies will provide you with a thorough website proposal ensuring there are no surprises come time to invoice for the project.


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