What goes into the price of a website
Why one website costs $900 and another $9,000, and how to work out which one you need.
Nearly every first call with a new client starts with “How much does a website cost?”, and nearly every time we have to answer with a question of our own. We’re not dodging. A website is a bit like a renovation: the price depends on how much work is involved. Repainting a flat over a weekend and gutting it down to the bare walls are both called renovating, and nobody expects them to cost the same.
Three kinds of website
“Website” can mean very different things. A landing page is one page about one offer, such as a service, a product or an event. Its whole job is to take a visitor from the first screen to sending a request without losing them along the way. Prices start at $900.
A company website has more to do. There are several sections and several kinds of visitor. A client wants to know what you do. A partner wants to know how to work with you. Someone thinking of applying for a job wants a sense of what you’re like as a company. So the work goes into clear navigation and making it easy to get in touch from any page. Prices start at $2,000.
A web service or client portal is a site where people do things rather than read. They place orders, check where an order is, download documents. That brings in server-side logic, user roles and connections to your other systems. Prices start at $4,500.
The difference between those numbers comes from the amount of work. A landing page has one route through it. A web service can have dozens, and each one has its own logic, data and checks.
Pages are the wrong thing to count
Many people expect a website to be priced per page. A page is only what you see on the surface. Behind it are the things a visitor needs to get done and the routes that lead there. Each of those creates screens, and each screen has states: an empty cart, a payment that didn’t go through, a form someone gave up on halfway. Repeating pages, like a blog post or a product card, are designed once and reused. The unique ones are designed one at a time.
Then there are integrations. A request from the site that lands in your CRM by itself, online payments, stock levels pulled from the accounting system. Every one of these connections has to be designed, built and tested for what happens when something fails. On top of that come requirements such as two languages, accessibility, heavy traffic or specific security rules.
So we estimate from what visitors need to do, the screens, the integrations and the requirements. The number of menu items doesn’t tell us much. Two sites with the same number of pages can easily differ in price several times over, and both prices can be fair.
What people forget to budget for
The same three things get missed on project after project. First, copy and photos. A beautiful design filled with filler text and stock photos does worse than a plain site with well-chosen words. Either have the material ready in advance or plan for it as part of the work from day one.
Second, the admin panel. If you’re going to update the site yourself, a comfortable admin is a proper part of the project. When it’s awkward, posting a single news item turns into a chore, and six months later nobody is updating the site at all.
Third, the launch itself: domain, hosting, email, analytics and an SSL certificate. It isn’t much work, but it tends to surface on the last day, when everything else is finished.
How to tell which one you need
Before you compare quotes, answer three questions. What should a visitor do once they’re on the site: send a request, buy something, call you? Do you have one kind of visitor or several? And will people need to sign in and do something, like check an order, download documents or reorder?
One goal and one kind of visitor usually means a landing page. Several kinds of visitor point to a company website. If people sign in to get things done, you need a web service. If the answers aren’t clear yet, that’s normal, and it’s what the first call is for. We ask questions, you tell us about your business, and by the end of it we both know what kind of site you need and roughly what it will cost.
Getting to a final number
Starting prices give you a sense of scale. A real figure only makes sense once we’ve looked at the task properly. We give it to you after the call and put it in the contract before work begins, so it stays the same throughout and there are no surprises at the end.
