Guide to how much a website should cost
Table of Contents
Introduction
Whether you’re a developer, an agency, or a client, understanding the pricing of a website can be a complex task. I’ve seen instances where websites worth £5,000 were priced at £25,000, and websites that should have been quoted at £100,000 were only priced at £30,000. These discrepancies can lead to confusion and dissatisfaction.
To address this issue, I’ve created a website pricing model that is both fair and accurate. This model divides the process of creating a new website into four distinct areas: Technology, Content, Assets, and Ongoing Costs. Each of these areas will be explored individually in this blog.
This model isn’t all-encompassing, but it provides a clearer picture of the costs associated with building a website. I find this model particularly useful for initial meetings, as thinking about the website in these steps can lead to important questions being asked. It also helps highlight where time and resources need to be spent.
Technology
When it comes to creating a new website, one of the first things I consider is the technology that will best serve the site’s purpose. This is a crucial step because the technology chosen can significantly impact the functionality, usability, and ultimately, how much development time and resources will be needed. When deciding on the technology needed, it’s important for the developers to ask the client questions about the purpose of the website and how it will fit into their business.
If the client wants to update the website themselves, a user-friendly Content Management System (CMS) like WordPress or Joomla might be the best choice. These platforms are relatively easy to use and offer a wide range of plugins that can add extra features to the site without the need for custom coding. This can significantly cut development costs, especially if WYSIG page builders like Elementor are used.
However, not all features can be implemented with plugins. Sometimes, custom solutions are needed. For instance, if the website requires a unique feature that isn’t available in existing plugins, then custom coding might be necessary. This could increase the cost, but it also allows for greater flexibility and customization. Custom coding is necessary on most large websites, as there will be unique functions that apply to the brand which will need to be reflected in the website. However, too often I have seen developers custom code websites that could have easily been built with a page builder. I find this bad for two reasons: it needlessly increases the time and cost of development, and it makes updating the website more developer-centric in the future. A good rule of thumb I like to use is that if a website only has static elements (images, videos, content all divided up in sections and blocks), then custom coding will not be needed, or should be kept to a minimum to facilitate continuous uploads into the CMS.
E-commerce functionality is another factor to consider. If the website needs to sell products or services online, then it might be best to use a platform designed for e-commerce, like Shopify, Magento2 or WooCommerce. These platforms come with built-in features that make it easy to manage an online store. Again, it is important to understand if the client’s requirements can be achieved with the basic features of the website builder, or if there are elements that will need to be custom coded.
Finally, if there’s a requirement for Search Engine Optimization (SEO), then the technology should deliver fast performance. Fast-loading websites are favoured by search engines and can help improve the site’s SEO ranking. Basic page builders make creating a website a very fast process, however custom development may be needed to optimise the code for fast performance.
Overall, the best piece of advice for this section is this. If you are a developer, ask yourself:” What is the quickest, easiest way to deliver the client’s expectations?”. If you are thinking about buying web services, have an honest conversation with your developers and always ask to understand how the technology proposed meets your brief without going overboard. Ultimately, when you buy a car, you don’t expect to be sold a Formula 1 car.
The technology used will have a crucial impact on price. Generally, the less custom coding is required, the faster the web build turnaround, which leads to lower costs. When it comes to custom features, the complexity of the development required should be reflected in the website cost.
Content
Too often, when a website is quoted and a design shared, there is no thought into who is going to write the content for the website. To keep the costs low, the developers will not include content in the quote, focussing solely on technology. This can lead to confusion, as often clients expect a fully finished website.
Who is responsible for the content needs to be determined at the quoting stage. If the client wants to write their own content, then the developers will not incur the time and resource cost for crafting content. As mentioned above, if the client wants to populate the website, they should have an easy technology to work with.
However, if the developers are writing the content, this will need to be factored into the website cost. Mainly, writing content takes time. Some developers are finding ways of improving efficiency in this area by using AI, however there will always be a human cost to developing content. For websites that are easy to build but require loads of content (such as websites with many pages), content costs can even match technology costs, highlighting why this is important for both parties to know.
I believe that website content should be written by a web copyrighter expert. Even for people who are good at writing, crafting content for the web is a specialism of its own. Having an expert do it will yield the best quality, but will also increase costs. If the website needs to support marketing efforts such as SEO or PPC, then having an expert write the content becomes paramount to ensure efficiency.
So as a summary, if you are a website developer, always start a conversation about content. It can be a lucrative add-on to the cost of the website, and it avoids client disappointment if a website with no content doesn’t meet their expectations.
If you are looking to have a new website built, always ask who is going to write the content, and consider whether an expert is going to be needed, or in-house resources will be able to handle the task.
Assets
When viewing a web mock-up or demo, the pages will usually display images. However, just as with content, there is often disparity between who will be responsible for producing the assets that will be displayed on the website. Whether it’s images or videos, there are usually three ways in which assets are tackled for a web project, listed below from cheapest to most expensive:
- The website will use existing assets owned by the client
- Stock assets purchased from image and video banks
- Unique assets are created for the website
It’s easy to see how these three options will have an impact on the website cost. If the client supplies their own images, then there is no cost to be attached to the process, making it the cheapest option available. However, I have worked with clients who supplied their own imagery, and too often it was unprofessional. Assets are very important to the look and feel of the website, and having bad images will make the entire website feel amateur. I would only recommend this option for clients who have professional assets already.
Using stock images is the next best thing. They are professional images, that are quite cheap to acquire. Most developers and agencies will have a recurring subscription to an asset bank, giving them access to millions of images that can be used on the website. This is a good middle ground that leads to professional images without breaking the bank. However, the con of using stock images is that they will never fully blend with the rest of your brand, and often will not provide a huge benefit to your users. The development of AI makes bespoke image generation easier and more accessible, however this technology is in its infancy and more time will take before AI images will be able to comfortably replace image banks.
Lastly, having bespoke assets professionaly created for the website is the best option. This leads to images and videos that fully represent the brand and fit the website like a glove. Using bespoke asseets will have an enourmous impact on user experience and will elevate the website. However, this is also the priciest option. When adding the cost of bespoke assets to bespoke content and technology, that’s when new website prices can increase noticeably.
Overall, if you are a developer, approach the subject of assets as early as possible. If the client doesn’t have any assets to provide, then the cost ,whether stock or bespoke assets, will need to form part of the website quote. On the other hand, when receiving a website quote, always enquire about the assets that will be used and understand any costs that might be associated.
Ongoing Costs
I have seen plenty of website quotes that have a static figure at the end. Whereas that cost is what will take for the website to be ready to go live, there are some ongoing costs which should not be overlooked. These need to be thought of at the same time with the costs for building the website, otherwise surprises and disappointment can arrive.
First and foremost, all websites need hosting. I will not delve into the particularities of quoting website costing, but this cost needs to be included at the start of the project. There is no worse surprise than finding out you have an monthly cost at the end of a website project, if you were not made aware of this in the beginning.
There might also be a technology cost. Some page builders, frameworks, themes or plugins charge a monthly/yearly fee. If this fee is not paid, functionality might disappear. Understanding this at the beginning is crucial, as it gives clarity about technology cost over time. Receiving an unexpected bill, which if not paid will disable core website functionality is something that no one will be grateful for, therefore transparency is key.
Another overlooked cost is digital marketing. For clients that invest in a new website performance might be a KPI. For a website to achieve users and conversions, a solid digital marketing plan needs to be in place, and it all comes at a cost. Personally, I like provided digital marketing strategy costs as part of a website quote, which allows the conversation about digital marketing to be started, but without having to commit to budgets just yet. The digital marketing strategy can be built around client’s budgets, which can be determined at a later date.
Foreseeing these costs and being proactive about them is key to ensuring a new website becomes a good, long lasting investment.
