How much does a web site cost?

Pricing a web site is not as easy as going to  shopping for products at your local grocery store or box store.

In my web reputation consulting business I am regularly asked, “How much will it cost me to get a web site going?”  That question is similar to the question what is the best type of coffee to drink; there is not really a simple answer.

Here are the five reasons why a simple, concrete answer is difficult.

1. Web site design and development is a service and not a product.
A quality web site is something that grows over time. Technology is always changing, which means that in order for your web sit to stay current it needs to be modified. While it may be hard to believe, a web site is a service since it will require an ongoing effort to maintain.

2.  Building a successful web site is a complex undertaking.
There are the obvious parts of a web site like written content, images, store products, and the freebies you offer to entice visitors to connect with you. But there are also other components that are just as important as those, maybe more important. After all, what good is a web site, if it cannot be easily found by potential customers? Those other components include SEO (Search Engine Optimization), social networking, and some level of planing of internet marketing - even if it’s just a newsletter.

There are dozens and dozens of questions to designing the best web site for your needs. Are you willing to go through those? Are you willing to pay for the time to go through that data processing to arrive at your optimum site? Or, is it better to use a trusted resource, with a decent client reputation, who can reduce those questions and get your web presence up to speed for a fair price?

3. Web site quotes are very subjective.
There are numerous ways in which to build a quality and successful web site.  You can find this out by contacting five companies and getting a price from each one. The prices will be all over the road. I have been told by clients that they received quotes of $1,500 - $8,500 for the same work. How can this be possible?

4. The measure of success must be clearly defined.
The web site industry has lots of opinions and none are right or wrong. For example, one designer might think your web site should be built from the latest code, while another designer thinks your site needs to look like a piece of art, and yet another designer says to build your web site with a simple, direct approach that maximizes SEO and social marketing from the get-go. 

While there are many bells and whistles and features a web site can have, but the most important question is, “Is your web site fulling your business goals and objectives?”
The success of your published web site can be measured in terms of page rank or search engine results. It can also be measured in terms of simple numbers like page views and visitor statistics.

5. There are two ways to price a web site.
The only way to price a web site is 1) an hourly basis or 2) a project model.  In a project mode, or fixed pricing, quote you receive a set price of $3,500 for 12 months. And on a hourly price tag you would receive a bid for $80 an hour, for as longs as it takes to complete the project.  As a rule of thumb, a medium size web site, without a store, will take 30-35 hours to design and build the content.

Pricing by the hour means you are going to see a weekly report on what was accomplished and how long it took to get ‘er done.

In both instances you will be working on a time line with expected completion dates for the tasks being discussed in your meetings. 

As a third party reference, you can review the average salary of a web designer at http://www1.salary.com/Web-Designer-salary.html

6.  The web site industry has few Standards.
Because this industry is relatively new, there is no deep collection of set practices in place. As I mentioned before, there are many ways to build a web site, there are many features and services associated with a web site, and there are multiple programs available to build a web site. Since web technology is constantly evolving, the scope of web site methods will likely increase.

In the end, there is really no meaningful answer to the question, “How much will it cost to build my web site?” And, when you understand the subjective foundation of the question, you have a more informed approach to moving forward with your web site. 

Steu Mann is a web reputation consultant with over 10 years of working with businesses in build quality web systems to achieve specific business objectives. Send him an email - click here.