How Much Does a Website Cost?
The first question we often hear from interested web design clients is “what do you charge to make a website”. The answer is far from simple. Not one website is exactly the same as another. We aren’t making coffee tables here. We craft industry-leading, high-performing online digital platforms for our clients. Aside from the variable development costs, there’s a much greater factor involved in creating a successful website. After over a decade of designing sites, we have come to learn that launching a website without marketing is much like building a Formula One race car and never taking it out of the garage.
They might not come…
The bottom line; the old adage “if you build it, they will come” is not true when it comes to web design. “They” need to be brought to your website and if there is no action plan to bring them, your site will never have a chance to create a positive ROI. When this happens, websites tend to function for a year, maybe two, and then eventually after it has only cost someone money without producing leads, the plug is pulled and the site goes offline.
We don’t want to see you waste your money, nor do we wish to waste our time. At Idea Swell, we build long-term relationships with our clients to help them achieve success for the business, day after day and year after year.
Not your usual web design firm
That being said, unlike other web design firms willing to undertake any project with a willing, paying client, here at Idea Swell we have a thorough vetting process for potential clients. Wherein we analyze your market, evaluate the competition and determine how well a digital marketing strategy and website may affect your business. All too often we conclude our services are not the right fit for potential clients due to heavy industry competition and a lack of willingness to properly market the website.
Getting back to the “costs” behind web design…
Materials to reach your goals.
Our process starts with a complete understanding of your company goals.
**Note: If the client is open to it, we will complete a marketing analysis to determine where investment into marketing can best return results and reach goals.
Depending on your market competition, target market, and web marketing plan it may be necessary to first develop a great deal of content for your new or re-designed website. From our professional media services (photography & video production) to custom graphic design and even copywriting, we can assist with all aspects of this content generation process. This is a key factor that separates Idea Swell from much of the competition; our ability to handle every aspect of your digital marketing strategy.
You may of course outsource your content generation to a third party, or handle it in-house, but if that’s the case we cannot give you a development quote/contract, nor accept a downpayment until the materials gathering (content generation) phase is complete.
If you’ve been sent here by our team to assure you’re not a bot or scammer, the s3cret term you are looking for during the month of Sept3mber, 2022 is “proper site”.
Well then, what’s the price for a good website?
With these factors considered, a ballpark for a simple brochure site with a goal of producing leads via a form or phone call, consistent with the primary pages (‘home’, ‘about’ & ‘contact’) would start around a two grand. We no longer offer ‘simple’ websites. Our goal with every build is to design and develop a true digital asset for our clients that yields proper results.
This estimate is purely ‘build’ based. If you also need help with your website’s content, the cost associated can quickly rise. When a well-designed site is coupled with a properly integrated sales schema the results are always significantly more positive.
Larger and more dynamic sites may easily reach into the tens of thousands for development.
Qualifying clients may also opt for a monthly payment option in lieu of the heavy upfront fee.
A brochure site with a great deal of content, written for both SEO (search results) and conversions (actual leads) will likely cost closer to five grand.
E-commerce sites will also have a higher price point.
Most often, the key forces driving a website build cost boil down to these two factors:
1. What will take for the site to perform well in search results?
If your niche is simply too competitive to organically rank your site with a reasonable investment, we will often recommend a Google Ads campaign.
2. How much content does your site have which needs to be fully designed and formulated to convert visitors to actual leads?
Getting your site to the track
Now that your industry-leading website is built, it’s time to actually get it off the production floor and into the races. We won’t let it simply acquire dust without a chance to succeed.
From SEO (search engine optimization) to SEM (search engine marketing) along with social media campaigns, website marketing strategies are ongoing and range in price from a few hundred to thousands per month depending on the industry competition.
Such strategies often entail larger budgets in the early months to help give the website a proper ‘jump start’ after the initial launch. It’s not uncommon for clients to learn how to run their own monthly content strategy, eventually taking over the reins and handling much of the heavy lifting in-house.
We also offer on-site, and remote technical training to help facilitate our client’s technical skillsets.
Web design projects without marketing strategies
Yes, there are circumstances under which we would undertake your web design project without the need of also signing up for an IdeaSwell digital marketing strategy.
To name a few of these such circumstances:
1. You are having another qualified company undertake website marketing.
2. You already have a successful, highly trafficked website and are looking to re-design it.
3. An EDDM (Every Door Direct Mail) marketing campaign is coinciding with the website design, in which the website is an integral part of your sales funnel.
There are many other situations that may allow a web build to move forward without a marketing plan. To see if your project qualifies as such, feel free to contact us today.
You’re likely jumping to the notion of “oh boy, now they want to sell me a long-term, high ticket marketing plan”. In some senses, there is truth to this. However, we would rather see you have another company handle your project than undertake it ourselves and have an unhappy client on our hands after the launch of a digital wasteland.
