How Much Should My Website Cost, and What Do I Get for the Money?
Finding an honest answer about website prices online is hard: most sites say “request a quote” and never name a number. Yet knowing how a price is formed is the only way to read an offer properly. 💰
Short answer: the price is set by workload, not page count — custom design or professional setup, who writes the content, e-commerce or not, measurement installed or not. The same phrase “a five-page site” can describe three entirely different jobs.
Below: the lines that set the price, the bands, the arithmetic behind cheap quotes, and what you should receive for your money. Our own rates stay open: corporate website prices. 🔦
What sets the price?
Website prices are the sum of four lines; look for these four when reading a quote.
Function: e-commerce, memberships, integrations
Payment infrastructure, stock management, bookings, CRM connections — each is its own job. An e-commerce site is by nature a heavier project than a corporate one, and its bands sit on the pricing page above. 🛒
Are measurement, search settings and training included?
In serious quotes, yes; in cheap ones, usually not. A site delivered without measurement starts blind on day one. Look for these three lines explicitly — otherwise they become tomorrow’s extra cost.
What do the bands look like?
Naming a figure is hard because scope varies so widely; let’s give the logic instead.
Small corporate, comprehensive corporate, e-commerce
A small corporate site (5-8 pages, professional setup) sits in the lowest band. A comprehensive corporate site (custom design, content production, many pages) sits mid-to-high. E-commerce roams a wide range depending on product count and integrations. We publish current rates with scope breakdowns openly. 📊
What should I receive for the money?
A price conversation is unfinished without a delivery conversation.
Is a website really the place to save money?
The question in everyone’s mind at decision time; run the maths over two years.
How is price negotiated?
Healthy negotiation happens over scope, not over the figure.
📝 Field Notes
Since publishing our price pages openly, conversations changed: the price question dies in minute one and the time goes to the work itself. Hiding numbers doesn’t protect clients, it tires them. An open price is the most practical way to open a scope conversation. 📐
📖 Quick Glossary
Workload: the real effort days a project requires. Delivery list: what you receive at project end. Source files: the editable design and site files. Phase 2: the development package deferred until after launch.
⚡ Quick Summary
Four lines write the price: design type, content, function, setup. 💰 Cheap quotes usually lack measurement, content and support. Without a delivery list prices can’t be compared. Negotiate scope, not the figure — and count two years, not one.
🎯 Next Step
We can name the right band for your needs in fifteen minutes: the quote page, or explore the model on the web design agency page. ⚙️
Frequently Asked Questions
Sık Sorulan Sorular
Custom design is built from scratch around your brand — the highest line. In a professional setup an existing structure is adapted by professionals, gaining speed and cost advantage. The distinction is opened in template or professional? 🎨
The line that moves the price most and gets skipped most often. Supply the copy yourself and the price drops; have the agency write it and a production cost per page joins in. Photography, video and translation are separate lines too. A quote without this row is incomplete. 📝
Simple: the real effort in a site is measured in days. If a price doesn’t cover those days, something is missing — no content, no measurement, no support, or the work was rushed. Cheap isn’t bad; undefined cheap is. 🧮
Source files and admin panel access, domain and hosting in your name, measurement setup, basic search settings, mobile compatibility, a short usage walkthrough, and a bug-fix period after launch. With that list present, prices become comparable; without it, you’re weighing apples against pears. 📋
Add to the build price: yearly hosting and maintenance, the missing pieces you’ll commission later (measurement, content, speed), and the cost of lost enquiries. The last one never appears on an invoice but is the largest: a site that doesn’t convert quietly loses business every month. Over two years, cheap sites usually don’t come out ahead. The right question isn’t “what does it cost” but “what does it earn me”. 🧾
Cut the figure and what silently shrinks is effort: fewer revisions, less testing, less care. The right lever is scope — fewer pages, supplying content yourself, deferring phase two. The comparison method is in the quote article; yearly costs in the yearly cost article, and the rest in the 18-questions hub. ⚖️
In serious quotes taxes are stated separately, and domain and hosting are usually a separate annual line. That separation exists for transparency: seeing yearly costs prevents the year-two surprise. Ask for the three lines shown separately.
The common practice is staged payment: start, design approval and launch. It protects both sides, since payment advances as the work does. Where full prepayment is demanded, ask for the reasoning.
On a well-built site, adding a page is a small job — often something you can do from the admin panel yourself. It becomes expensive only when the structure wasn’t built for growth. That’s why architecture is day one’s most important decision.
Source: McKinsey & Company