Website Design Costs
Looking at getting a website designed? Got lots of ideas for the website but haven't got a clue how much it will cost to get the website designed?
Don't worry - in our 11 year experience you would fall into the majority of queries we get. This article will hopefully try and give you an outline as to what you should budget for. I should point out that as no two web design agencies are the same in terms of skill/ability,support, etc., the charge per day will vary depending on the company. Usually daily rates can range anywhere from €600 to €900 per day.
Time Means Money
The cost for web designers will be the length of time it takes to design the website. A typical website design should be designed in 2 or 3 days, depending on complexity. This will usually involve main drafts, followed by smaller edits. You also need to allow approximately 1 day for getting the designed converted to code through a "cut up" stage, ready for development work to begin on it.
For a website to work for a company they will need to be able to simply update their website themselves. They do this through a content management solution (CMS). The implementation stage on a standard website should not take any more than 1 day, or less in some cases. Throw in testing (including main browser testing), search engine submissions, CMS training - the whole project should be completed in about 5/6 working days. (Sadly these 5/6 days may take a few months to complete depending on feedback, training availability, etc.)
Website Add ons
Inexpensive add ons to websites (some of which would come as standard) would include:
- Blogs;
- Photo Galleries;
- Mailing List;
- Contact Forms
Over the past 12 months at Webtrade we have been able to add workflow and members' areas to the relatively inexpensive list, whereas before these would have been a lot more expensive items.
Larger Web development costs
What can really add to projects are areas of customisation. One area that can take a large development time is when you need your website database to integrate with a 3rd party system, e.g. Integrations to stock systems for shopping carts can typically be something that may even require a scoping budget to figure out what will be involved. You need to strongly review the cost/benefit analysis of any integration work in advance, to decide whether the integration is worthwhile.
Learn from your website visitors
If budgets are tight we would always try and encourage prospective clients to get their main website functionality working and phase in the changes as required, in a second phase a few months after "go live". What often happens is that the phase 2 element of the project actually changes once the client has reviewed the working website and gotten feedback from users. By waiting, the client gets better value, as they are delivering what their website users want. With usability software, we can now test the completed design for you to see how well it is being used, to help you plan fror any future changes.
Other website costs that need to be considered:
Domain Name: These are not expensive and should be no more than €50 p.a. depending on extension.
Website Hosting: A website needs to be hosted somewhere so that people can view it online. This would be usual done as one of many websites on a particular shared server. This would usually cost anywhere from € 200 - €400, depending on the hosting companies. The items to consider are:
- Backups they will perform, in case of an emergency!;
- Size of website, database and volume of visitors;
- Quality and speed of server that the website will be on
If the website is a large website, or is in need of additional security, then you many need to go for a dedicated hosting solution - be warned this will be a lot more expensive than the shared offering.
Don't forget that value is the key
I hope this article is of help to you getting your head around all the different areas relating to website costs. Of course, we at Webtrade would love to speak to you if you are looking for a website (Contact Webtrade). But what we would urge is that the costs of getting websites designed should really be based on the value each offering will give to your organisation. Neither cheapest not the dearest agencies may necessarily offer the best value.
Good luck with the new website!