How much roughly is a top website?

[Levi1989]

I know websites can be picked up pretty cheap for just a couple of pages but my website needs to be a massive part of my business and where I hope to generate most of my customers from so I will be investing alot of time into it. many pages, pictures, ways to purchase products through the site safely (unsure if that costs extra)

Just wondering if anybody has a rough idea as I have looked online but prices really seem to vary.


Any recommendations would be really appreciated too

 

[OldWelshGuy]

The question you are asking is like 'how much is a car? in short in is unanswerable as you have not given enough detail.

A website can cost £50 (or even nothing), or it can cost millions.

how big is the website, how many proiducts, what features do you need, what countries will it operate in, do you need SEO to rank?

 

[Levi1989]

Well it is mainly to operate locally for my trade but I would like a feature for customers to purchase products through the site like stickers, vinyl, signs if they do not live locally enough to be delivered.

just I will want to have lots of colours, text, pictures, links, lots of pages., maybe the odd video and a system for customers to pay via the website if needed.

I would like a "sign design" feature for customers to get an idea of what they want etc but unsure how I would implement that. (so if you say wanted a yellow sign with black italic text on you could test it on the site first etc) but would have no idea if thats something I would need to develop myself or if another company offers this system.

I would like the domain co.uk or com.

 

[OldWelshGuy]

To have a full blown sign making site with ecommerce facilityies as you describe is likely to cost £5,000 -15,000 (this isn't a quote as I don't build sites any more). If it is a simple brochure site with examples and set prices and the like but no bespoke ordering facility then £500-£1500 should do it.

 

[Levi1989]

Thanks for the reply

Wow bit steep for me the designing feature etc, maybe in a few years

Wouldn't necessarily have to have prices on the site (if that pushes the price up) Just need something to advertise my services etc, was hoping around the £100-200 mark but then overtime evolve it as the revenue goes up as my start up funds are not huge. Sorry to ask so many questions but what is it that drives the price up so high or is that the going rate? Maybe I could leave the ordering facility out for the first few months and just advertise local trade.

 

[Glowbridge]

what is it that drives the price up so high or is that the going rate?

That's the going rate for a bespoke site. A relatively simple business website is going to take a rough minimum of 50 hours Research / Plan / Design / Build / Test

Customising of a template would be closer to your budget but there are obvious downsides. It wouldn't be unique to you, it generally wouldn't have much more than a single day of time spent on it (Which means dropping some things out of the standard process, like Research) and it isn't going to help you further down the road when you feel you do need a bespoke website.

 

[Paul_Rosser]

You may find this post useful - http://www.ukbusinessforums.co.uk/forums/showthread.php?t=265585

It was designed to show the massive difference in prices between types of web development projects.

As OldWelshGuy says though it's like asking "How much is a top of the range car?" it really depends on what exactly you want, how complicated it will be and how bespoke you need.

If you can take something off the shelf and tweak it a bit to suit your needs then the cost will be quite low, if you need something custom written using a variety of technologies then the sky is the limit.

 

[mrsmcy]

Have a look at the web design company Aylis. http://aylis.com/bigcommerce-design
We used them and can't recommend them highly enough. Dave is very helpful and the price range for the sites are advertised on his site so you can see the type of thing you get for your money. Not as high as £5k plus which we were also quoted but it would be a bit more than £200. Our site is on bigcommerce which from what you say you need would be a good platform.

We personalise products so the customer can select the font colour, font, position of text etc. bigcommerce has a good feature where you can set rules for example a customer can't choose black print on a dark blue product. You can also add extra money so if they have a small sticker it's £5 medium +£2 etc.

Once the site is designed you can add your own photos, content, videos. I'll pm you our site so you can see what bigcommerce can do.

You can also do bigcommerce by yourself and use one of their templates. That would only cost you about £15 a month. http://www.bigcommerce.com/plans.php

 

[webgeek]

A project from earlier in the year was going to run just under 50K for the site, though there was still going to be added labor for getting some of the training course information into the system (about 100 topics in 40 cities).

The difference between a 5k and a 50k site is often not the design elements, as we saw proposals for the 5k to 10k range and their portfolios were gorgeous. The cost differentials come into play when you start looking at other system integrations (CMS, ERP, LMS), multi-country, multi-payment processing, multi-lingual, internal search customizations and so on.

Other areas of difference is how much participation you get into the wire-framing at the early stages, how much time they spend on usability, how much they know about your business (via use cases and personas) so as to create the taxonomies that most of your prospects would use to drill down into the site and find the information you require.

Finding an agency who has done a lot of projects similar to your company is key in getting solutions that fit. If they've done a lot of work, but never anything close to what you do, then ask yourself how comfortable you are being the guinea pig.

Finally, platform drives a lot of the cost equation. Companies who build on Wordpress or an off-the-shelf CMS system are generally going to be MUCH cheaper, the sites much easier to get worked on by other companies/outsourcers/staff, and often much harder to tweak into doing those special things you want done (without compromise). Bespoke CMS's can have a lot of extra horsepower, though you may get tied into the company for support because no one else can figure it out, and you may get annual license fees for the pleasure of using this code they've used 100 times and are continuing to squeeze profit out of.

How much is a top website? How much do you want to pay!

 

[Levi1989]

Cheers for all the replies, helped me a lot I will continue to research different things that I feel I need and dont need and will hopefully get there sooner or later

 

[Paul_Rosser]

I've buit quite a few and used to run a team of programmers who wrote complicated sites.

If you want any help setting up the domain and getting webspace drop me a PM.

 

[Urban Publications]

Struggling to undestand this post, the OP asked how much is a top website, with some features that are simple and some that are more complicated, within 24hrs the OP is now confident about building his own website.

OP if you have been doing your reasearch and come across MR Site or other like this then dont waste your time and energy with them.

If you are wanting to build your own site then you will need to understand a few languages.

1.CSS..probably the easiest of the list as you are basically building invisible boxes and filling them
2.Html..You wont get anywhere without this

And now the head banging stuff that I promise you, will send you crazy

3.PHP. I like to call PHP "Simply Complicated"
4.SQL.
5.xml
6.Js
7.Flash

If you are in a hurry to get your site built then get someone to do it, if you have a few months and plenty of reading time and want to jump on a MASSIVE learning curve then go for building your own

Or you could go down the CMS route, but again they are designed for more layman, but to get the most out of any CMS you will need some knowledge of CSS, PHP, SQL

But good luck with whatever route you take...but dont do the Mr site route

 

[Levi1989]

I think the thread title was labeled a bit wrong or maybe a bit misleading by myself as I didnt mean top top thousands of pounds website but I can see how it looks like that.

After exploring more about building my own sites and reading your post I am not going to even attempt to build my own as I cant spend that amount of time doing so. I will continue researching to find the best option.

I suppose for now I just need something for start up at around the £200 mark but how far that will get me I dont know. Thanks for your post though

Struggling to undestand this post, the OP asked how much is a top website, with some features that are simple and some that are more complicated, within 24hrs the OP is now confident about building his own website.

OP if you have been doing your reasearch and come across MR Site or other like this then dont waste your time and energy with them.

If you are wanting to build your own site then you will need to understand a few languages.

1.CSS..probably the easiest of the list as you are basically building invisible boxes and filling them
2.Html..You wont get anywhere without this

And now the head banging stuff that I promise you, will send you crazy

3.PHP. I like to call PHP "Simply Complicated"
4.SQL.
5.xml
6.Js
7.Flash

If you are in a hurry to get your site built then get someone to do it, if you have a few months and plenty of reading time and want to jump on a MASSIVE learning curve then go for building your own

Or you could go down the CMS route, but again they are designed for more layman, but to get the most out of any CMS you will need some knowledge of CSS, PHP, SQL

But good luck with whatever route you take...but dont do the Mr site route

 

[Deleted member 27344]

I just love threads like this:
"How much is a site?"
Depends but as an example around £xxx
"Wow! That's a lot. I'll build it myself then"

Seriously, never look at something like a website, marketing materials, advertising etc as a cost - but look at it as an investment.

 

[Levi1989]

Yeah the thread does make me look a bit silly. Problem is as far as my start up funds are they are not huge but a website is something that I really want to invest in as it will be the major pull for custom and advertisement but if I have a budget site at first, say a few months down the line surely I will be stuck with the same "budget" site and wont be able to upgrade to a better site. Its a bit of a tricky situation but I cant afford to dwell on it for too long.

 

[Urban Publications]

If its a major part of your business then wouldnt you want to spend a major amount of cash/time on it.

What sector are you starting the business in?

 

[movietub]

Clearly the OP doesn't anything in the way of customised functionality from the site so it should be qute cheap.

That said, it worries me when someone says they want a good site for a £100-£200 budget. There are many very talented people that will put a good looking site together for that sort of money, but it probably won't be the best value site...

The truth is that no one can design a site that really compliments and does the best for your business without taking the time to understand and care about your business. And with the best will in the world, someone looking to earn £200 isn't going to take the time to do that!

Another poster put an estimate of 50 hours on a good corporate web site, I think that's about right. Probably only 10 hours will be spent building the site itself, but the other 40 hours researching and planning are just as important and of course need to be paid.

So 50 hours = £500-750 dependent on the rate. Which I think is about right and in most cases would be better overall value than the £100-200 alternatives out there.

EDIT: I couldn't afford that when I started up, so I learned how to build my own site. I guess the moral is that once you work out what your business needs you should find a way to get it, even if it's a lot of work it's generally better than compromising just because you can't afford it.

 

[Urban Publications]

EDIT: I couldn't afford that when I started up, so I learned how to build my own site. I guess the moral is that once you work out what your business needs you should find a way to get it, even if it's a lot of work it's generally better than compromising just because you can't afford it.

Exacty the same here.

Sorry did read the post again and I noticed you want a site for vinyl signs/stickers etc, you also mentioned locally..concentrate on this

I would start with a static site and like mentioned concentrate locally first, for you to build a site, or whatsmore have a dynamic site built with the features you mentioned and have any chance in the search engines, on a national level then it doesnt look like your budget is anywhere near, nor will it be an overnight fix..even for the pro's

Just had a look and approx 20,000 people search for vinyl stickers/signs etc on a monthly basis..if you have no clue of SEO then you will need a pro...and they would want your site built to a professional standard to give them a fighting chance.

 

[Levi1989]

Thanks for the extra information and post guys. I will go with a static site at first like you say just to concentrate on local business and rely on leaflets emails and word and mouth (as my father is already in a similar trade) we can work together in an "unofficial" partnership to get my business really off its feet. As time goes on and I start to turn over increased revenue I think then I will look to invest a larger amount of money into my site has the company hopefully progresses. I guess for now its a case of starting off small and improving everything as I go.

 

[OldWelshGuy]

i have worked in the banners stickers/labels industry and it is no place for an amateur as there are a few companies there that know what theya re doing and invest in SEO.

Build the site locally and then promote it locally, when the money comes in, look at growing it.

 

[Levi1989]

i have worked in the banners stickers/labels industry and it is no place for an amateur as there are a few companies there that know what theya re doing and invest in SEO.

Build the site locally and then promote it locally, when the money comes in, look at growing it.

This is now my intention just to start nice and small and like you say as the money comes in grow the company and site.

Think this thread is pretty much done for now. Thanks to everybody who posted

 

[Websitehandyman]

If I was you I would segment the areas of the site to take advantage of what you want, when you need and who you employ to do it. Save money by hiring the right people to do the right job. The advantages to this are, for example if you pay what will be a decent amount for features you can, should you wish to, bolt these options on to other sites you might want to open later.

So Frontend, Blog, Design You sticker, Buy of shelve section perhaps all independent code built if and when you need it. At the price you want to pay considering their ability to earn.

 

[Dot Design]

I know websites can be picked up pretty cheap for just a couple of pages but my website needs to be a massive part of my business and where I hope to generate most of my customers from so I will be investing alot of time into it. many pages, pictures, ways to purchase products through the site safely (unsure if that costs extra)

Just wondering if anybody has a rough idea as I have looked online but prices really seem to vary.


Any recommendations would be really appreciated too

Like you said it's very tricky to say, it's almost the 'how long is a piece of string' question.

The more detailed the spec you can put together the more likely you are to get an accurate price and there maybe ways to work around things. As some have said you can potentially spend ££'s or even £££,£££'s