Price for a simple website?

[Paul Imagetovector]

It fascinates me when I look on the net at the price a simple website (4/5 pages) can be produced at. I have seen prices as low as £49. Has anybody seen cheaper? How do they make a living from this?

In amazement

Paul

 

[SLAM DUNK]

Hi Paul,

Personally I would steer away from sites that cost £49 - they would probably prove to be a false economy as the price reflects what you get (namely something cheap & nasty).

I have spent thousands on websites in the past & this also proved to be a waste of money. Suggest you allow yourself a budget of say £500 - I can put you in touch with my web supplier who will build you a bespoke site for that kind of sum. Too many "web" designers are happy to take your money, pass the work out to someone else & add on their slice!!! So be careful!

Plus of course you have to think about marketing the site. PM me if you want details - I'm NOT on commission!

cheers Slam

 

[Medden Website Design]

There are sites out there for less than that even and depending on what you want it for would depend on if it is right for you.

I have also seen sites that have cost a fortune and are created with tables or on a website builder but unfortunately the buyer is not aware of this.

My advice to everyone would be to shop around - any web designer worth thier salt will provide a good portfolio and client testimonials.

What is that old saying "buy cheap, buy twice"

Clare
xx

 

[gmar]

Yup, those cheap websites are built using templates and you'll usually end up with nothing but garbage code which is no good for SEO (plus they usually end up looking horrible). Clare is right, if you don't spend the money up front, you're just going to end up replacing it 6 months down the line.

I run my own SEO/Web development company and all my work comes from word of mouth. My customers know that I'm not cheap, but I get the results they want and that's all that matters at the end of the day.

 

[awebapart.com]

A lot has happened at the very low-end of the web market in the last few years. Most of the lowest-end solutions are automated DIY sitebuilders. In this category even £49 is expensive, considering that Microsoft are now giving away Microsoft Office Live Basics for free.

There are also the hosting companies that use whitelabel sitebuilders to offer sitebuilders for free or at low prices (e.g. free instant site one page website with domain name purchase from 123-reg.co.uk). How can they offer their service so cheaply? Well it helps when Microsoft do a deal with the sitebuilder developer to give the Windows-hosting-only sitebuilder away for free to hosting companies - in order to encourage hosters to move from linux hosting to windows hosting!

The sitebuilder solutions at this low end still have some advantages over more expensive solutions, due to the DIY nature of a sitebuilder system it provides a content management system as standard, allowing the business to update the site when they want. There is also the benefit of using a tried and tested system.

Some people say that you cannot usually get good SEO out of these sitebuilders, but as an experiment and demo, I set up a 1 page site with 123-reg's instant site a few months ago:

www.webdesignnorthampton.org.uk

and it has managed to reach google page 1 position 10 for the competitive search term:

web design northampton

It could probably do better without the ads (if the site was upgraded to the £2 per month package). Yes it helps having the keywords in the domain name, but that is just one of the 200 factors google uses to assign ranking, and this is also a competitive term that is targeted by local web design firms, national design firms, and directories too.

There are also problems with the low-end sitebuilders, e.g. cheap hosting, and I describe these problems on the site www.webdesignnorthampton.org.uk

 

[you2meet]

I am new to this however, I purchased a dating website for a minimal amount of money included hosting and doman name. What I summarize by your blogs is that these are a waste of time as you end up getting what you paid for which in my case isn't alot. So even if time and money are invested not to expect a large income form it. Basiscally you get what you pay for.

 

[Calibre Designs]

I agree with all the above comments.

Although web design is not our main focus, we do occasionally work on projects with a team consisting of one graphic designer and one web coder. Bespoke designs can be achieved.

 

[Paola]

Unfortunately the design industry isn't regulated so any Tom, Dick, Harry and Sue (i'm not sexist) can call themselves a website designer these days just because they happened to build their 12 year old cousin a 'hobby' website or whatever.

This is one of my little pet hates as people like myself are fully qualified with design qualifications and have spent years and time carving out a profession for ourselves and then you get these design cowboys who think they can charge a nominal fee for a crappy piece of work that's got no creative input, is ill thought out, looks crap and fails to do it's job properly.

Unfortunately people still opt for this option which has a knock on effect on the rest of the industry. My advice is to look at a designer's portfolio and also find out if they have any qualifications relating to the services they offer this should ensure that you get a creative, effective and original design solution.

 

[Astaroth]

There are a number of websites frequented by small overseas designers and developers. I have seen many of them doing design for sub $20 and some doing ecommerce etc for little more.

Generally the standard is above amature but not at what I would consider professional (read as too much like a template site design) however there have been a few that do rival solid pro designers - one of which will do fully valid HTML (inc 3 PSD mockups) for $5

 

[DEJ2210]

Paul I also agree stay away. I built my website from 1&1 they have good prices for hosting and you plenty of help with their control panel. Website are getting easier to build all the time. My advice would to go it alone.

 

[Poppy Design]

Yes you usually get what you pay for.

However for some people on a limited budget it may be an option.

Personally as a web designer running my own company there is no way I could do a 4/5 page site for £49!! £500 is nearer the mark.
You have the whole concept/design drafts and then the actual draft - you may ask clients for final copy but there are always minor typo errors or sudden change of images and you may well end up doing 5 or 6 amendments.
Then of course, if you offer a bespoke service, like I do - there are all the bespoke graphics that make the site unique.

Joanne

 

[ColinL]

I'm intent on having a website and confess I've been eyeing some cheap options. I am constrained by cash. My business is bookkeeping and accounts, and at least initially but who knows, local. Whilst a web presence is important it won't be one of my primary ways of marketing.

Anyway. I've been looking at (FrontPage) templates for sale online. Some of them look good to me. Is this really such a bad way to start (given my situation)? I'd want some decent images though!

Colin

 

[Sally@CC]

Hi Colin

One thing to watch with cheap off the shelf websites is how much code you have access to. If you have limited access then there is very little about the design you can change (just colours and pictures). Just something to watch out for while you are shopping around.

Sally

 

[dave_n]

People forget that a website is a REPRESENTATION of your business. It is the modern window shop. But unlike a window shop people make their minds up whether to browse or not in FIVE SECONDS.
Why would anyone want to represent their business with a cheaply designed and implemented website??????
If you can't afford a decent one then don't get one at all. Once someone visits your site and leaves it without being interested you have lost them forever.
Unlike a normal window shop that people will walk past on a daily basis the web has literally billions of window shops all vying for business....do u really think people stop and look at the cheap ones????

 

[RedEvo]

Unfortunately the design industry isn't regulated so any Tom, Dick, Harry and Sue (i'm not sexist) can call themselves a website designer these days just because they happened to build their 12 year old cousin a 'hobby' website or whatever.

This is one of my little pet hates as people like myself are fully qualified with design qualifications and have spent years and time carving out a profession for ourselves and then you get these design cowboys who think they can charge a nominal fee for a crappy piece of work that's got no creative input, is ill thought out, looks crap and fails to do it's job properly.

Very well said! I'm not a designer but I do employ one and I couldn't agree more. There is a lack of regulation and it will always be thus as lives don't depend on it......

d

 

[awebapart.com]

Unfortunately the design industry isn't regulated so any Tom, Dick, Harry and Sue (i'm not sexist) can call themselves a website designer these days just because they happened to build their 12 year old cousin a 'hobby' website or whatever.

It goes much further than that, the way the industry is going with easier to use tools doesn't just mean that more people can set themselves up as 'web designers', it means that more and more businesses do not need to commission web designers, the business people themselves become the 'web designers'. This has happened already in photography, desk top publishing, word processing (managers typing their own letters and emails), and it is happening now in web design - just ask some of the businesses on this forum, the hundreds of mrsite customers, the thousands of Microsoft Office Live customers, and the thousands of businesses using DIY web building packages from the various hosts. And that's just the easy sitebuilder side of the DIY web design market, there's also the slightly more complex DIY web design tools market too with software like www.websitex5.com or using www.nvu.com with templates from www.oswd.org

This state of affairs will only continue, as the new generation of business owners and decision makers - the ones brought up with the knowledge of creating their own myspace, bebo, facebook, friends-reunited, ebay pages or sites - are tasked with buying a company website.

Only very recently on this forum was a startup business on a very low budget going through this DIY web creation process, and the end result, which is pretty good for the budget is at www.exoticdetail.co.uk

If anything there will be less point in someone setting themselves up as a web designer as there just wont be the market, and only the web designer 'wheat from the chaff' will filter through and continue. I also reckon that with the rise in popularity of diy tools like sitebuilders, some people who used to be 'web designers' will embrace these new tools and add value to them by focusing more on designing graphics, banners, templates, etc rather than the whole website (this is already happening to some extent with web designers offering semi-bespoke solutions based on content management systems like Joomla or ecommerce systems like VirtueMart, osCommerce, Actinic, CubeCart, etc).

There will still be a need for good custom web designers, as with photography, whilst there are things you can do yourself, there are also more important jobs that require the professional touch, and sitebuilders only meet the needs of businesses who have fairly common website needs, anything out of the ordinary then you still need custom development.

This is one of my little pet hates as people like myself are fully qualified with design qualifications and have spent years and time carving out a profession for ourselves and then you get these design cowboys who think they can charge a nominal fee for a crappy piece of work that's got no creative input, is ill thought out, looks crap and fails to do it's job properly.

That might be the case with some 'web designers' creating websites but it is not the case with most sitebuilders. Sitebuilders such as the instant site package used by 123-reg, have been designed and developed by professionals, the company behind instant site is SWSoft. A sitebuilder is an extremely complex piece of software engineering, we know this from developing our own sitebuilder service. The swsoft templates have also been designed by design professionals using professional photography and professional models. Sitebuilders are designed to minimise or even remove any custom coding requirements so there is less chance for things to go wrong, and the good ones have search engine friendliness and some onsite SEO features as standard.

You are quick to big yourself up and be dismissive of others, but interestingly your home page reminds me of a DIY myspace type layout, the news section on the home page doesn't work correctly in the most popular browser IE6, and there are nearly 400 errors when you w3 standards validate the site. At present I would have to say that the business I mentioned earlier that went the budget DIY route has done a better job with their website.

People forget that a website is a REPRESENTATION of your business. It is the modern window shop. But unlike a window shop people make their minds up whether to browse or not in FIVE SECONDS.
Why would anyone want to represent their business with a cheaply designed and implemented website??????
If you can't afford a decent one then don't get one at all. Once someone visits your site and leaves it without being interested you have lost them forever.
Unlike a normal window shop that people will walk past on a daily basis the web has literally billions of window shops all vying for business....do u really think people stop and look at the cheap ones????

There are some that say if you are serious about your business then you should be paying more for your website - which is also true. But my opinion is that there is a sliding scale of how much does a business really need a website, and this scale starts at zero (those businesses that do not need a website) and goes up. Therefore there also exists a sliding scale of how much a business is prepared to pay for a website which meets their needs, and this scale also starts at zero (those businesses that do not need a website) and goes up. There also exists a sliding scale of expectation for websites, you would expect a large corporate company to have a better website than your local market fruit and veg stall. Generally low-end DIY sitebuilders and other DIY tools sit at the low end of these scales in this market.

 

[self-sale]

If the purpose of the site is to boast and promote you business and your skills, why would you want to do it on the cheap.
You may be the best and most talented at what you do but people won't know this as they wouldn't get past your cheap and nasty web site.

Invest more, be clear on your objectives for the site, invite several companies to tender for the job, then negotiate hard.

It fascinates me when I look on the net at the price a simple website (4/5 pages) can be produced at. I have seen prices as low as £49. Has anybody seen cheaper? How do they make a living from this?

In amazement

Paul

 

[you2meet]

Ok guys thanz for the input, the reason I bought the website in the first place was really to get my foot on the ladder, as I don't have experiance in this area. So any advice would gratefully listerned too.

 

[VLAHAKISA]

Wow, great spot Awebapart.

That is completely scary, I never even checked, but when Paola was going on about skills and qualifications and about 'cowboy web designers' (which isn't the first time I've heard them talk about that) I just presumed that the builds they create would meet the standards at the WC3, and to not meet the standards in the slightest when you keep banging on about being a professional isn't really on!

My site only has 58 errors and I decided a long time ago to stop offering web building services due to my inability to code 'to standard' and now refer my clients onto a developer that can do it 'properly'.

Clearly this doesn't stop some people. Which is fine, not everyone can afford a very skilled developer, but it's important to not sell yourself as something that you are not.

The Sitebuilder software does actually build sites that meet standards amazingly enough and I don't think its a bad way to start at all if you don't have a budget for a full custom design.

If you aren't a designer I'd stick to a template rather than trying to create your own style because it will just look bad...a professional template will be better.

If you are looking for custom design at any point in the future, a great web developer is www.bluecubemedia.co.uk - this developer knows how to build custom designs that do meet the standards set down by the W3C. No errors on their site!

Amanda

 

[Sally@CC]

If you can't afford a decent one then don't get one at all.

It really saddens me when I read comments like this, it almost smacks of 'go home little boy you don't have what it takes'.

I say take your hat off to the little guy that at least has the courage to give it a go and give them some encouragement.

Okay with a huge budget you get a flashy website and loads of advertising, which means the pennies start rolling in quicky to pay the bank loans off but some of us are happy to start off small and carry less or no risk. I am sure there are millionaires out there that started with £200 and a lot of drive!!

"Give us little guys a chance" (that is me wavng my banner and shouting in the street).

 

[RedEvo]

Like anything in life you can pay thirty bob and you can pay a million quid for the 'same thing'. Thing is, they never are the same thing. It's always been thus and always will.

IMHO.

d

 

[awebapart.com]

That is completely scary

Sorry, that's the last thing I want to do, be a scaremonger about W3C standards. W3C standards validation isn't the be all and end, I mentioned it because there were so many errors, but even then I mentioned it as a third, less important, point. It is more important to make sure your site works in the popular browsers and be search engine friendly (treating the search engines as browsers too), that's the top priority. If you can get this, and you have just a few W3C errors (and as long as they are not important problems, some errors are not as important as others), then it is not so bad, so don't worry.

 

[Sally@CC]

Like anything in life you can pay thirty bob and you can pay a million quid for the 'same thing'. Thing is, they never are the same thing. It's always been thus and always will.

Sorry not sure if the above post was in response to mine.

Of course that is true but it does bother me when I hear the 'give up now' comments. To me it is like saying if you can't afford Jimmy Choos then don't wear shoes.

Sorry I am not getting at anyone personally, the help and encouragement on UKBF is amazing but I just get annoyed by these comments, us little people come here for encouragement and advice not to be told to give up before we start.

 

[Sally@CC]

Sorry just wanted to add that my comments are not suggestng that if somebody comes to UKBF with a crappy no brainer idea that they should be encouraged but to me that is a different issue to you dont have a huge budget, don't bother trying.

 

[VLAHAKISA]

It really saddens me when I read comments like this, it almost smacks of 'go home little boy you don't have what it takes'.

I say take your hat off to the little guy that at least has the courage to give it a go and give them some encouragement.

Okay with a huge budget you get a flashy website and loads of advertising, which means the pennies start rolling in quicky to pay the bank loans off but some of us are happy to start off small and carry less or no risk. I am sure there are millionaires out there that started with £200 and a lot of drive!!

"Give us little guys a chance" (that is me wavng my banner and shouting in the street).

I agree....I started out five years ago with a homemade site that was ghastly in every way....my site is still home made but not as ugly as it used to be and I've been around for over five years now and doing very very well now.

Now we can't all start big, so I do think if you absolutely won't or can't take the financial risk of the cost of a good quality build it's not going to mean business failure if you start out with a DIY website or a template instead.


Amanda

 

[VLAHAKISA]

Sorry, that's the last thing I want to do, be a scaremonger about W3C standards. W3C standards validation isn't the be all and end, I mentioned it because there were so many errors, but even then I mentioned it as a third, less important, point. It is more important to make sure your site works in the popular browsers and be search engine friendly (treating the search engines as browsers too), that's the top priority. If you can get this, and you have just a few W3C errors (and as long as they are not important problems, some errors are not as important as others), then it is not so bad, so don't worry.

No, I didn't mean having any errors are scary. The reason why my site has errors still is because it's not harming my site or business to have them and so I do understand that it isn't the be all and end all of web design.

It is desirable to aim to keep them low/non existent however because complying does usually mean that your site is search engine friendly and works in all browsers...the two generally go hand in hand.

However what I did find scary is that someone would so strongly go on about their professionalism and skills and qualifications and have as many as 400 errors...which seems to indicate to me that they don't really have a good grasp on web development at all.

I find it scary to discover that someone who is ranting on about web dev/design cowboys all the time, is this poor at web development or am I missing something and 400 errors isn't that bad in some way?

Amanda

 

[Matt1959]

It depends on who you are targeting with a website surely. If targeting business, yes I agree that a site should be top notch and look businesslike and proffesional because thats what business owners are used to seeing. However, if you are targeting private consumers, they are not so informed and you can get away with less. I'm very happy with my site which cost me about £200 if that, and so are my customers so why would I want to change it? I also think that saying you've got to spend £500, £700, £900 or whatever otherwise don't bother, is a generalisation and not helpful to some people. Better to study these and other Forums to find out for yourself what you can get for the money - its still possible to get an adequate cheap job IMHO.

 

[Eagle]

How do they make a living from this?

Says the man who charges £4.15 an hour for vector conversion... You'd make more money flipping Burgers at Maccy D's.

How do you make a living?

 

[Danny Bluestone]

You pay for what you get. If you are a small business or a startup go for the cheap £50 option and then come to a professional when you need the website to generate revenue and actually do something for you. If I were to tell you that you could build a site for lets say £3K and you would need to spend £12K a year on marketing but you might earn £100K from the Web alone would you go for it? Obviously there are no garuntees but a professional digital agency will show you how this can be achieved. Its all about a professional solution at the end of the day. Sadly there are many cowboys and template solutions out there which simply won't allow you to compete against your competitors who will be rolling with professional solutions and be listed in the top of search engines. Getting a template that was designed in Latvia or India will not serve you well but if you dont have money is the only option. Unless you go to a UK student who might wack something together. The Web design and Online marketing business is booming and there is no lack of business. Like in any business, its always the ones who realise a professional investment is needed that do well. The ones who pay nothing normally get nothing in return.

 

[RedEvo]

You pay for what you get...........

Bang on this post in my view. I think what's being missed with this whole debate is the value professionals bring to businesses who retain their services.

In essence you can get a great 'looking' site for thirty bob and a fried fish, simple as. you can hire great coders abroad - assuming your can manage them - for next to nothing. You can hire most ebusiness skills on the cheap BUT, real pro's add value in so many other ways and that's what you pay for.

IMHO.

d

 

[Debug Design]

The web design and development sector is saturated with a wash of skill levels and as such the prices vary considerably. I would tell the designers and developers what budget you have (realistically) and you will find that many of them would try and cater for you.

We are are 4 strong team of designers and devlopers and sometimes if we are waiting on feedback, or just so revved up and in a creative frenzy we want to fill that time with design or experimentation with AJAX or CSS... Otherwise, its boring link building...

I would say, tell them what you want and for how much, if its unrealistic and un-doable, they will say 'sorry, we can't help' but if you after a simple website, nice design, clean XHTML code and no content management system they many of the companies would love to help.

When the site become slightly more complex, such as a CMS, CRM, booking system, house search, ordering online and e-commerce, then you start to separate the men from the boys because its much more specialist and doing it well requires alot of planning.

If you just just want some advice please drop me a line and I will let you know what your options are, or at least, what to ask for from your creative agency.

Ian

 

[ukjim]

sites can be suited to budget, I would be more than happy to point people in the right direction, just ask