In simple terms the cost all comes down to the amount of work required.
Specifically, the 2 factors determining how much work is involved are the size and complexity of your website.
For example, this means that if you want a website with standard customisation, it is going to cost less than a website that is highly customised and wants intricate details.
In terms of actual £'s, the cost to build a website for a small business could be less than £500 or more than £5,000.
That’s a big price range difference. It will be easier if we break it down, so you can see exactly what makes the cost so different and allow you to form a realistic estimate of what it will cost you to design and develop your website.
There are 2 Options you can choose from for designing and developing a small business website
OPTION 1: Hire A Professional
Small business owners are often extremely busy and if you are a technophobe then you will need to hire someone to help build your site for you.
Although often when you search online sites of website designers and developers you are probably unable to find any prices listed or prices that are all over the shop, from cheap to ridiculously expensive.
Don’t worry though, as we have some good news for you. We have done all the hard work and research what it costs to build a small business website in 2020.
We searched for website designers in High Wycombe, Buckinghamshire, UK that did list their prices, we found the going rate in 2020 to build a modern, professional small business website was typically £500-£2,000 but could be around £10,000 or even more, depending on how many pages the site had and the amount it all needs to be customised.
Now that you know roughly what things will cost, we can take a look into the more specific areas that affect the price of creating a small business website:
· Page count. If you are being offered a 10 page website for around £1,000, but you will need 25 pages for your site then how much extra will that cost? An easy way to work it out is to add about £100 extra for each page of a standard website package. So in this case 25 pages would be an extra 15 so an extra £1500, so overall you would be paying £2,500.
· Custom site layout. Almost every website design will start with a template or at least a theme. It isn’t very usual for someone to code a website from scratch anymore. Coding from scratch is far too expensive and very time consuming. Using a template or theme allows you to be about half way done with your website, but there is still a lot of customisation and additional coding that will need to be done to help it look like a functioning site and bespoke to your requirements, because not all websites and customers requirements are the same. The more you need to customise and code the website, the more it will cost. Templates and themes are a major reason you can often build a professional small business website in the £500-£2,000 range instead of £5,000-£10,000 or more.
· Custom images & graphics. High quality images and great graphics can allow your site to have a unique looks, but this too comes at a price. In addition, sophisticated visual effects often require special editing software and/or the services of a custom graphic design specialist which will inevitably add to the cost of the website.
· Custom programming. If you are using WordPress you can often find a plugin that has the exact functionality that you want right away. However, sometimes this isn’t possible and you might need to use coding or trial and error to get what you want which costs time, or even a little tweak to your Wix website to make it better than your competition could require coding too.
· Number of design revisions. Most website designs start with a rough outline of what they want it to look like. It is then quite common to have around 1 or 2 revisions after the designers have done some tinkering to get it to exactly where you want. Some website designers can offer up to 3-5 revisions and some even offer unlimited. However it is important to take into account that every revision will add to the overall cost of the website and usually 1-2 design revisions will be more than enough.
· Website content development. Great, interesting content is the foundation to any great website. You need to ensure that you have your content ready, if you are deciding to launch a new website. If your existing site has content that is not up to date or outdated then you need to use the base of that to change and turn it into something great. Not having your content ready could be a big barrier stopping your website from launching so even though it can often be time-consuming and difficult it needs to be done. Sites like Fiverr and People Per Hour can allow you to find people who can help you write this content for a cheap price.
Pro Tips on website pricing
1. If you think that hiring a professional is your only option but you don’t think you can afford a lump sum of payment at once, some developers offer financing. This will allow you to pay monthly in smaller more manageable amounts. So, you can have the website you desire to grow your business but it won’t break the bank.
2. Be careful with cheaper pricing. Unusually low prices for lots of pages often means you’ll get shoddy workmanship, an unpleasant experience or they’ll charge you for every little thing. You get what you pay for and it is good to remember that.
OPTION 2: Attempt the build yourself
If you have are more techy and have at least a basic understanding of web technology, you might be able to do it yourself.
The things you will need to build yourself aren’t too expensive and are certainly cheaper than paying someone else.
· Domain name: £10-£12/year to register a new domain. There are a lot of different registrars to choose from.
· Website hosting: If you are looking for a WordPress host costs range from about £100/year for standard web hosting from companies like BlueHost or HostGator to £300-£500+/year for more technical web hosting like WPengine or SiteGround. You can most likely go for the cheaper option and it be fine unless your site is going to be getting a lot of traffic, probably more than 100,000 visitors a month. However, if you are looking at something like WIX or Shopify then hosting costs between £60-190 a year but gives you a platform to build your website easily and manage your online store products and payments.
· SSL certificate. You might not be planning to sell things from your website, however it is still good practice to secure your site with HTTPS protocol. You can get an SSL certificate for as little as £10/year or as much as £200-300/year. Do a little research into what is on offer, but only buy what you need. Some web hosting companies even offer a free SSL certificate as an incentive for you to host your site with them, so that might be something you should consider.
· Premium website theme. For WordPress its likely to cost around £75-£150. There are so many themes to choose from. Some free, some paid. It is probably best practice to spend some money and make sure you get a higher quality theme though. We’ve looked into many website themes and have found that Template Monster has great designs and solid coding. However, if you are working with WIX or Shopify the theme cost is likely to be free or only a few £'s, and that will give you a lot of what you are looking for, and anything out of the ordinary then you have Experts on hand.
· Stock photos. If you are able to do your own photography and get high-quality images yourself then you are good to go. However, if this is not the case, which is more often than not then you should invest in some stock photos to make your website look more professional and interesting.
Some examples of good places to get these images from are Shutter Shock, Getty and iStockPhoto. In most cases, you can probably get all that you need (at least initially) for £29-100. Then you will just need to buy what your website needs as and when it evolves.
However there are FREE image websites out there, for example, you can get free, high-resolution, royalty-free images for your website from PIKWIZARD, Pixabay or Unsplash. The only issue is that there is a limited selection available.
IMPORTANT: Never, ever, ever just copy/paste images from other sources onto your site, unless you’re 100% certain you have permission. Otherwise, you can get sued. It is best to just purchase your images as this is a lot less costly than a lawsuit!
· Education. Free-£300. Unless you work on websites every day, you’re probably going to have to buy a few books or take an online course or two to learn Photoshop, HTML/CSS coding language, etc. to get yourself up to speed in one or more areas of website design and development.
Overall you are probably looking at around £200-£600 in expenses to get your website up and running by yourself.
The main cost of a DIY website is the amount of time you will spend on it. It can take around 20-40 hours to produce even the simplest of sites so if yours is more complicated you need to be prepared that it might take a while.
Building a modern, well-engineered website is way more time-consuming than most people realise. But if you have more time than money right now and you don’t get overwhelmed by web technology, the DIY approach is a perfectly viable option.
Head over to our website to view our fantastic packages and portfolio.
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