One of the most troublesome questions that comes to your mind while considering developing or revamping a website is “how much do I have to pay?”
And it’s a common concern. However, the worst mistake is to settle for a site that comes at a cheap price. A website is an important brand touchpoint and it plays a crucial role in evoking reliability among your audience. Therefore, you must pay attention to designing a user-friendly and engaging website even if it costs you a little more.
Now, as a professional website development company, it’s difficult to give a clear-cut answer to the question we started with - how much do you have to pay to build a website.
That’s because, several factors influence the cost of website design. This contributes to a custom pricing for each website. Again, when maintenance is involved, it’s further difficult to measure the pricing as it is a recurring cost.
Let’s take a look at the factors influencing the price of a website design and maintenance. We will also explain which costs are one-time and which ones are recurring. In the final segment, we will focus on an estimated website design cost for your project.
Without further ado, let’s dive in then.
Factors Influencing Website Design Cost
First, let’s check out the factors that will determine the cost of your website. Take a look.
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Number of web pages
The cost of a website design increases with the increase in the number of web pages. For instance, an eCommerce website usually has more product pages than a small business website. Therefore, eCommerce website development services cost higher than regular CMS based website.
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Technology Used
The use of technology is a determining factor for website cost. A dynamic web application built with PHP or Magento will surely cost higher than a static website built with WordPress. That’s because the developers have to put more effort while dealing with complex technology.
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Features
The more features you add, the more you pay. For instance, a standard or basic website may include integrated social media, Google map, and contact form along with a mobile responsive layout. If you want to add image slider, newsletter subscription, blog, client testimonial, and other dynamic elements into your website, it will cost you more.
However, if you ask the experts, paying a little more for an appealing dynamic website design is always recommended. You are developing the site to attract the customers and win a competitive edge. Investing a little extra will readily pay you back by helping you to achieve your goal.
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Varied Quotes
Each company has its own price chart. The quote will vary depending on whether you hire freelancers or an experienced website design company. The expertise of the company, the team size, location, and several other factors work contribute to it.
Not sure why location is a factor here? Well, web development price in the UK can be 3-4 times more than that in India for a similar quality work!
Cost Breakdown of Website Development & Maintenance
Here’s a step by step approach to estimate the cost associated with website development.
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Domain cost
The first step to crafting a website is to obtain a domain name. For this, you need a domain registrar like GoDaddy, Google, BlueHost, HostGator etc.
A premium domain will cost you higher but offer some extra facilities. You can register the domain every year or purchase it for two consecutive years.
Many professional domain registrars offer an integrated service where you can get a dashboard for managing databases, email accounts, hosting, and DNS.
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Hosting
The next task is to host your website so that it finds a place in the virtual realm. Hosting service providers will offer you space on the server at their custom quotes.
You can book a server on a yearly or monthly basis. Some choose VPS hosting plans for a secured web experience, some choose shared hosting plans while some are okay with dedicated hosting plans.
You can talk to the customer support team of any hosting service provider. They will help you to choose the right hosting plan for your website as per your requirement and budget.
We recommend you to provide a safe user experience at your website. Therefore, ensure to get an SSL certificate for your site. You can opt for it while choosing a hosting plan.
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Website Design
The cost of custom website design varies on different factors including the company quote, the design you choose, the number of web pages you require, and so on. This is usually a one-time cost but you can modify or revamp your website as the industry trends change. That will demand you to pay some more.
Here’s a serious consideration. There are some basic readymade designs that come for free or at a low cost. However, these template designs are not professional and don’t suit any serious business. Therefore, it’s better to get a custom website that fits your business goal and niche. Remember, your website must reflect your brand aesthetics.
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Content Management System (CMS)
Before talking about a CMS, let’s quickly define a static and a dynamic website. A static website has content that doesn’t change frequently. It doesn’t require a separate CMS. However, the content on the dynamic website changes and you need to include a CMS here. It’ll help you to change the content without disrupting the structure.
There are various CMS available on the web including WordPress, Drupal, Joomla, etc. You can also build a custom CMS to make your site more engaging.
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Content Writing
A website design is incomplete without content. You can also write the content for your site but if you want it to be more professional, user-engaging, and optimized for search engine, hiring content writers is a better idea.
Documents, write-ups, images, infographic, video - the professionals can create diverse content for your website.
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Search Engine Optimization
This is an optional step but crucial to driving more visibility and web traffic. Engage professional SEO services to earn valuable backlinks, enhance your site’s rank on the search engine, increase brand awareness, and draw relevant audience to your site. Various companies offer distinct quotes for SEO services. Pick the right package as per your business requirement.
Remember, SEO is a long-term process and you need to invest in it for some time to get noticeable results. Trust us when we say, it’s worth your money, time, and effort.
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Database
A website is a repository of data and it’s increasing every moment. You need an efficient mechanism to deal with it. And a database management system is what you need at this hour. It can facilitate some interesting additions to the site.
Depending on the extent of integration, its cost will vary.
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Maintenance
If you want your site to feature a top-notch performance all the time, you need to engage a professional maintenance service. You can either hire a regular or on-demand maintenance as per your budget or requirement. The professionals will fix the bugs, slow loading time, add different features, and more according to your necessity.
Estimating Website Design Price
As you can understand, website design price depends on diverse factors. That’s the best part about custom web development. It allows you to pay for just what you want. Therefore, it’s always better to engage a custom web design service instead of a template-based one.
The price range of website design significantly varies from one company to another. You can get an idea of it in this link. You can find three packages here - Starter, Best Buy, and Premium. Pick the right package as per your budget and requirement. Also, the prices outlined here are the starting ranges. You can further customize the site with more features.
Got any query? Feel free to comment below.
