What does it cost to make a web site?

A guide to calculate the cost of your next web site

I think I have mentioned this phrase somewhere on my web site but it does not harm to repeat it:

Your Web site is your most essential asset in growing your business.

So we know that having a web site is essential for a successful business today but what does it cost to make a web site?
How much would you need to budget for a web site project and what do you need to consider.

Well – Here are some facts you will find both interesting and useful

1 Domain name

To have your web site hosted online you need a domain name. You can buy a new domain name for around £8-12 or you can buy an old domain name. An old domain name can cost anything from £50 to several hundred thousand pounds (even millions!). The factors that determine the price for an old domain are for instance age of the domain and SEO keywords used in the domain. e.g. SEO.com were sold for £3 million in 2007
You will pay a renewal fee every year for the domain which is usually higher than the price you paid for a new domain; this can vary and depends on the registrar.

Total Cost (Estimate) £10

2 Hosting

To be online a web site needs to be hosted. This is something we will assist you with and is often included in a proposal as a separate cost.
What type of hosting is there and what is best for you depends on your requirements.

a) Shared hosting
This is where many web sites are hosted on the same server sharing its resources. You will not have much control of the hosting environment and are stuck with what the server can do. This is great if you do not have much functionality on your web site. This is also a very cost effective way to host your web site.
Price from £5/month

b) Virtual Private Server (VPS)
This is more expensive than a shared hosting but you have more control of your hosting environment. It is still a shared server but with more options to configure your requirements.
Price from £20/month

c) Dedicated server
A dedicated server is best for web sites that has a lot of traffic and has a lot of functionality and interaction with a database. You have full control of the hosting environment and can decide what extra software to be installed and run and how many web sites to host. This type of hosting is the most expensive
Price from £50/month and upwards
We at YUHANITO offer shared hosting and VPS hosting and are happy to assist you if you need a dedicated server.

Total Cost (Estimate)
£60 – £600+

3 Design and Development of the web site

This is the part that has the most variables and the cost will vary considerably depending on the various kind of work required.

a) Design Do you need a lot of customisation or bespoke development or will a ready-made theme work.
With a ready-made theme, the framework is there and you will have the option to change colouring and some placement of text and images. For a very simple site, this is a very cost-effective way to get the site built. For a pre-made theme price range from Free to £100
For a site with a custom made theme, extensive customisation to a theme or a bespoke build price range from £300 to £3000+

Graphics – Will you provide the images for the site or do you require this to be provided.
In most cases, it is a combination of this. We are happy to source images for your web site and the cost of images will be a straight pass-through cost to you. We will, however, charge for the time it will take to source the right images as this can be quite time consuming to source the right image.
Expect to pay around £5 – £20 per image that is sourced from a stock library.

b) Content How many pages of content are needed and what types of pages are required? Will you be providing this or do you need this to be provided for you. If you will provide the content yourself do you have the time and ability to do this? If you outsource this the quality of this will vary depending on who is writing this and how much you are paying for it.

• A freelance writer (non-native) can write for around £1-5/page
• Agencies can charge from £35/Page

c) Development of the web site’s functionality

Again, this will vary depending on your requirements. Items here can be

• one or more contact forms
• Database connectivity for dynamic content
• Forums
• Blog
• Membership
• e-Commerce
• Audio-Visual elements
• Personalisation for each visitor (based on settings and/or past activity – Amazon is a great example here)
• Integrations with third party platforms

Total Cost (Estimate)
£300 – £10,000+

Extra costs may be required for security, updates and maintenance of the web site
We implement security for all web sites hosted by us on a self-managed basis. As an optional service we will manage this for you if this is something you do not have time for or inclination to do.

So, what does it cost to make a web site?

Here are some example Prices for a new web site – These are the average prices in the UK

Brochure Web site £600 – £2500
A web site to give basic information about your business – This creates an online presence and is a good way to display the product and services of your company

Custom web site £ £1000 – £5000
This is a web site that is tailored to your specific needs to showcase your business the best way possible. It includes interactivity and audio/visual elements. Optimisation for SEO is usually built into this

CMS web site £1500 – £10,000+
Sites that require membership functionality, forums, blog which require the use of a database and/or dynamic content
This enables the web site owners to log in and create and edit the content of the site.
Our preferred CMS is WordPress using a premium theme

e-Commerce web site £3000 – £10,000+
Includes the above plus e-Commerce functionality with a shopping cart, product listing, ability to add/edit products and payment integration (PayPal, credit cards etc.)

Total Cost of building a web site:

This depends on the scope of your project and which decisions you make on the way but I hope this article of will enable you to make an informed decision and set your budget!
The bottom line is that quality matters and you get what you pay for.

Important notes

Design and Development for a web site is a service and not a product.
Looking at it from this angle will hopefully help you understand why it is difficult to give a single price to it.

There is a lot of planning involved.
How much time you take in this process will influence the price greatly. How detailed you go into this and the various functionalities you will plan for.

Quotes will vary due to being very subjective.
This can vary from £1,000 to £10,000 based on the same requirements. Unbelievable but true!

There are many ways to pay for a web site.
You go for a fixed price contract or an hourly rate for the web site or a combo of the two.

There are very few standards in this industry.
This is also very subjective to the developer. As the web industry is still fairly new there are very few standards.
For instance the choice of CMS, database system or server platform, all this can affect the price.

We hope this has given some insights in your initial question: What does it cost to make a web site?
It may not be as straight forward as you initially thought but it should help you on your way in choosing a web agency and what platform to use,

The real answer to: “What will it cost to build a web site?” can be a tricky one and there are many variations all depending on your web developer.

Here at YUHANITO, we focus on using well-known systems that are well documented and supported.
Our server platform is Linux with PHP and MySQL and our chosen CMS is WordPress.
This enables us to keep our prices low and at the same time provide a premium service

If you like to know more please contact us to discuss your requirements. We always give a free evaluation of your current web site and are happy to assist you getting your next project started.