Web Design Cost
Get an instant estimate on your web design project
Get an instant estimate on your web design project
We took it upon ourselves to break down all the different things that we’re doing when designing a website so that you could easily figure out the approximate cost of web design. Take a look below at the very simple questions you can answer to get instant pricing on a new website. Keep in mind that this is just an estimate. Typically web design pricing ends up being 20% more or less than the estimate given at the end of the form.
Easily estimate the cost of a website
Pick some features
We can set up your Google Analytics for you.
Sell your products online
Set up a blog on your site.
(applies for e-commerce sites only)
We can write the content for you and add stock images
How many images do you think you'll need?
Every page will have a minimum of 300 words
Typically up to 100 words
For e-commerce sites
We can set up your Google Analytics for you.
Sell your products online
Set up a blog for your site.
Here's a couple more addons
3 logos + 2 revisions
Create up to 5 social profiles
Connect your products to Google Merchant Center
How many products would you like to add to your Google Merchant Center?
We can write the content for you and add stock images
How many images do you think you'll need?
Every page will have a minimum of 300 words
Typically less than 100 words
Choose how you'd like us to build your site
WordPress themes are an inexpensive way to go. It's also easy for you to manage your site.
Custom made sites are coded and programmed from scratch. You can still get a custom coded WordPress site.
The final estimated price is :
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A look into the history of website design costs
See that guy to the left? That’s Tim Berners-Lee. He created the first web browser and called it the WorldWideWeb. He also built the first ever website which really didn’t look like much more than some words and links. Back then there wasn’t really “design” as we know it today. Anything designed mostly had to do with functionality rather than looks and aesthetics. You weren’t really paid as a “web designer”, but more than likely you could get paid as a web developer/computer programmer.
You can take a look at the first ever website here. That was Tim’s website and throughout the years he’s managed to build up an estimated $50,000,000 net worth. You’d think that the guy who made the first ever web browser and website might be worth a bit more, however we’re sure he’s not complaining.
In 1995 JavaScript was introduced by a guy named Brendan Eich. Back then it was called “Mocha” and it eventually became called “JavaScript”. It was a language used to compensate for the limitations of HTML. There were many things you could do with JavaScript to bypass extraneous coding in HTML.
Today JavaScript is mostly avoided where CSS can be used. However back in the mid-90’s if you knew JavaScript and HTML, you could be hired to program websites. Some freelance web designers in the 90’s reported having made as much as $10,000 for two weeks worth of web design work. However it should be noted here that not every web designer was making that kind of money. If you worked for a company you were likely making much less (the equivalent to $20 – $50/hour today).
In 1996 we started seeing some actual web design occurring. But just like anything else in the 90’s, web design was generally less than aesthetically pleasing. For the most part it was a lot nicer to have a change from simple links, black text and a white background. Companies paid tens of thousands of dollars to have a website that stuck out from the rest of the crowd.
Imagine that in a world full of black and white websites (at least most of them were black and white in the beginning) you’ve got the site that has vibrant colors. It definitely sticks out. In addition to colors, GIFs (Graphics Interchange Format) were introduced. This was certainly an era of many GIFs. Coincidentally, GIFs have recently become popularized again through social media platforms such as Facebook and Tumblr.
In 1998 Cascading Style Sheets (more commonly known as CSS) was becoming popular. The idea behind CSS was to have the presentation or design of a website be separate from the content. You could create a better presentation of your content by using CSS. As a web designer you were at the top of your game if you knew CSS and could use it in building a website. This also meant that people paid more for what you knew.
So the content was created in HTML while the look and format of your site was in CSS. It was less than perfect in the beginning. Because of how new it was, it took time for people to adapt to it. In fact, it wasn’t uncommon to encounter bugs in the beginning. Today CSS isn’t considered to be a “must know” language for every web designer. It’s mostly considered important for every web designer to know about it. However if you’re fluent in CSS, it’s definitely a bonus.
Although Flash was introduced earlier than 2000, it was in heavy use by businesses. In fact, in the earlier years of Flash it wasn’t uncommon that you would encounter websites that were so heavily animated it would slow down your computer and take forever to get anywhere on the website. However that wasn’t the case with all web design. Flash has been used for many years to provide a more aesthetically pleasing web experience. However, when it’s used in excess it will certainly slow you down and create an opposite effect of what you’re trying to accomplish.
In the early 2000’s web design was booming. There was high demand from businesses to have a beautifully designed website. This was how people would get to know your brand and remember you. If you had a beautiful website it was a pretty big deal. Web design agencies charged good money to code your site. A lot of work and knowledge went into every website that was built! The idea of paying less than $1,000 for a website was laughable at this time.
2002 was when the web 2.0 boom occurred. Sites were using excessive intro animations which made it take forever to get into a website, blogging was becoming a huge thing, micro blogging (such as Twitter) was introduced and expanding, and social media was becoming popular. In fact, Myspace (if you remember that old thing) came shortly after in 2003.
Websites were very interactive and required heavy design, however some business owners felt that they didn’t have a need for web design if they simply had a social media page or a blogging page set up. This wasn’t common, but it happened. In fact, believe it or not there are actually business owners today who still hold onto that mindset.
Web design was still flourishing at this time. With new online concepts came a demand for designers. It’s estimated that to build a site as successful as Twitter might cost you nearly $100,000.
Around 2005 single page websites were kind of a big thing. You still find them fairly often today. These were websites that had a navigation bar at the top which would take you to a section of that page. Often times these websites would also have a “back to top” button. This design concept was new and became very popular, very fast.
Web design was very well established as an industry by this time. In the earlier years of websites it didn’t matter too much if you were on the internet. With the advent of search engines, websites and web design became more and more popular. Thus there was an increase in demand for web designers.
Facebook was created just a year earlier, in 2004. The cost to make Facebook. It took millions of dollars to create the Facebook we have today, however if you were to get a quote on such a website you would be looking at somewhere around $500,000 to $1,000,000 and anywhere form 9 months to a year and a half.
In 2011 web designers started using parallax scrolling in their designs to create a more visually appealing experience for users. The concept behind parallax scrolling is to create dimension on a website and give off the appearance of having layers. You’ll notice in the GIF to the right that there’s a foreground which is moving more rapidly than the background. This creates depth which is a cool effect to have on a site.
This among many other design concepts have been introduced since 2010. Responsive web design had been introduced as an alternative to having a mobile website, textures were introduced as layers to images to create neat effects, and many other innovative designs have blossomed since.
Over the last 5 years or so web design has gone through some interesting changes. Companies that once boasted a large portfolio of custom-made websites are becoming antiquated with the advent of organizations like Shopify and Wix and others. It beckons the question for many as to what type of web design is best for the price. Let’s take a quick overview of some of the options available today.
SEO agencies in particular will rent websites for a reasonable price. The concept behind this is that a professional can pay monthly for a website that will rank well in Google and produce leads. An example of this would be a roofing contractor who doesn’t want to spend $2,000 – $10,000 on a new site. Instead he approaches an SEO company who will put his name, logo and contact information on one of their websites for a small fee of $500/month.
The problem with renting a website is that you never own it and you typically don’t have control over much. If you decide that you’d like to work on your own SEO, it is often a rigorous process and usually ends up in failure. If you are late in paying due to some emergency, it’s possible that you could lose the site and end up with absolutely nothing. In addition to those facts, over the course of several years you will have spent much more than the initial cost of getting your own website.
Overall it isn’t a terrible idea to rent a website that is already generating leads. This is actually a decent idea for someone who wants to make money right away. However as a note of caution, there are many companies who will make you a website for a monthly fee and charge you for SEO, but you wind up not owning any of it. This is very important to know because the last thing you want is to spend hundreds or thousands of dollars on a website that you don’t actually own and produces very little results for you.
When someone wants to rent a website to you, make sure that it’s ranking well in Google already and that it’s producing phone calls and/or leads.
There are many platforms available for people to build their own websites for a small monthly fee. GoDaddy has their website builder, Wix has an easy platform to work with, Shopify is great for e-commerce, VistaPrint has a platform, and many more. The convenience is in the pricing and the ease of use. If you intend to manage your own website, this may be a decent option for you.
You pay a very small monthly fee (or in some cases you would pay for a year upfront). On average you can expect to pay anywhere from $5/month to $100/month depending on all the bells and whistles you get. This will usually cover things like your domain name, hosting and other options. It would seem that this is too good to be true! Well there’s a downside.
Drag and drop platforms often take a lot of horsepower which can lead to sloppy or excessive coding and slowing down a website. They are also often times very limited in certain advanced customizations. As an example if you wanted to speed up your website, you might find certain aspects difficult. If you wanted all invalid URL entries to redirect to a certain page, this isn’t usually an option available to you.
For the most part you can create a decent website and pay monthly for it, however there’s much more SEO value in having a custom designed website. If you want a website that generates business for you, custom is the way to go. If you just want something to show off to your friends, you might consider a simple website builder.
Social media pages are not web design. There is a very big difference! If you think that having a Facebook page for your business is going to make you a fortune, think again. People who make money on social media are usually entertainers who spend countless hours a week building up a following. They produce content that attracts new visitors and often times this content is featured on a website (usually they feature them on platforms like YouTube or Blogger).
Creating a social media page will cost you nothing! It’s something you should absolutely do. A lot of the websites we build at Franklin Web Design include making social media pages and then syncing them up to the website so that posts are automated.
We would highly recommend that you create social media pages, but please do not attempt to use this as the hub for all your traffic! Chances are you’ll never get found this way and you’ll have a rough time with your online reputation. Starting with a website, then building up your SEO is one of the best ways to gain new customers online.
You have have heard of WordPress before. There are two sides to this platform. The first one is a free WordPress website that you can get. This is similar to opening a Blogger account. You’re definitely not going to become the next Elon Musk with one of these free websites. In fact, these sites are somewhat comparable to social media pages in that they are primarily used for blogging and not typically used to represent a business or brand.
The second part to WordPress is the CMS (Content Management System). When you buy a domain name from a place like GoDaddy, you can set up hosting and then install WordPress. This is different from the free website. From there you can install themes or have a theme custom-built. These themes look like a majority of the websites you see on the internet. You can have a theme that looks like a million dollar website, or you can get a very simple theme that costs you nothing. Whatever the case may be, this is one of the more popular options people take with Franklin Web Design.
The main appeal to this is the ease of use while also the ability to manipulate and perform more advanced functions. As an example, you can easily manipulate your website speed on this platform, you can easily enter custom code, and you can easily let an SEO agency take over and work with you to get YOUR website to the top of Google.
The cost to do this is about $60/year for hosting and maybe $12/year for domain registration renewals. Having a theme built for you is another story and that typically costs more depending on things like the amount of pages you need, whether or not you need content written or stock images, e-commerce capabilities etc.
If you’re interested in building up your business through online marketing, this is one of the best ways you can do it. If you start off with a drag and drop builder you’re only going to be able to take it so far before you have to ditch it altogether and build a custom site to gain an advantage over your competitors.
When we talk about custom built websites, we mean a website that’s coded from scratch. Most small to medium sized businesses don’t go this route because it’s typically more expensive than the other routes. A website that would cost you $180/year on GoDaddy might cost you $2,000 if you use WordPress and might cost you $5,000 if it’s custom coded.
One of the primary virtues of having a custom built website is that it’s unique! This holds a lot of value in SEO and it also makes your website stick out more. You can also request certain customized features by having a custom website. As an example, if you wanted to be able to book appointments, accept donations and sell tickets to events, a custom website might be the route to go. If you just need to tell someone that you’re a surgeon or lawyer, having a WordPress site made with a theme is probably the best option available to you.
Over the years web design has had its ebbs and flows. In the beginning there just wasn’t a lot of demand for it, but the demand increased as more and more people became aware of the internet. Then cheap services became available to make it easy for people to build their own websites, however search engines didn’t seem to like those sites very much.
There are many options available in terms of website design pricing. Our options are considered very reasonable in this industry. It isn’t uncommon to see pricing as high as 50% – 100% more than what we charge. You can also find very cheap web designers, however quality and credibility become a concern as these options avail themselves.
Give us a call if you’re looking to have a website built. We’d love to hear from you and give you a quote!
I’ve been fortunate enough to study and work with some of the greatest online marketers on the planet. I love what I do, and it shows in every SEO project I take on.
Still not convinced?
I’m not just selling a position in Google, or website traffic. I make the phone ring, get people in the door, and I dominate markets. I’d like the opportunity to help you meet your goals as a company. I’ve done it before with several others, and I can show you how I’ll do the same for you.
No website? Need a new site?
Whether you’re a startup and you need a new website, or you have a company but you don’t like the website that was built for you, we’ll create an SEO and website design package at a discounted price to get you going. Call us today or fill out our form and get a quote on your SEO and web design.
Providing top quality, affordable web design services in Franklin, Brentwood and Nashville.
Our committment is to helping local businesses flourish with our website design and SEO services!