average price for website design uk
What is the Average Price for Website Design UK is a question we get asked frequently here at Sliced Reality.
The decision to build a website is a step in the right direction because, as we all know, a website will help you reach a broad audience and expand your business opportunities.
Of course we all want to reduce website design costs. However, when is comes to price, everything depends on what kind of website you are planning to build and, more importantly, what it is for.
A website cost can vary depending on your individual needs of business. Here is a breakdown of the elements needed, and price and costs you should expect to pay for each of them:
Domain Name
A domain name is the memorable part to your website, this is the www. part of the website that visitors will type into Google or Internet Explorer to find your website.
Put simply it is your address on the internet. Most common domain names end in .com or .co.uk with most people opting for the .com as it was the original domain name released.
Domain names can vary in price. First of all, some start at £1 for the first year, however be wary of these “cheap” domain names as often, after the initial 12 months, you are charged a premium to renew.
Instead opt for a provider that offers domain name registration for a few years for around the £30 price point.
Once your domain is registered, you then need to point it to a area on the internet which stores the code to your website – this is called “hosting”.
Hosting
This is putting your website online so the world can see it and where your domain name will point to. Most website suppliers like GoDaddy, Wix, and SquareSpace charge between £36 – £144 annually for their starter packages.
Most hosting packages come with limits around capacity and bandwidth. Capacity is essentially the amount of space on the server they give you – usually this is 500 to 1000 megabytes which is plenty for a standard website.
Bandwidth limits relate to the number of times your website can be visited without incurring more charges. Usually you will be allocated enough bandwidth to handle 100’s of visits per month. But be warned, if you website and business relies on lots of traffic, you will incur more charges.
When calculating the average price for website design UK, hosting is often the highest cost.
Design and content
This includes the visual design, look and layout of your website. GoDaddy, Wix, and SquareSpace. come with free templates you can use with their packages. However their Website Builder packages cost from £10 to £28 per month, so not they are not exactly “free”.
There are content creation companies who will create the actual words to go on to your website. Typical costs are around £10 to £50 per hour or £100 to £1000 per page.
Shopping cart and e-commerce
Depending on what functionality you want in your website, shopping cart (also known as e-commerce), can substantially add to the cost of your website.
Most website designers will charge £1000’s to add this functionality plus the cost to write code to integrate payment systems.
Payments systems usually come with a monthly subscription charge (like bank charges) which you will need to pay.
However, quite often now days, Shopping Carts and Payment Systems can be handled by a specially coded plugin (an add on) within your website.
Email Address
To have your own yourname@yourdomain.com email address, you will also require an email package.
These usually are charged per mailbox, and cost from £10 to £25 per year. If you have the requirement for 3 or 4 mailboxes, the costs can add up quickly.
SEO
Search engine optimisation (or SEO) is the ability for your website to be found in a search result each time internet users search for a particular word or phrase relating to a particular business.
For example, if you are an car dealer in the UK and someone searches (on Google, Bing or any search engine) for a specific range of vehicle which you sell. Good SEO optimisation improves the chances of you website appearing and ranked higher on the result page.
project management and testing
During the design and build of your website, you must stay in constant contact with your website design company, and then again when testing. Even the best website design company will not get it right first time, so amendments will need to be made through out the build process.
Most companies charge £500 to £1000 for Project Management and Testing fees, and then amendment will be charged on top of this cost, especially if you have sign off your website and then make a change.
Why you need to be careful with "FREE" website builders
There is always a hidden cost to many free websites like GoDaddy, Wix, and SquareSpace.
They may be free initially, but to perform against other business, you will need to add their additional services at a later date.
Alternatively, “free” websites may be free for the first 12 months, then you will inccur addtional fees after your inital “free” period – If you refuse, all your website is gone.
Most “free” offerings also put banner and popup adverts on your website to sell other products to your visitors.
These adverts will be unrelated to your business and annoying to your website visitors. If you have a business related to gardening, your visitors will not be interested in ads from a web hosting companies and Pizza Hut gift cards.
Remember, they are the landlord; you are just a renter. As such, they can change their terms or shut you down unexpectedly.
Check out our article on Wix here for more information on Wix Services