I see this question asked on various forums and on Elegant Market Place Facebook group on a regular basis, just how much should I charge someone to create a website for them?
To be honest there isn’t a correct answer, or not in my opinion anyway but I will try and explain things that need to be taken into account when creating a quote for a potential client.
Location Location Location
Where you are based is quite important in terms of the rates that is generally paid in any profession.
We are located in Yorkshire which is a large Northern county in England.
Our prices will be lower than a web design company based in London as the economics of being in the capital and Southern England is higher than here in Yorkshire so the prices reflect this.
That is just from different parts of England, the same will apply to different parts of the world.
Company size and experience
The size, experience and reputation of your company is also very important..
If you are just starting on the road to being a website designer and possibly working from home you can’t expect to charge the same as a company that has been trading for over ten years, is based in a large studio in the heart of a city and has a portfolio containing some of the biggest businesses in the world.
Hopefully as you get more experienced and your portfolio starts to grow you can look to increase what you charge.
The Clients Background
This is quite an important part of knowing what sort of budget you will be working to and therefore what you can realistically charge.
I work quite often with small businesses or community groups who will not have a very large budget for someone to create a website and will therefore look to maybe create a Facebook page or go down the route of the ‘free’ website creation tools like Wix or WordPress and will take some convincing that first impressions count and that its beneficial to have a website designed by a professional.
In the case of community groups some may be funded by a third party such as grants they may have applied for so therefore are governed by money available to them.
This kind of client isn’t going to pay the same as what a large established International company would pay but especially when you are first starting as a web design company these kind of clients are valuable for experience and allowing you to grow your portfolio.
So How Much Should I Charge?
Well with everything I have just posted I hope it has given you some ideas on how you should budget yourself but here is the way I tend to approach giving a client a quote.
I trade in designing websites so therefore I consider myself a trades person.
In my opinion a trades person based in South Yorkshire should be charging £100 per day for his/her services.
So if you look at the clients brief and feel you can complete this design in a week then you would charge £500 (working to a 5 day 9am-5pm week), if you feel it will take you two weeks then £1000 etc.
This is purely for my time, such things as hosting, plugins, hiring of a developer if needed etc would all be priced on top.
The £100 a day principal is what I try to adhere to and use it as a guide as much as possible.
Please take into account the company I run is a small business and doesn’t have a large studio and a dozen employees to pay for hence I can afford to have this guide price.
Ultimately what you charge is up to you, as a web designer we don’t unfortunately have a standard price to work to.
You could decide to undercut everyone in the area but that comes with the reputation of being cheap or you could charge more than everyone else but you need the experience and knowledge to back that up.
Hopefully this post has helped in giving you an idea on how to approach a client with a quote but in terms of answering the question ‘How much should I charge a client for creating a website’ I personally don’t think it can be answered purely down to the simple economics of where you are based, the size/experience of your company and likewise who the client is.
The best advice I can give is to research what the local web design companies to you are charging by looking on a search engine, don’t use the price someone may advice from a different part of the world as Gospel because they may be in a totally different background to you in terms of experience, knowledge, location etc but use the price purely as a guideline.
Good luck
