It’s an obvious fact which you can’t ignore for too long that someday your business will need a web site, so why not today? You might be afraid of the cost. You have heard of many who built their web sites themselves and others who have spent some 5 figure amount. Some business owners are very pleased with their site, but still there are many who having a sluggish design and navigations failed in their objective and regard it as a waste of time and money.
What’s the fact?
Almost every week, potential customers calls or emails me -who all want to know one thing: How much for a site design?
Some eight out of ten run for the hills after listening my answer. Believe me. Well it is according to industrial buzz- even 15% lower correctly speaking but I think it might still sound scary.
Ofcourse no two websites cost the same. We (better say all designers) work on an effective website strategy based on your budget and needs. There are some parameters which define it like the scope of your content type, design, size of site needed, advanced programming, multimedia content, and time taken to develop in accordance with your target audience and then the web site will be constructed to your wishes.
In order to have a successful website what you need is:
1. Atleast one Domain names
2. Server space to hold the site
3. Content
4. Web Site Design
5. Professional placement and search engine marketing
6. Website Maintenance
Let's go through each of these elements:
Domain Name
It’s your online identity. Domain name is how people will look for you on the web. Generally, you can have a unique domain name registration for some $70 for two years. A professional web developer can show you how to select and register your name. Every day hundreds of domain names are registered.
You should visit sites as www.domain.com or www.buydomains.com . They are the best location for solution to your registration needs.
After looking at the first process’ Buy a domain name: $ 70. Doesn’t sound that bad. Next comes the reality of hosting.
Server Space
As you will want your site hosted with a commercial hosting company to avoid slow loading or search engine related complications related to free hosting providers. While for a general site; it’s like about to pre-pay for two years in order to lock in that great price of $5.50/month. For a small business site figure is somewhat $20- $30 per month. If you want to use E-Commerce and take credit cards then $50/month is a good estimate as hosting fees.
Keyword Rich Content
I’m sure you may already have catalogues and brochures to serve as a basis for your site. But still developing a quality content w.r.t. your need specifications is a major challenge ahead. Plus to get the traffic from search engines you also need to use the keywords more effectively. Obviously the costs here will vary widely, so it’s not possible for me to give any estimate. If you have the text, photographs, and art work available then the cost should be minimal for sure.
Web Site Design
A professional web site designer will save you hours of valuable time and produce an original and attractive site. The designer should work with you to capture your vision for the look and feel of the site. If it’s regarding a business site for potentially millions of people, you should have the site professionally designed. Figure on $250-$500 per page for a basic page, more for an E-commerce page. A top designer will probably not start a project for less than $1000.00.
You can also opt for web templates they might cost you far less. Even if its just a hobby site or is just for leisure then you can also choose among the thousands of free designed templates available on internet.
Search Engine Marketing
Just having a well chosen domain name and a great looking web site are not enough. Your web site needs to be properly marketed so that potential customers find your site.
For that to achieve you will have to rank higher on the major search engines. A professional web site marketing firm may make necessary changes to your site in order to achieve that goal. The firm should register your site with various search engines and directories. They may recommend special pages called Content Pages for your site. You should get a full report on their activities and your search engine placement. Companies as www.patrickgavin.com , www.greenlightsearch.com offer solutions to take your website to the top of the major search engines at effective rates.
Web Site Maintenance
Site maintenance is a must on almost all web sites today. It provides your current and prospective customers with up to date information on your products and services. A web site needs to be maintained, both in content and in positioning.
Some firms offer to maintain your web site on daily, weekly or on a monthly basis. You can use this service an hourly basis or you can simply hire them on a 6 - 12 month maintenance contract, where they monitor, tweak and update your web site as per needed.
Search engine positioning is a dynamic process. Your site needs to be modified to reflect the latest changes in search engine criteria. You will want reports reflecting your latest search engine ranking. Periodically most of your site will need to be reregistered.
You need to budget of somewhat at least $100-$200/month for marketing maintenance, and if you have large sites then expenditure is in the excess of $1000/month or more in order to aggressively marketed and maintained. Content maintenance costs depend on the number and difficulty of the changes requested needed to be implemented.
Conclusion All of the above said things affect the final expenditure amount. Beware! Never to go by the developer who just throws out a price without going over the options with you. There should be no charge to discuss your requirements and your design specific outline that depicts a picture of what and how much is needed to be done.
Finally the site design must meet the web standards based on the W3C guidelines and full testing in multiple web browsers and on both Mac and Windows platforms.
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