This is a question businesses ask themselves, web designs agencies, advertising agencies and of course, us, all the time. Not to be too much of a smartass, we generally retort with something such as “what does a dinner cost”? Most anyone can run down to the nearest fast food chain and get a burger and a drink for a couple of dollars. That might fill you up, it might not. It certainly isn’t very good for you and continued ingestion of that fast food for dinner might actually be bad for your health. The effect on your wallet, however, is pretty minuscule.
Conversely, you dress up and drive to the fanciest 5-star restaurant in town and enjoy a meal cooked with the finest ingredients by a well-trained chef just for you. While this is a wonderful way to enjoy a special night out that your taste buds and stomach might thank you for, your bank account might not enjoy too many repeated nightly visits.
We can say the same for a website. A cookie cutter one size fits all, template service is pretty much the fast food of website design. For a few dollars a month, you can have a web presence that shows you exist, but not much more. At the same time, you can choose to have a site built from the ground up with custom programming to exacting specifications and spend a pretty penny for it. There is, of course, a great middle ground.
A website, like a meal, like a visit to the doctor, a visit to the lawyer, or a visit to the auto shop can be boiled down to the time it takes to do the service. The cost of rebuilding an engine is far more than the cost to check the air pressure in your tires for two reasons. One, it takes exponentially more time. Two, there are more material costs involved. Time is money and the time to do something right costs more than just doing it.
If you want to give yourself an eye exam, there are apps out there that do it for free. Don’t think for a moment that any app can replace the experience and expertise of an Optometrist. If you want to consult a lawyer about a legal issue, you can Google your problem, or you can rely again on the expertise and experience of the professional to help you. Yes, you can build your own website. Be our guest. If you think you have the experience or expertise to do better than us, for it. If you think your time is better spent building your website than running your business, who are we to say no. If on the other hand, you want an experienced firm with the expertise of building award winning and industry recognized websites, then let’s talk.
Our hourly rate at dba designs & communications for most services (as of the beginning of 2017) is $150 per hour. On average, an informational website with about a dozen pages takes us on average somewhere between 50 and 60 hours to complete for our clients. Sometimes, when we work with a number of companies in the same business disciple, we have a headstart with the pages and content that a website needs to have and can reduce the time needed to design and build the site accordingly, such as the eyecare industry, where we have built websites for dozens of ECP’s.
Before we finish, however, let’s look at the other side of the cost coin. Let’s say just having a website can net you one more patient or client a month. How much does the cost of producing the website mean to your business? Before you answer, let’s say a good website design can net you one more patient or customer a week. How much more is that good website worth to you over just any website? Is it worth the investment? Our clients seem to think so.
