What does a professional website design cost? What type of price should you pay?

Like anything else in life, good things don’t come cheap. It isn’t cheap to own and operate a top branding and design firm, trust me. It takes creativity, technical know-how, marketing skill, and a significant investment in talent, ongoing education, and infrastructure to build an industry-leading Web site.

Step 1: Your website design cost starts by establishing a realistic  marketing budget.

Your marketing budget, depending on your industry, should be between 3% and 12% of GROSS sales. That means a $1 million company, pending their industry, should set a budget between $30,000 to $120,000 to build and market their brand.

Building your brand initially is part of start up cost, which varies based on numerous factors. The brand building alone , without any advanced application development….generally runs between $30,000 to $75,000 for key components such as naming, logo, collateral, custom web site, presentations, blog, email campaigns, SEO, basic PR, etc. This cost logically adjust with the size of the company...larger companies or well-funded start-ups may spend a lot more to enter the market with authority.

These website design pricing and marketing budget guidelines are publicized by organizations like SCORE and the USSBA. They are benchmarks based on real statistics and actual business case studies. These benchmarks are the reason why venture capitalist usually require a reasonable marketing budget. Start with a realistic overall marketing budget, and you’ll be ready for the next step.

Step 2: Determining Web design cost for your Industry: Realize that you're not just designing a Web site, you're building a brand.

Budget for the full scope.

Your Web site is not a stand-alone marketing tool. It is, in many cases, prospects’ first impression of your brand. It is also the place your prospects go to form or validate an opinion about your company before they decide to take the next step. It is the most important element of your brand image and sets the pace for your conversion process.

There are many necessary steps to building a highly effective web site. Just getting to the "design phase" requires an in-depth marketing discovery and strategic web marketing plan. To build a site without this plan is like building a house without a blueprint – it’s going to fall apart.

Here are a few of the basics that need to be discussed with marketing professionals outside of your internal team.

• Your marketing goals and objectives – measurable, specific, and realistic. (If we don’t know where we’re going, how will we know if we’ve arrived?)
• Your value proposition from the customer’s perspective and how best to reflect that value proposition in the Web site strategy.
• The step-by-step conversion process – from entry to conversion and everything in between. Consider the four major personality types and their varied buying processes.
• SWOT analysis: how the strengths and weaknesses of your company, combined with the opportunities and threats, affect your Web site strategy.
• The current AND desired position of your brand in relation to your competitors, and how that affects your Web site design strategy.
• An analysis of what your competitors are doing and how you can outperform them.
• A clear assessment of the benefits conferred by your products and services. Features are cool, but people buy benefits.
• Your sales arguments – why should people buy what you’re selling?
• Calls to action – how will you get prospects to act and what actions do you want them to take?
• An Engagement Plan - How are your users going to interact with your site?

Ah, now you’re ready to start designing something – almost.

Step 3: Understand the full scope of your true needs.

To be successful, your Web site will need to include some of the following components and media. To build a site without them is like going big game hunting with a pocket knife: it’s just not smart.

Components and media needed for an effective online brand and to help determine a realistic website design cost:

• A branding blueprint (marketing strategy as outlined in Step 2).
• A Web outline that fully integrates all navigation and makes it completely user-centric.
• Visual direction and messaging aligned with your marketing objectives.
• The physical design of your Web site home page based on agreed-upon visual direction and messaging.
• Physical design of an interactive subpage template that will inform your visitors and guide them through your site while maintaining brand identity.
• Professional copywriting or content optimization (yes, you do need it) that allows prospects to scan information that will pique their interest and drive them toward your calls to action.
• Flash animation to stimulate interest and communicate key points without crowding the page.
• Custom-designed blog. This is critical: It’s today’s free PR machine and a SEO staple.
• E-mail template design that matches your new online brand. This is the best ROI in marketing – a must-have!
• Online downloadable PDF brochure, something your prospects can forward to a decision maker or read on the Metro, with easily digestible information. Yum!
• Online converasion forms – why make it difficult for someone to contact you? Interactive forms make inquiries a breeze and data capture automatic.
• Internal search engine. Forrester Research says that users abandon sites when they can’t easily find what they are looking for. This was a top abandonment complaint in 2007. A Web site search tool enables users to quickly find the information they want, without hassle.
• Search Engine Optimization – Your Web site should be designed in a way that is search-engine friendly. By thinking ahead, you’ll have a site that is well-positioned for SEO results.
• RSS Feeds – There’s no easier way to provide your visitors with fresh content than through RSS feeds – not to mention the SEO value!

And the list goes on…

Since most of the above items cost $1,000 to $5,000 or more each, you can quickly see that building a highly successful online brand and custom Web site is going to take a serious investment. Yet, a Web site that is built correctly will grow revenues and awareness of your brand more than you can imagine.

OK, OK, I get it! So what does a custom website design cost?

The web design cost should easily fit into the budget guidelines mentioned above. The bigger your company, the more you should invest in your online brand and the more features and functionality you can afford to enhance your online presence. If you invest the way a $5 million company does and you’re a $45 million company, you’re going to fall behind your competition and fail to impress your customers.

Madison Avenue and other high-profile agencies will charge mid-six figures and more to build an online brand. On the other hand, you could hire a freelancer or a small Web design team to build something for less than $3,000. But that would be more likely to hurt than help. Putting the right assets in place to build an effective brand is costly, but the rewards are substantial and ongoing.

The average design cost for a full service agency for marketing direction, messaging, design, coding and CMS implementation is going to be between $10,000-$25,000. This is without any back end programming, databases, custom applications, FLASH animation, etc.

It takes a LOT of time, and is epxensive to produce best in class web site design. At ImageWorks, we put a LOT oft time and thought into our creative direction and designs…they are designed to attract customers and persuade them to interact.

Additionally, when combined with the right content and interactive features you can make such an impact with your customers that they will eagerly anticipate the next step in communication.

The power of your new brand:

Hopefully, you now realize what it costs and what it takes to build an effective and conversion-oriented custom Web site and online brand. The rewards will be tremendous. Here is what you can expect with a Web site done right:

• Your employees, prospects, and clients will have confidence in your brand.
• The number of prospects who visit your site will substantially increase.
• Visitors to your site will be impressed, making them more likely to want to learn more about your products and services.
• Measurable results will be obtained that can be used for online improvements.
• With an actual system to convert prospects, you’ll be able to take advantage of the 80% or more of prospects that have a “buy later” mentality.
• More referrals will come your way.
• Your investment will be paid back in spades, and then some, resulting in substantial revenue growth.

Web design pricing ranges radically based on so many factors...but hopefully this will be a good guide for professional web site development cost and budgeting.