cost of web design and hosting

[Heraldeer2]

I'm interested in setting up a website for my business, but i have no idea how much i should expect to pay. I don't want anything too flashy, but professional looking and would need to be able to add or change some of the content myself. Any ideas on what i should expect to pay (initially and ongoing?)....thanks

[fo3nix]

It's a bit of a 'how long's a piece of string' question really...

What features on the site are you after? Are you just wanting it as an advert for your company, just to get a presence online? Or are you wanting to sell things using your own shopping cart system?

The design itself shouldn't be too pricey, but I'm sure it easily can be.

The hosting also depends what you need. You can get half-decent hosting for �30/year. But if you want more advanced stuff, like an SSL certificate for an online store, you'll be paying more. Likewise, more visitors to your site will be more expensive, that sort of thing.

You can get decent free CMS systems that'll let you edit content easily yourself, so they should only charge you for either developing a bespoke version (maybe not required), or for customising an off-the-shelf app.

[trevHCS]

Depends on various things including how many pages you want, anything beyond standard web pages and where abouts in the country you live.

For example, we charge about �950 for a 5 page standard site (design - one off cost), then about �150/year for hosting. Then there's promotion if required at �200/year and also a maintainance package around �200/year (maybe not needed in your case).

That's probably top end of what you're likely to want to pay to be honest, but also don't go for the 10 pages for �100 people. Just like anything else, the really cheap ones are not worth your time.

The best way to find someone is to look around your competitors, local businesses and sites you like. Some of them will cost an absolute fortune (a lot more than the above), but there's normally companies who occupy the middle ground and are reasonably well established.

Also avoid anyone who claims they'll get you to the top of the search engines, they'll regularly submit you to search engines or cold calls you as they normally have big sales teams and not much else.

Oh and avoid anyone in the Lancaster or Preston areas as there are a pile of companies there all owned by two bigger companies and to be honest they are absolute cowboys. If you hit one of those forget any chance of getting business from your site.

[Heraldeer2]

Thanks for this...i'm looking for an online presence, more of a catalogue than a shop, so there would be no online transactions. Probably 5-10 pages sounds about right and some decent visibility on search engines. As you say TrevHCS, some charge little, some a lot and when you don't know what you're on about its probably easy to take the wrong route!

[YvonneM]

What area of the country do you live