What a small-business website costs in its first year

A first year usually has six lines. Some are paid once, some every month or year, and some apply only if you choose them.

• The project: planning, writing, designing and building the site, paid once.
• The platform and the domain: the website platform’s plan and your domain name, billed by those companies.
• Help after launch: updates, checks and fixes, if you want someone else to handle them.
• Content you don’t have yet: photography, a logo or other materials.
• A second language: if your customers need one.
• Advertising: an ad budget and its management, if you advertise.

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At JayLM Studio the project has a fixed price for the scope we agree on: $850 for a Landing Page, $1,250 for a Small Site, $1,650 for a Focused Refresh of an existing site and $2,750 for a Full Site. A Custom Build is quoted by scope, from $3,600. If the scope grows, you get a new written number before any more work.

Every package includes writing the pages from a conversation with you, two review rounds (three in a Full Site) and fixes for 14 days after launch. Ask any designer the same three questions: what the price includes, how many rounds of changes it covers and what happens if the scope grows.

Your site runs on a website platform, and the platform usually bills its plan to you directly. Your domain is renewed with the company you registered it with. Neither is part of a design quote, so check whether a quote mentions them at all.

Use the current price on your platform’s and your registrar’s own pages. This guide gives no amount for them, because plans and prices change. With JayLM Studio, a one-time project lives in your own accounts: the domain, the platform and the site are yours.

A website keeps needing small things: a new photo, a changed price, a page for a new service. You can make the changes yourself, pay for them one at a time or use a monthly plan. JayLM’s care plans are Essential Care at $200 a month and Growth Care at $400 a month, with a three-month minimum.

One line not to count twice: hosting is included in a JayLM care plan for sites on Wix Studio, so while the plan runs you don’t pay the platform’s hosting again for that site. On other platforms the plan stays in your account and you pay it directly.

Writing the pages is included in every JayLM package. Photography, a logo and other materials you don’t have yet are separate, from whoever you hire for them. A second language is an add-on, quoted with the project.

Advertising has two separate costs: the ad budget, which for Google Ads you pay directly to Google, and the work of setting up or managing the campaigns. At JayLM, Google Ads work is quoted separately: an audit, a set-up with conversion tracking or monthly management, each at a fixed price after a first look. Monthly management has a three-month minimum.

Before you compare quotes, write one line for each of these, with who bills it and whether you need it.

If a quote leaves a line out, ask what it costs and who pays it.