Webdesign starting at $60... what do you think?

It has been a year now since I launched my webdesign service in spanish, CreaTuSitio.com

The service is based on TemplateMonster's templates: you choose one, and we build your site based on it with the content you send us.

Here you can see some of our client's sites:
http://www.erictorres.net (the cost was $179)
http://www.agetour.com (the cost was $98)
http://www.kingsofleather.com (the cost was $60)

The price depends on the template (it starts at $60), and it includes the HomePage + 5 html inner pages. Extra pages beyond that are $10 each.
Programming is also available for a little extra (it depends on the project).

At this point I'm really proud of the service, i'm getting really good testimonies from my clients. I work a lot on standarization (for consistent good work), yet i'm flexible and try to understand the customer's needs.


Anyway.. the thing is.. i'm thinking of translating the site and launching the service in english. It would take me some time to do it, so i'm wondering...

what do you think of the service? and the price, would you pay $60 for a website?

 

Too cheap, imho. That translates as roughly

 

so i can easely charge twice, in your opinion..
interesting!

 

Jorge - My first reaction (as someone trying to make a living in the same field) is anger at a designer undercutting prices so drastically. But then that is probably jealousy hah -

I think you should charge what you need to charge to make the business work for you, but I'd say charge a bit more - enough to give a sense of value to the product.

I was charging 1/3 of my current rate 1 year ago and getting a poor amount of business. When I doubled my rates I doubled my business. A few months later I was getting more 'cheap work' than I could handle, so in an effort to slow the amount of business I was getting I raised my prices again by a good amount - the result..? MORE work - but now at a rate that is more comfortable for me.

There seems to be a thresh-hold in every market where bargain-and-value meet. You are offering what seems like a lot for the price - I'm always wary of "A Lot for A Little" - society at large is taught "You get what you pay for" and to be wary of the "Great Deal" that is probably a "Great Scam" so I imagine there are shoppers who might bypass your service because it "sounds too good to be true".

Again, charge what you need to make your business work for you, but keep "percieved value" in mind.

Best of luck - I'm sure you'll do fantastic!

 

Way to cheap. Charge more and your business will probably go.

Templates often have really bad code in them and most sites made with those templates don't validate with the W3C's Markup Validation service.

http://validator.w3.org/check?verbose=1&uri=http://www.agetour.com/
http://validator.w3.org/check?verbose=1&uri=http://www.erictorres.net/
http://validator.w3.org/check?verbose=1&uri=http://www.kingsofleather.com/kingsofleather/

Perhaps I am just really picky about the code, but the standards are there for a reason. It takes time to clean up template code and that would use up your $60.00 pretty quick.

 

The price is very cheap indeed, but it does not mean the service is poor: $60 is not bad here so I wanted to use it as an advantage over my competition.

I did reasoned about the percieved value, but the above reasoning was stronger in my mind, specially for the hispanic world.

But the english world is totally different, and your experience is very interesting, thank you for posting it!

 

yeah, validation is not on our top list of priorities, and it won't be for that price.

 

Jorge - Exactly

You know your market better than others would - you know what the market expects - Really - code validation isn't on the list at all for 90% of web design shoppers - its primarily the 'designers' and 'tech people' who even notice or care.

Most people are looking for a quick effective internet presence, especially in the 'Under $500' range.

Best of luck - again - charge what you need to make your business work for you.

 

You could always offer a tiered pricing system. This gives you the option to do budget sites for those who can't afford much, and then offer additional hourly fees for adjusting templates to make them search engine friendly (validating code, editing Flash only sites to include html links and/or sitemaps, etc).

Give clients options and let them choose what fits their needs.

You could also just offer an hourly rate, maybe a lower rate for entering data, and a higher one for editing code. If you're doing English/Spanish versions, what about providing translation services as well?

Just some ideas....

 

i don't know if you should publish how much your clients payed for their sites. i personally would not like to be listed here with a price tag next to my site

 

Good point.

 

exactly AzAkers! thank you, good luck to you too.

Dreamshop, translation, that's an interesting idea

devbistro, prices for ALL designs are displayed on my site, and our webdesign company is shown on client's sites ("design by...") so the price is one click away anyway.

 

i guess that the price they pay for having their site designed for cheap

 

It is a template-based web design... it has advantages (price, time) and disadvantages (more people could have the same design, design prices are known).

People have different needs, so options are always good.

 

You get what you pay for and clients eventually realize that.

I have two sites I'm working on rebuilding from scratch for $2000+ each. They cleints origainlly paid only a couple of hundred, but gave up on the original designers, since they could not provide good ongoing support and could not make the sites look like the clients wanted.

BTW http://www.kingsofleather.com/ looks terrible in FireFox, text flow into background and graphics are half missing. That's typical of my experience with cheap site design.

 

I think you could go a bit higher, but don't do it at the cost of business. Try to maximize profits without losing customers. You're doing well if you have customers, so you're starting well.

The main problem with web design, is not that it's difficult, it's how awful some of the clients can be. Just waste all your time. You might sit down with them, figure out exactly what they want, set a flat fee for that, then hourly for things when they change their mind down the road.

I started to do a page for an accounting firm at one point. It was cheap, $150 for a fairly complex site. (nothing major, but worth more than that). So, we laid out a simple, nice design, improved the graphics (they had paid a lot for a graphic that my friend made in photoshop in about 30 seconds. Gray text on a green gradient... and that came from a professional logo design company).

Anyway, they decided they wanted more bells and whistles, they wanted to call us several times a day with new ideas, color changes. The last straw was when they said, after you get done, we'll suggest any changes we want, you do them, then we'll submit it to our legal department, they'll re-word your copy, then you'll fix that.

So... basically, I would start high, if a customer is a good customer, give them a "deal" that way, they feel special, recommend you, etc... and you can still stick it to the time wasters.

 

I started offering design/hosting/updates for a set price rather than a build fee, if you charge £30 per month then at least they know you will be around in the future and you can use templates etc, It vary prices dependant on what they want, ie ecommerce has build fee etc but why not offer a cheap monthly fee including hosting and updates in the future if they pay you £30 per month rather than bash them out, it doesn't take long to build up a client base and you can then offer other services and ensure a longer term income rather than searching for new clients all the time.

Personally I would rather build an ecommerce store and charge £50 per month with a £300 build rather than do it for £2k and then go looking for new work spending money on advertising, if you do a good job referrals can grow your business without limit.

I have never advertised in 4 years and I have 3 websites to build next week.

 

How much would a health site cost for being designed on an average.

 

Moser -
You'll probably need to dictate a few more details before anyone could accurately quote a project cost for you.

Design - are we talking about a 'wham bam thank you mam' AdSense farm or a Flash product/brand promotions site or a content driven authoirity site..?

Health...as in..? Dental, Mental, nutrition, exercise, disease, medical, nursing staffing..lots of lateral space to interperate here

Size of site - 5 pages vs 500 pages ..?

What Features - forum, forms, chat, flash, ..?

Do you need SEO?
Do you need hosting?
Do you need a domain name?

I imagine you could recieve a number of varying quotes from $100 - $10,000, given a few details you might get a better idea of the real costs for the site you have in mind.