
Yes, Websites Cost More Than Fifty Bucks - andrewbadera
http://www.fogofeternity.com/2009/10/yes-websites-cost-more-than-fifty-bucks/
======
maxklein
Hmm, are the Nazi color themes a free extra?

Yes, websites are not free, but it's low hanging fruit, you see? There is very
little barrier to entry, a lot of people know about them, and info on how to
make them is readily available.

As a developer, I would not want to invest my entire future in websites.

------
ErrantX
I agree with him to a point; that point is probably about the $60 an hour
charge limit.

We charge $55 - $70 per hour for custom work; I think that is a reasonable
expense. I've seen quotes from competitors that work out at anything from
(assuming they took the same number of hrs) $120 to $300 an hour.

That's silly; I really cant imagine they can give a small or medium business
any _extra_ value or quality we could.

(once branding comes into it, and really big companies etc. I agree prices do
climb; and rightly so, but I get the impression that's not really what he's
talking about)

~~~
run4yourlives
It depends though... If you're a brand name like say, Jason Santa Maria
(<http://jasonsantamaria.com/>) you can sure charge the premium. His
experience alone warrants the extra charge.

~~~
ErrantX
that's the different class I was talking about; 90% of companies don't want
nor need such experience

------
maudineormsby
I just left a company (College, actually) with this problem. They had no idea
what a great website would cost, so they constantly balked at the prices.
Unfortunately, they have a very poor website (as does most of higher
education) due to their unwillingness to spend.

Having been in on the bid process, I can tell you that the prices were not at
all unreasonable. The major problem in the cost being too high was that the
College has no willingness to maintain the site themselves. Those hours of
maintenance and updating are the expensive part, and add up fast.

------
skolor
This may be me, but I can't see any company needing a website that costs "tens
of thousands of dollars or more" not being better off hiring someone for in
house work. At the rates people are talking about in this thread, say a
$15,000 website design should be taking around 250 hours, or around 2 months
of work for a single employee. If you're going to invest a quarter of the
yearly salary for a web designer in your site, its probably going to be in
your best interest to just hire one so they you don't have to keep contracting
out every time you need a change made.

Mind you, I can see the preference towards just doing a one off contract to
have it made, but only if your site is going to remain relatively static. Each
time you want to make a change to it though, you'll have to re-hire someone to
do the work, or try to hack it together in house. If you're going to be
actively developing the site though, (I would prefer to) have the designer in
house, so he can weigh in during the design meetings for other things too.

~~~
jcoby
I am a freelance web developer, so maybe I can show the other side of the coin
to you.

For $15k from me, you would receive: 1) a complete website built to your specs
(including advice on how to best design your site if desired) 2) a period of
support and bug fixes after the site is finished and 3) a site built using
readable, commented code with actual error handling. I charge by the hour, so
you can keep me around as long as needed and make as many changes as you like.

It's lower risk to bring in a contractor than to hire a full-time employee. I
don't require an office, a computer, health insurance, or a period of time to
learn your company and its politics. If you don't like me or my work, you can
generally terminate the contract without any legal problems as long as you pay
your outstanding bill. I don't have to play office politics so I can do the
things that an in-house developer wouldn't be allowed to do.

I come to the table with several sites under my belt and a library of code
that I can draw from. Once you have a website built by a skilled contractor
(note, there are lots of unskilled ones out there), you can bring in a less-
skilled developer to maintain the site or enter into a reduced-fee maintenance
contract.

Really, it comes down to what you plan on doing with the site. If your
business is a website, you're probably better off developing it in-house.

If your business involves a website/web app but it isn't core to your business
(or if you don't plan on continued maintenance), it makes sense to hire it out
and use the money saved on other business expenses. eCommerce and CMS sites
are a perfect example.

If you want a website to announce you exist, hire it out to the cheapest
contractor or flat rate developer you can find. Just don't expect to be able
to easily maintain it.

You tend to get what you pay for. I've worked on several sites where they
hired out cheaper developers only to bring me in to clean up the mess and make
the site _work_.

------
decultured
I agree with the basic premise of this article, but saying "99% of the time
that quote will be a reasonable price" is disingenuous. While some customers
that do not know the value web development expect to pay too little, they are
just as likely to get overcharged by opportunistic developers.

It is much like getting car repairs. If you go in informed, you are likely to
get a fair price, whereas if you don't you may be taken advantage of.

~~~
pavel_lishin
It also helps to shop around.

------
roc
This is a hold over from the last few people who Just Don't Get It. (It being
the Internet)

They'll be gone soon.

~~~
jubbam
Websites (crappy ones) could cost $50 initially if all they are is static
content or generated in some uniform way without human involvement. They won't
be web applications, they won't look novel or unique, but it will be a web
site, a meager web presence. Obviously many people don't come in asking for
this option, but it is an option. If the client only has $50 they're going to
have to lower their expectations.

We can all get together and complain that there shouldn't be $50 web sites but
if a client is asking for one and knows what it means then yes, there should
be $50 web sites.

These people will not be gone soon. There are many people still starting their
online presence, still understanding the online world, and there will continue
to be as more and more people are exposed to the ability to connect to the
internet.

~~~
btilly
Actually more people want that than you'd think.

There are people who buy thousands of domains, and then park them with some
company like Oversee.net. Sure, the websites they get are crap. But each one
makes a few dollars per month for zero effort. Multiply that by a lot of
domains and soon you're talking about real money. And besides, sometimes
someone will want to make a real site with one of those domains and will buy
it from you.

If you don't like them you call them domain squatters. If you do you call them
domainers. But for better or worse they are part of the Internet ecosystem.

------
andrewbadera
"A gifted amateur might do a decent job for a friend’s site. It’s rarely a
good business option. You can also get great design for cheap prices by
choosing templated options. Some of them are excellent. The Twicet template on
ThemeForest costs $35. That price is economical for the designers because
they’ve sold nearly 1,000 copies. That’s cool, but it means there are 1,000
websites out there that all look pretty much the same. That’s your choice for
dirt cheap web design – amateur, or a template." Great stuff!

