3 ms·

A relative of mine had a static site with 4 pages made for her business. Static site to show some images and files and list a phone number and email. $13,000 d

A relative of mine had a static site with 4 pages made for her business. Static site to show some images and files and list a phone number and email. $13,000 dollars + monthly hosting charges.

sphars 3y ago
Wow, I need to start charging a lot more
M4v3R 3y ago
Assuming $50 per hour it’s 260 hours of work. Divide that between a programmer (static websites still need too be coded) and designer that’s 130 hours each - less than a month of work. If the website was custom made (didn’t just use a premade Wordpress template) then this price is entirely believable.
- iSnow 3y ago
  2x130h for a four-page site? It's not 1998 anymore.
  - sethammons 3y ago
    I was making 4 page sites in 1998. Honest time, including a log in and management of content, was a few days of work (php 3, mysql, and the awesome js that auto placed the cursor on the login input). If it didn't have db driven content, it would be a few hours max.
- nicbou 3y ago
  I used to make websites for small businesses. That was a decade ago but still. There's a lot of overhead with small clients. They don't have an internal employee who makes and sends the copy and the content. You really build everything from the ground up. You also have to host it and keep it online. There's only you; you're the whole IT department. Also I made 50 an hour a decade ago as a student. It's a low income for a freelance professional with unsteady work. Realistically, it's closer to a month of full time work, but it's spread over 3-6 months of talking, meeting, getting feedback, waiting for images etc. It was one of my favourite jobs because I could apply tech to solve smaller, tangible problems. It was also the hardest to live from.
- csa 3y ago
  This math is out of touch with how good static websites are actually made these days, imho. 1. $100 per hour min for anyone good. Possibly more if in a high-cost labor market and/or working with certain agencies (mostly boutique). So that’s 130 hours right there. 2. No discussion of interaction with customer. That could be many, many hours depending on the customer and project specs. 3. The 130 hours for design and coding are way, way over actual time required unless the specs are highly stylized. My guess for each would be 4-20 hours, depending on complexity. 4. Depending on the site, copywriting and SEO might be a bigger labor/money sink than the design and coding. All that said, there are many agencies who can make good, basic static websites for $5-7k plus hosting. The catch is knowing which ones are good. Another possible issue, depending on the agency, is what is the smallest account that they will do business with. $13k may have been the agency’s minimum.
FredPret 3y ago
Was there custom design work?
laratied 3y ago
We have just evolved a type of racket to over charge people but this massively inefficient racket will hopefully die soon. At this point it is really just a type of business tax and anti-progress. Paying 13k for a geocities site is increasing the probability the business fails. I just can't imagine anyone paying that by 2030. Midjourney can already do the most amazing design work but it is stuck at the conceptual level. It won't be stuck at that stage for ever.
csa 3y ago
That’s really high, unless there is part of the story that we are missing. I could see it costing this much if there was extensive copywriting needs, detailed SEO needs, super-high performance requirements, and/or highly-stylized design. Otherwise, that’s way overpriced.

A relative of mine had a static site with 4 pages made for her business. Static site to show some images and files and list a phone number and email. $13,000 dollars + monthly hosting charges.

sphars 3y ago

Wow, I need to start charging a lot more

M4v3R 3y ago

Assuming $50 per hour it’s 260 hours of work. Divide that between a programmer (static websites still need too be coded) and designer that’s 130 hours each - less than a month of work. If the website was custom made (didn’t just use a premade Wordpress template) then this price is entirely believable.

iSnow 3y ago
2x130h for a four-page site? It's not 1998 anymore.
- sethammons 3y ago
  I was making 4 page sites in 1998. Honest time, including a log in and management of content, was a few days of work (php 3, mysql, and the awesome js that auto placed the cursor on the login input). If it didn't have db driven content, it would be a few hours max.
nicbou 3y ago
I used to make websites for small businesses. That was a decade ago but still. There's a lot of overhead with small clients. They don't have an internal employee who makes and sends the copy and the content. You really build everything from the ground up. You also have to host it and keep it online. There's only you; you're the whole IT department. Also I made 50 an hour a decade ago as a student. It's a low income for a freelance professional with unsteady work. Realistically, it's closer to a month of full time work, but it's spread over 3-6 months of talking, meeting, getting feedback, waiting for images etc. It was one of my favourite jobs because I could apply tech to solve smaller, tangible problems. It was also the hardest to live from.
csa 3y ago
This math is out of touch with how good static websites are actually made these days, imho. 1. $100 per hour min for anyone good. Possibly more if in a high-cost labor market and/or working with certain agencies (mostly boutique). So that’s 130 hours right there. 2. No discussion of interaction with customer. That could be many, many hours depending on the customer and project specs. 3. The 130 hours for design and coding are way, way over actual time required unless the specs are highly stylized. My guess for each would be 4-20 hours, depending on complexity. 4. Depending on the site, copywriting and SEO might be a bigger labor/money sink than the design and coding. All that said, there are many agencies who can make good, basic static websites for $5-7k plus hosting. The catch is knowing which ones are good. Another possible issue, depending on the agency, is what is the smallest account that they will do business with. $13k may have been the agency’s minimum.

FredPret 3y ago

Was there custom design work?

laratied 3y ago

We have just evolved a type of racket to over charge people but this massively inefficient racket will hopefully die soon. At this point it is really just a type of business tax and anti-progress. Paying 13k for a geocities site is increasing the probability the business fails. I just can't imagine anyone paying that by 2030. Midjourney can already do the most amazing design work but it is stuck at the conceptual level. It won't be stuck at that stage for ever.

csa 3y ago

That’s really high, unless there is part of the story that we are missing. I could see it costing this much if there was extensive copywriting needs, detailed SEO needs, super-high performance requirements, and/or highly-stylized design. Otherwise, that’s way overpriced.