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One of the most frequently asked questions by business owners about setting up a WordPress website is: how much is it going to cost? And this is often followed by: how much will it cost to set up an ecommerce site? The truth is, the costs can vary greatly from one company to the next, but this doesn’t mean that you should simply seek out the company that charges the least. In fact, this could be a disastrous mistake.
There are many so-called website developers that will offer you their services for a reduced cost, but do they really care about the long-term success of your business? Do they really know what they’re doing? Unfortunately, many of them don’t.
This is why it’s important from the outset to get real about the cost of developing a WordPress or eCommerce website. When you understand the various tasks involved in creating and maintaining a fully-operational, user-friendly website, you begin to realize that the fundamental truth remains: you get what you pay for.
In this post, I’ll try to help you understand what is involved, and give you a general idea of the necessary costs, so you can give your business the best chance of succeeding in the online arena.
The Benefits of a Professionally-Built WordPress Website
Having a professional-looking, secure website is crucial in today’s competitive online environment. More and more people are relying on Google search and their mobile search assistants (Siri, Cortana, etc.) to find out information about businesses, products, and services. Your website needs to be ready to compete – to stand out to potential customers, and represent your company in the best possible light. WordPress is one of the best platforms to help you achieve this. Here are just a few benefits of WordPress websites:
- Create a great first impression of your business.
- Flexible, scalable designs.
- Easily update content, wherever you are. Built-in blogging capabilities.
- Extended functionality with plugins. Increased security features.
- Increased security features.
- Ecommerce functionality.
- Automatically optimized for mobile devices.
- Clean code that is favored by Google, leading to higher search engine rankings.
These are just nine advantages of WordPress. The value of spending money on a professionally-built WordPress website shouldn’t be underestimated; it’s a long-term investment that will help secure the future growth of your company.
WordPress Facts
Did you know that WordPress is used by more than 26 percent of the top ten million websites? Furthermore, WooCommerce – an open source ecommerce plugin for WordPress – is now the most popular ecommerce platform on the web, used by around 37 percent of the entire web. There are around 30 themes and 370 extensions available, with prices ranging from free to premium. What you go for depends on your ultimate business goals and your marketing budget, but as with anything, if you pay less, you’ll get less.
So what are the typical costs of developing a WordPress website, or a Woocommerce site?
For a standard six page WordPress website with a blog page:
- Design: two weeks full time – $3,600.
- Theme development: two weeks full time – $3,600.
- Copywriting: one week full time – $1,800.
If you go for an off-the-shelf WordPress theme:
- Design (logos, photos, color palettes, etc.): one week full time – $1,800.
- Theme implementation: one week full time – $1,800.
- Copywriting: one week full time – $1,800.
For an ecommerce store, there are various elements that need to be put into place:
Stable UX design
A reliable hosting package that is scalable
Third-party fees (such as PayPal)
Copywriting
SSL certificates
Visual development, including imagery
Domain testing
- You could do all this by yourself, and it would cost around $1,000, provided you knew what you were doing. For a custom built ecommerce website, tailored to suit your unique requirements, you’re looking at a minimum cost of around $5,000.
Apart from the initial set up costs, you also need to make allowances for maintenance fees, which are crucial to delivering a reliable website experience for your audience.
In Summary
If you’re looking to build or update a website, WordPress is easily one of the most popular and effective platforms to deliver the results you’re after. Whether you need a standard website or an ecommerce store, it is flexible, reliable, portable, and scalable.
Hopefully this rough guide has helped you understand the various costs involved in developing a professional website that is fit to compete in today’s marketplace. Don’t be fooled by bargain-basement prices, because your business is worth more than that.
I’ve been creating, developing, and maintaining WordPress websites for forward-thinking businesses since 2005. If you want to stand out online, get found by more potential customers, increase conversions, and improve sales, get in touch today.
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