Price your websites
How much should I charge for a small business website?
Price from scope, your costs, your capacity and your market, and consider a one time setup fee plus a yearly maintenance agreement, without promising results.
What you will be able to do
Set a price for a small business website from scope, costs, capacity and your local market, and present it as a one time setup fee plus an optional yearly maintenance agreement. You will be able to explain the number calmly, without guessing and without promising results.
Before you start
- Notes from at least one discovery conversation, real or practice.
- A rough list of your monthly business costs: software, hosting, domain fees, insurance, taxes.
Why this matters
A low price feels like a win at yes and turns into resentment by the second round of revisions. A confident, explained number also signals experience; a nervous "um, maybe a thousand?" invites haggling.
An example offer: around $2,500 upfront plus $1,000 a year for agreed maintenance, for a defined scope. Your number comes from your own scope, location, costs and experience.
Illustrative example: $2,500 setup and $1,000 a year of agreed care. Your prices, costs and retention will differ.
- $3,500Year 1
- $1,000Year 2
- $1,000Year 3
- $1,000Year 4
- $1,000Year 5
The setup fee is paid once; the maintenance agreement can repeat each year the client stays, as long as you deliver the agreed work.
Step by step
Tick each step as you do it. Your ticks are saved in this browser.
Write the scope as a list
Pages, forms, booking, who writes the content, revision rounds, launch, training. Use the website proposal template so you never forget a line.
Estimate your hours honestly
Hours per item, including meetings, emails, phone testing, DNS and launch day. Add a 20 to 30 percent buffer. New designers usually estimate low.
Work out your target hourly rate
Yearly income you need before tax, plus yearly business costs, divided by hours you can realistically bill. Twenty billable hours a week for forty five weeks is about 900 hours.
Multiply and sanity check against your market
Hours times rate is your floor. Compare with what local agencies publish. Far below means underpricing; far above, check whether your scope is bigger than needed.
Decide the setup fee and the payment terms
Round to a clean number. A common structure is half upfront and half at launch.
Define the maintenance agreement separately
List what a year includes (hosting, updates, backups, security checks, a set number of small changes, a response time) and what it does not (redesigns, new pages, new features). Price it from yearly hours and costs plus a margin. Setup fees and recurring care goes deeper.
Check your capacity before you agree
If you are full, offer a later start date or a higher price.
Present the price with the scope, not alone
Say the number, what it includes and the next step (see the example below). Then stop talking.
Never promise results
Say what the site is designed to make easier, not what customers or rankings it will bring.
Example
Say you are pricing a fictional clinic site in a mid sized US city, for a client like Hillside Family Dental.
Scope
* 5 pages: Home, About, Services, Insurance, Contact
* Online booking link to their existing booking system
* New patient form, mobile friendly
* Basic on page SEO and Google Business Profile link
* 2 rounds of revisions
* Launch, DNS setup, 30 minute training call
Estimated hours
Discovery and meetings 4
Design 10
Build 14
Content help 4
Testing on phones and browsers 3
Launch and DNS 2
Email and admin 3
Subtotal 40
Buffer 25% 10
Total 50 hours
Target rate $50 an hour (illustrative, set your own)
Floor 50 x $50 = $2,500 setup
Market check Compare with what local agencies publish. For this
illustration, assume they land in a similar range
Maintenance, yearly
* Hosting management, updates, weekly backups, security checks
* Up to 12 small content changes a year
* Problem response within 2 business days
* Not included: redesign, new pages, new features
Estimated 1.5 hours a month plus hosting and tools
Price $1,000 a year
Change the rate, scope or city and the number changes.
Bad pricing conversation:
You: Um, it depends... maybe like a thousand? Or less? And I can
throw in the logo too.
Good pricing conversation:
Client: So how much?
You: For the five page site with online booking, the new patient form,
mobile testing and launch, the setup is $2,500, half to start and
half at launch. Maintenance is $1,000 a year, which covers hosting,
updates, backups and up to twelve small changes. I can start on
the 3rd if that works for you.
Common mistakes
- Pricing from what you think they can afford. Price from scope and costs, then adjust scope if the budget is lower.
- Vague maintenance. "Ongoing support" with no limits becomes unlimited free work.
- Discounting before they ask. It signals you do not believe in the number.
Try it yourself
For one real or practice prospect, work through steps 1 to 6, then write the three sentences you will say when they ask "how much?"
Time: about 30 minutes.
Deliverable: a filled in pricing section of the website proposal template and your three sentence answer.
Check yourself
Resources
- Website proposal template for scope, price and terms
- Handle objections and close for when they push back on price
- Setup fees and recurring care a deeper look at the yearly agreement
Finished this lesson?
Mark it complete to track your progress through the course.
Last reviewed October 18, 2026. Prices, laws and tool terms change, so check current terms before you rely on any figure.