Setting your Design and Marketing Budget

Correctly Setting your Web Design and Internet Marketing Budget

I would like to thank Ian Lurie: http://www.conversationmarketing.com/2008/09/setting-your-internet-marketing-budget.htm for some of these. The remainder of them, I have developed over the years of dealing with people and clients that have seriously unrealistic expectations of what technology, and the time it takes to set it up and use it, really cost.

1. If you want a site built by a single untrained individual who ‘learned how to use Dreamweaver’, expect to spend less than $2000. Also, expect to build a new site within 3 months.

2. Just because you found someone that can use a template on Joomla, Drupal, or Xoops, don’t assume they know anything about web design.

3. If you want a site built by a 5-10 person, boutique-style agency, expect to spend, at an absolute minimum, $10,000. These are experts, and they deserve to be paid as experts.

4. If you find a 5-10 person, boutique-style agency that’ll build you a site for $2000 or less, expect something that looks like they had a sneezing fit during the design phase.

5. If you’re spending $250,000 to build your product and get it to market, don’t tell me you can’t spend $15,000 to give it a decent web site, unless you want to watch my eyes bug out like I’ve been suddenly depressurized.

6. E-Commerce is not just adding a “buy now” button to your site and sending people to PayPal.

7. Databases are not “Plug and Play”. A lot of thought, planning and work go into function, design, reporting, etc.

8. Reliable hosting costs more than $9.95 a month.

9. All dedicated servers ARE NOT equal.

1. If you’re building a new site, expect to spend 2X that amount again in the year after the site launches. Unless you want it to sit there, all alone, with no traffic.

2. Paying for a listing in the Online Yellow Pages IS NOT Internet Marketing. You might as well have a bonfire with your money.

3. If you expect to get a #1 ranking on Google for $99, you’re insane.

4. If you hire a smart individual with a proven track record to optimize your site for search engines, expect to pay at least $5000, one time. Unless they’re your friend, or they’re willing to work hourly.

5. If you hire a big agency with all sorts of fancy tools, an army of copywriters and other expertise for search engine optimization, expect to pay, at an absolute minimum, $50,000 for a one-year engagement.

6. If you want to double your sales this year, you are going to have to pay more than $1000 to do it.

We are sure you’ve heard the old addage – “You get what you pay for”. Well it also applies to all of the services we provide. Pay for quality, you won’t regret it.