ou decided to create a website for your business on the Internet and asked a programmer to design your website, you saw a huge difference in prices, starting from $50 to $3,000 and more..
At this moment, you are confused: Why is there such a large discrepancy in prices?
There are also some platforms ready to develop websites… How do I choose the most appropriate one for me among all these changes?!
Of course, there is a difference depending on the freelancer, the service, the level of companies, the reputation of the company, the features you want on your site, the quality of the work required… and other technical matters.
But you, as a business owner, ultimately care about the final product you want to obtain (which is your website).
It is not always necessary that the most expensive is the best. Perhaps a site that costs $200 meets your needs, or it may cost $1000 and does not meet your needs or is not suitable for you.
The important thing is that the site suits your needs and has an acceptable cost and benefit.
Therefore, I wanted to share with you this simple information through which you will know how to choose the right person to build your website, even if you do not have any previous programming experience. You will know what your correct choice is after reading this article, God willing.
Let me first explain to you what the components of a website are and how it works.
In order for any website to be visible in the world of the web, it needs three things:
1. The domain
It means the domain of the site. For example, when you want to go to the Google website, you write in the browser: www.Google.com. Therefore, any user in the world who types in his browser google.com goes to the famous search engine and does not go to any other site.
This is the concept of a domain in a nutshell, and therefore you will be required to reserve a domain from any company that provides domain reservation services (there are dozens of companies) that provide you with this service for usually $12 annually.
Reserving a domain is one of the easiest processes you do when building your site.
2.Hosting
It means the service that you will rely on to host your site’s files and make it visible on the Internet. After the site is fully designed, and you want to show it to users so that they can read its content and interact with it, you will need to rely on a server that you subscribe to in order for your site to appear to users.
So that you do not have any confusion, the domain reservation service (mentioned in No. 1) is intended for reserving the domain only wwwexample.com
As for the hosting service, it is the service that makes images, articles, registration forms, videos, and all of these things related to your site available to the user and he can view them and interact with them.
Hosting service often starts at $4 per month for a new user.
3. Website design
This is the most important part that you need to take care of when building your site and choosing it correctly, as it is the most expensive process.
It means all the programming work that you will do to build your site: how you will design the appearance of its pages, articles, the appearance of images, icons, speech, features, and all the parts that you want to appear on your site..
Of course there are many details depending on your needs for your website, but let me tell you about website building methods
a. Relying on ready-made tools
This method is very simple. You sign up with a specific company that provides you with all the supplies to build your site and provides you with ready-made tools, and you use them to design your site as if you were designing it in the Paint program without writing any programming code. (The most famous of these platforms are Wix, Weebly & Shopify) and usually start with a $20 monthly subscription.
B. Relying on content management systems
These are operating systems that are provided to you through which you can launch your site and use some other ready-made tools with some other additions that enable you to modify its programming code so that your site appears in the final form that you want (the most famous content management systems are WordPress, Joomla, and OpenCart for electronic stores), and it is often a part Some of these tools are free and some are paid.
C. 100% reliance on a programmer
This method is to agree with a programmer or company to design your site from scratch, and this programmer is responsible for developing and designing all the details of your site.
I will give you a simple example to know the difference between the three options
For example: If you decide to buy a new computer (PC), you will have a choice of three
A- You buy a ready-made computer from companies that provide you with a ready-made computer (computer case), the most famous of which are HP, Dell.
B- You bring the processor, RAM, Power Supply, hard drive, and motherboard and connect them to each other to form your computer.
C- You make an agreement with a factory to manufacture each of the parts. The bag with specific details
You will ask me what is best?
Each type has its advantages and disadvantages, and let me briefly tell you the differences between them
For example, in option (A)
Buying a ready-made computer does not give you great flexibility to easily upgrade the processor, powerplay, or graphics card. Rather, you are tied to what is compatible with the motherboard provided to you by HP or Dell, and the price of the case is often higher than the price of the case that you assemble.
But what distinguishes this type is that you get a ready-made bag of everything and it is ready for use directly without any modification.
Exactly the same thing when you rely on a ready-made platform such as Wix or Shopify or whatever the platform is, it provides you with the ease of creating your site in less than an hour and the platform is responsible for hosting and providing the necessary protection and tools for your site and everything… but what is wrong with this method is that You are governed within the framework that the platform creates for you, and you cannot deviate from the possibilities that the platform provides you.
In addition to the high cost relative to the capabilities you get (for example, on the Wix platform, you pay $24 per month to get hosting with only 20 GB of storage space).
As for option (b)
You may put some additional effort into choosing the motherboard and making the rest of the computer components compatible with it, then installing these parts together until the device becomes consistent, but what distinguishes this option is that it is less expensive than option (A) and you can control your computer more and change any part and upgrade it very easily.
The exact same thing applies to your site when you rely on a system like WordPress. You make an extra effort to connect all the tools that you will rely on to build your site, but the result is more control over the appearance of your site and the features in it, and you can also move from one level to another level easily.
As for option (c)
You manufacture each component of your site yourself and thus it is more customized to the exact capabilities you want for your site without any increase or decrease, just as you go to a tailor and ask him to tailor a dress for you that is 100% your size.
So, to sum up in this part, the total that determines the cost of building the website is: domain + hosting (according to hosting capabilities) + website design (according to the method and capabilities that you will provide in building your site).
Now comes the important question: What is the ideal model that suits you when building your website?
Choose the appropriate model
Of course, each type has its advantages and disadvantages, as we talked about, and I do not want to give you final advice in the end and do this or not do that, but I want you to understand some of the technical basics yourself so that you can ultimately choose what suits you…and this you will learn about in the next part, God willing. In determining the ideal model for you.
In the beginning, you must set an approximate budget for the site. Of course, you have a budget ceiling and a certain price that you cannot exceed depending on the nature of your business activity. Based on this budget, you will put yourself in front of the right choice.
Therefore, we will divide the budget into three sections
Section One: Those with a large budget ($2,000+)
This department often has a good online project, such as an online store or service website, which it creates and provides many services to many potential customers.
I’m not just telling you about someone who creates an introductory website about the company or an educational blog, but I’m telling you about a large project that has an advertising budget of more than $5,000 and whose website contains more than one service, more than one application, and more than one API.
This model would be best for him to build a website from scratch, relying on a programming team that will help him code each site code to suit his needs.
You will go to a reputable software company or Inhouse Agency and start discussing with them the goals of your website and the ideas that you want to implement for your business project. Then these programmers will transform this model into a professional website that meets your needs as a business owner.
Section Two: Those with a medium budget ($200-$1000)
Of course, this budget will be determined based on your needs. For example, the online store through which customers purchase is different from the website that contains some simple pages that introduce your company.
In the case of those with medium budgets, it is more appropriate for them to choose a Content Management System and then appoint a person to monitor and implement the site’s business plan.
You will need to know some basic information that qualifies you to choose the appropriate system. Will you choose OpenCart, WordPress, or Joomla? Then you will agree with a professional person (whether a freelancer or one of the company’s employees) to design the website with the required specifications based on this system and choose the appropriate hosting and the appropriate template. These matters enable him to finally design the site with the required specifications and have a role in monitoring the site and providing continuous technical support and other technical matters.
Of course, when you rely on a ready-made system and ready-made tools, the cost is lower than the first type that builds everything from scratch. In addition, when you rely on a famous open source system (such as WordPress, for example), it has the support of many programmers around the world, and therefore you will find a lot There are people who have the ability to help you carry out the necessary tasks on your site.
Advice : If you want to rely on this model, read carefully about the advantages and disadvantages of each content management system to know what is best for you, and rely on a reliable hosting service that you subscribe to, and you own the hosting and have access to the username and password (do not make the first and last decision in the hands of the programmer only ).
Section Three: Those with a small budget (<$200)
If you have a startup project and want to save every $1 you spend and start with the minimum resources available, I will tell you how to start your website simple and get you a really good return.
We will not reduce the budget until we reach poor quality, and we will not spend a lot of money on things that we can do without in the beginning, but rather we will choose the least capabilities that we can rely on to launch our website.
We will bring ready-made hosting with simple capabilities (Managed shared hosting), then we will bring the content management system (mostly WordPress), then we will install it on the hosting, bring a ready-made template and ready-made tools, then install them, and thus we will have a ready-made website in which you rely on ready-made tools and then customize them as required.
Even if you do not have previous programming skills, as I said, we will rely on ready-made tools that help us create our website.
Exactly like a person who buys a new house and then buys ready-made furniture and puts it in its appropriate places.
If you are this person, this explanation is suitable for you
Through this practical explanation, which lasts approximately an hour and a half, you will learn about the necessary things to launch your website based on WordPress. In this video, I explain my process for launching a simple website that contains: the home page + the services page + the contact page + the about us page (and you can also build other pages based on On the same tool as in the video)
If you do not have a clear picture yet, write in the comments what you need to create a website and the features you want in your website, and I will suggest the ideal model to you, God willing.
