I have heard this question often by clients: how much should I be paying? It is a legitimate question and concern that you SHOULD be raising because everyone has a budget. Amazon or Google have budgets. Mom-and-pop shops have budgets. Everyone has a limit to how much they can spend on anything.
However, there is an even more important spin on this question that NEEDS to be addressed: how much am I willing to INVEST into a project? Clients usually consider a project to be an expense. This is especially more pronounced in design and development projects, in specific niches such as restaurants, hotels, etc. The most common question is: how much will it cost? I urge you to re-phrase the thinking to: how much should I INVEST. Why? By re-orienting the way you look at your project, the higher chance your project has of success. When you consider your project an expense, you tend to scrutinise the wrong things. Design and development project success is not about how much you spend. The success of your project comes down to a company’s ability to leverage it’s entire team, which starts with project managers, to manage, organise and execute your project requirements. You can spend a fortune, but still end up with a shitty website. You can spend a few hundred bucks and get a candy-dandy of a website. It all depends on how committed a company is to their brand, reputation and staff.
This is why I highly recommend the services of a digital consulting company (… ahem Smokyfish Ltd. for example). A digital consultant can take your target budget AND help you choose a contractor for your project. If you do not know who to choose or how much to pay. If you are having difficulties balancing both and want to minimise your risk of ending up with “no money and no honey” then consider hiring a specialist to do that analysis for you.
Smokyfish Ltd. will discuss your project with you in depth, regardless of budget. Even if it is a $100 landing page, but you want to get it right, contact us. Consider consultations with us as an INVESTMENT. We want your project to be a success and help you SAVE money.
I have seen it happen so many times. A client chooses the lowest bid in an effort to save money, hands over an initial deposit and two months after the deadline has passed, the project is still incomplete or the developer is unresponsive. When price is considered first and foremost in a project bid, things have a higher chance of going sideways. It is not a question of how much you should pay, it is a question of how much you should invest.
Smokyfish Ltd. can help you determine how much you should invest. If you have multiple bids on your project, but are having difficulty making a decision, then contact us for a consultation. Smokyfish Ltd. can look at all the quotes you have received, research the bidders, ask additional, relevant questions and advise you on the why and who.
Also one thing to consider. Many design, development and marketing companies (such as SEO/PPC) all have an average range of prices. If you Google the top SEO companies right now for example and contact them, their quotes will be pretty close, but some might try to quote you even higher than you should be investing. That is where you have to watch out. If most SEO companies are saying $5000 per month at a minimum while another is quoting you $7000 per month, then that warrants additional scrutiny.
Keep in mind that a higher quote does not translate into higher quality of service or guarantee you will receive what you need or expect. Companies know this. They could easily do the work for you for $2000 a month, but mark it up simply because potential clients might think something is wrong or too good to be true. This would be true if this was a physical product. The same markup rules that apply to physical products do not apply to digital products and services. Yes, there are people working behind the scenes at a software development company trying to earn a living wage, but there is no raw material supply or logistics costs to consider. Most US and Canadian companies outsource their work (a topic for another post), which is not something that is bad! A company that outsources to India? You should not jump to cross them off your list. You can end up with a horrible result even if you pay extra just so you work with USA born and bred developers.
So before you consider spending any money, consider investing part of it first into a digital consultant’s services. Smokyfish Ltd. wants your project to be a success!