If you’ve got a business, you need a website – that’s just how it goes these days! Even for those with physical retail stores a customer can visit, a website will be their first port of call. Anyone who wants to shop for a product or service like yours is going to look up providers before they do anything else!
But how much will it cost to set up and run a website? Are these expenses just another you could do without? Let’s consider this question with the points below.
Picking Your Builder
This is what we recommend for all small and home based businesses, as it’s generally cheaper than getting a website made from scratch by a professional webmaster. It’s also a lot less time consuming than trying to code yourself, unless you’re already proficient in HTML or a coding language. Pick your builder based on what they cost to use, what features they offer at the most basic of levels, and how much they allow you to customize the pages you design.
Registering a Domain
Domain registration tends to be a once a year cost, although a lot of domains have an initial two year period when you first take them out. Depending on the popularity of the domain in question, which tends to be determined by what keywords are involved, you could pay upwards of $500 or you could pay as low as $2.99 per year. Keep this in mind when you’re coming up with a website and/or brand name!
Finding a Host
If you decide to host through your website builder, this cost will be tied into the price you pay every month (or annually). You should be able to see a breakdown of the exact costs when you check the invoice you’re sent whenever a payment goes out. However, there are multiple forms of hosting you can invest in (with the cost tending to scale as you go), if you decide this shared cost isn’t for you.
Taking Payments
You might think it’s super expensive to try and operate an ecommerce website. You might prefer to sell solely through third party platforms like Amazon, for example. You can see the fees outright when you do so.
However, if you’re using WordPress, you can download a payment gateway for woocommerce and subscribe. Payment plugins like these tend to only cost around $3 a month when you first start out. You could even get a discount as a new business subscribing for the first time!
Keep in mind though that the cost is all dependent on how many customers you have, and how often they’ll be purchasing. Although that does mean you can easily scale while keeping an eye on the total expense it’ll bring.
Operating a business isn’t as costly as you might think. In fact, for all the results it’ll bring in, the cost will more than justify itself as time goes on! Think of it as a necessary investment.
