The honest answer to “what does a website cost?” is “it depends”, which is not much use when you need a budget. It helps to know what it depends on. A handful of decisions account for most of the price, and you can make most of them before you ask anyone for an offer.
What drives the price
Five things decide most of the work, and with it most of the cost.
- Pages and layouts. The number of pages matters less than the number of different layouts. Ten service pages built on one template are less work than five pages that each need their own structure. A simple company website usually needs a home page, a few service pages, an about page and a contact page.
- Content. Someone has to write the texts and supply the photos. If they exist and are ready, the build is faster. If they still need to be written, photographed or collected from colleagues, that work has to be planned and priced, whoever does it.
- Languages. In Switzerland a second or third language is common. Each language adds texts to write or translate and check, and every later change has to be made in each language. Decide early which pages need which languages.
- Integrations. Connections to other systems add work: a booking tool, a newsletter service, a shop, a map, forms that send enquiries to your customer database, or a customer login. Each one has to be set up and tested, and sometimes adjusted when the other system changes.
- Design. A layout based on a proven structure costs less than a design developed from scratch. If your logo, colours and fonts are already defined, the design work starts from a clear base.
Two smaller factors are worth naming as well. If your staff should edit texts themselves, the site needs an editing area and a short introduction to it. And if the new site replaces an old one, the old content and addresses have to move with care; the relaunch checklist in these guides covers that step by step.
What MomentumQ’s starting price covers
MomentumQ publishes its starting prices so you have a reference point before the first conversation. A company website starts from CHF 4'000. It is meant as a clear home for your business: your services, your work and an easy way to contact you. At that starting price you receive:
- design and development for your business;
- layouts for phone and desktop;
- publication, the source code and a handover.
A simple website of this kind usually takes one to two weeks. Larger projects are priced on their own: a new web application with accounts, payments and agreed core functions starts from CHF 12'000, and a mobile app from CHF 18'000. For a complex project, a paid one-week planning phase from CHF 1'800 produces the requirements, a technical plan and a fixed-price offer for the build.
Starting prices and timelines are guidance for the stated scope. The written offer confirms the binding price, the delivery date and the VAT treatment.
Costs that continue after launch
The build is a one-off cost. A website also has running costs, and they belong in the budget from the start:
- Hosting: the server or platform the site runs on.
- Domain: the yearly registration of your address, for example yourcompany.ch.
- Third-party services: licences or usage fees for tools the site connects to, such as a booking or newsletter service.
- Maintenance: technical updates, small content changes and occasional fixes.
What these cost depends on the provider and on the service you choose, so a general figure here would mislead you. Before any work starts, the written offer lists the recurring costs your project involves and states who operates the site after launch.
Ongoing support is optional and quoted separately. MomentumQ’s monthly support allocation starts from CHF 3'500 and is meant for solutions that are developed further month by month; it can be cancelled after the first month.
What a written offer should contain
Whoever you ask, compare offers on what they include, not only on the total. A written offer should state at least:
- Scope: which pages, languages and functions are included, and what is not.
- Your input: which texts, images and access you supply, and by when.
- Timeline: the delivery date and the points at which you review progress.
- Price: the binding price, what it includes and how VAT is treated.
- Recurring costs: hosting, domain, licences and maintenance, and who pays for them.
- Changes: how changes during the project are handled. Their effect on price and timing should be agreed before they are made.
- Handover: what you receive at the end: source code, access and documentation.
- Ownership: who holds the domain and the accounts. Ideally, that is your company.
If an offer is vague on any of these points, ask before you sign. A clear answer now costs less than a disagreement later.
How to get a useful offer
You do not need a finished brief. A few sentences on what the site should do, which languages it needs and which texts and images already exist are enough for a first conversation.
At MomentumQ, that conversation takes 30 minutes, is free and is without obligation, and you speak directly with the developer who would build the site. You then receive the scope, timeline and price in writing, and work starts only after you agree. During the build you see regular progress and can give feedback; at launch you receive the code, the access and the documentation.