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6 tactics for more affordable website design

A website is now an essential part of your online presence. Whether your goal is to make money, advocate for a cause, or simply grow your audience, you won’t be taken seriously without one.

Your site must look good, be pleasant to use, and show clearly the action you want your visitor to take. If it’s dated, cluttered, badly designed, or confusing, anyone who checks you out online will assume that your work is poor quality too.

“If you think good design is expensive, you should look at the cost of bad design.” — Ralf Speth, CEO, Jaguar

Even though it’s a vital tool, your website may also represent a significant cost for you. Experienced, professional designers charge anywhere from $3,000 - $15,000 to create a custom site that meets your needs, and I realize that may feel out of reach for many authors and small business owners.

But you do have other options and an affordable website can sometimes cost much less than you think.

Here then, are my top tips for a great result, without throwing quality and effectiveness out of the window. And you can combine some of these tips, to make your project even more affordable.

Limit the scope of your website

1. Scale back the number of pages

Especially if you’re just getting started with a website, you do not need dozens of pages. A good minimum starting point would be pages for:

Home / introduction.
Your Work: what you sell or offer to make money, and how people can buy from you. For my author friends, this is your Books page. For coaches and consultants, this is your Services page.
About: a brief bio.
Contact information, or the next step that your website visitor should take in working with you.

If you’re an author, you can always add a blog, book reviews, your media kit, book club questions, and events to your web pages later.

If you’re a speaker, coach, or consultant, you can add testimonials, case studies, FAQs, resources, and workshops in the future.

However big your website eventually gets, you should always focus on the key action that you want your website visitor to do next. A small and simple site can be just as effective (sometimes even more so!) than confusing your viewer with too many menus and pages.

2. Reduce additional integrations

Some parts of a website that you might assume would be standard will actual incur extra charges. I love Squarespace, but extra pieces like email campaigns and appointment scheduling do cost more than your basic subscription price. Learn more here about the different Squarespace pricing plans.

Examples of other things that can increase your monthly expenditure, regardless of which web platform you choose:

If you want an email address that uses your domain name (for example, mine is web@paulinewiles.com), you’ll often need to pay your domain company for this, or set up a Google Workspace account.
Your email list may be on a free service, or you might pay a monthly fee, especially as your audience grows.
If you want an online store, this usually costs more (and/or you’ll pay a percentage of each sale).
Some scheduling tools offer basic functions for free, but often, you’ll pay to have additional appointment types, reminders, and packages.
If you want to sell online courses or memberships, you’ll definitely need to budget for a tool for these.

Benefits from limiting the scope of your website

If you hire a professional web designer, you can expect a smaller project to result in a lower invoice.
If you want to build your website yourself, you can use a much simpler platform. And that’s my next tip:

3. Use a budget-friendly tool

For a professional, attractive, SEO-optimized site that has serious capabilities to grow with you, Squarespace is my firm favorite.

However, if you only need a very simple website and/or your budget is fiercely constrained, I often recommend Carrd.co.

You can make a nice site using Carrd on the free plan, however, I encourage you to invest just US$19 per year for the Pro plan. This is probably the cheapest website hosting you’ll find. Combine that with your own domain name (around $12) for a total annual website cost of only $31.

Carrd is an excellent choice if you:

Need to economize by building your website yourself;
Are happy with no more than 4-5 pages;
Don’t need (or want) to blog;
Are not looking for stellar SEO capabilities.

Carrd is a world-class option to achieve a cheap website for a small business. For what it costs, I’m impressed with it and I’ve had great feedback from others who’ve used it too.

4. Look for discount codes

When you’ve chosen the website platform that is best suited to your needs, it’s worth looking for special offers.

WordPress is now one of the few choices where you’ll buy hosting separately; for the other big players like Wix, Weebly, Carrd, Strikingly, and Squarespace, you’ll pay an all-in-one fee that bundles the tool, the hosting, and tech support together.

Because I specialize in Squarespace websites, I am most familiar with how you can save money when you join as a new customer there.

How to get a Squarespace discount

There are 3 main ways you can reduce the cost of your annual Squarespace subscription:

Work with a Squarespace Circle member like me and you’ll get 20% off your first year of your website subscription, as well as extra services like email campaigns, member areas, and Squarespace scheduling.
Use Squarespace discount code PAULINE10 when you sign up here, to get 10% off.
Keep an eye on the Squarespace home page for special offers. These come up several times a year, often before major holidays in the USA. But they generally only last a few days, so you’ll need to act reasonably fast.

There is a Squarespace free trial available that lasts 2 weeks, so this is a great opportunity to create your website before paying. My clients get a 6 month trial, but I build and launch your custom website much faster than that. Still, it’s nice to have that extended option!

How to get a discount on your Carrd.co subscription

Carrd is already amazingly well priced, and when you’re only spending $19, it probably isn’t worth your time hunting high and low for a coupon code!

However, in recent years, Carrd has offered a generous discount for several days in late November, around the time of Black Friday in the USA.

Even better, the discount applies to Carrd plan renewals, not just brand new customers. This is one of the few online tools I’m aware of that rewards existing customers too.

5. Start with a professionally designed template

You might think you only have 2 choices for creating a new site: either build it yourself, or hire someone to do it for you.

Wrong. It’s now possible to purchase a premium template, specifically created for your type of business, with an overall look that you love. The key pages you need are already in place, a website expert has added meaningful Calls to Action on your pages, and the whole thing is designed to get results from your target audience.

From this professional start, you’ll swap out the placeholder text and images for your own material, update colors and fonts to suit your brand, connect your social media accounts and other links, and publish.

You can use this template method to create an incredibly affordable website. And although it’s still possible to end up with a messy result, in general, it will look better than if you start from scratch.

Here are some Squarespace template shops that I recommend.

6. Ask nicely for more affordable website design

As a website designer, I’ve researched what my clients truly need for an effective website, and I tailor each proposal to meet these needs. I show guide prices on my website, as I like you to have as much information as possible when you’re researching your project.

Other web professionals work differently. A few charge by the hour. Some offer intensive single-day projects. Many will chat with you before pricing your desired website with a custom quote.

If you’ve found someone you’d love to hire, but you’re worried about money, consider approaching them nicely, and stating your budget. I’m willing to discuss your priorities with you, so that you get the best bang for your buck.

You should also join the email list of your preferred web designer. (Get on my list here.) If your favorite designer runs a special offer, or is trying to fill a cancelled project slot or tricky “holiday” week, there’s a good chance the folks on their email list will be the first, or only, people to hear about it.

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However, be cautious about these money-saving approaches

I understand a website is a significant investment. But in today’s world, it may well be the primary representation of your brand and business.

“Building a great website is an investment into your company and hiring someone who knows what they’re doing can lead to far more business than it cost you.” — Dylan Albertazzi

Regardless of how you initially reach new clients and customers, you can be sure that hundreds of strangers will come to your website to “check you out”. So if you economize too much on your web presence, you will critically undermine your perceived worth and professionalism.

Based on recent conversations I’ve had, several people have told me they wish they had not:

Hired an inexperienced website designer. True skill takes time to acquire, and a new designer is likely to make mistakes that you’re unaware of. (I recently worked with a client to completely rebuild her website; it looked fine but was disastrous for SEO because almost everything had been created as an image, which Google can’t read.)
Worked with someone overseas, charging unbelievably low rates. Even if the person you hire lives in a country where everyday costs are low, designers on Fiverr and similar platforms can only make a living by turning your project around at maximum speed with minimum thought. They simply can’t have your best interests at heart working this way, and they have neither the time nor expertise to be your strategic marketing partner.
Asked a friend or relative to build the website. You’ll get stuck with something you don’t love, probably with the same mistakes that inexperienced designers make. It will be a really awkward conversation, when you decide it’s time to level up your game.
Built their site themselves, from scratch. If you’re considering this option, at least try to educate yourself before you begin! I have free resources to help you with this, and my low-priced Website Planning Power Pack is extremely popular.

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These cautions aside, it is still possible to save money on your new website and get strong results. I am convinced that a simple, stylish website is far better than none at all. You have a number of options for an affordable website design project that results in something you love.

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Would you like me to design and build your Squarespace website?

As a professional specializing in website design for authors and solopreneurs with books, I’m an expert in creating a stunning and effective home for your work.

If you’d like technical expertise, online marketing advice, and all of the implementation taken care of, consider hiring me. After careful preparation together, I’ll design, build and launch your site in just 2 weeks. Learn more, and then schedule our free and friendly chat.

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