It's the first question every business owner asks and the one agencies are strangely bad at answering. So here's a straight answer.
Why nobody gives you a price
Partly because it genuinely depends. A one-page site for a mobile barber and a booking system for a six-chair salon are different animals.
But mostly because a lot of agencies want to find out your budget before they tell you the price. That's not a quote — that's a negotiation where only one side has the numbers.
We think you should walk in knowing the ranges.
What you're actually paying for
A website is three things, and only one of them is visible.
The thinking — who your customers are, what makes them call, what has to be on the page for them to trust you. This is the part that decides whether the site brings you work or just sits there.
The design — how it looks and how it guides someone to picking up the phone.
The build — making it fast, mobile-first, secure, and easy for Google to read.
Cheap websites skip the thinking. That's why they look fine and do nothing.
The honest ranges
For a New Zealand small business, in 2026:
Under $1,000
A template with your logo dropped in. Sometimes a DIY builder with someone else's photos.
Fine as a placeholder if you're just starting and need something online. It won't bring you leads and it won't rank. Don't expect it to.
$2,000 – $5,000
The sweet spot for most local service businesses. Custom design, built properly, fast, mobile-first, structured so Google understands it, with pages designed to turn visitors into enquiries.
This is what a dentist, plumber, salon or roofer should expect to pay for a site that actually works as a lead source.
$5,000 – $10,000
More pages, more custom work. Online booking, service-area pages, integrations with your CRM or calendar, proper copywriting.
$10,000+
Ecommerce with real product ranges, custom software, member areas, multi-location setups.
What drives the price up
Fair reasons your quote goes up:
- Number of pages — 5 pages vs 25 pages is real work either way.
- Ecommerce — products, payments, shipping, tax. It's a different build.
- Custom features — booking systems, calculators, portals.
- Copywriting — if you can't supply the words, someone has to write them.
- Photography — stock photos are free; a shoot at your premises isn't.
Unfair reasons:
- "Premium" with nothing behind the word.
- Charging for pages that are the same template repeated.
- Rush fees for a deadline they set.
What you should never pay for
A site you don't own. Your website, domain and hosting accounts should be in your name. If leaving your agency means losing your website, that's not a service — that's a hostage situation.
Mandatory monthly fees just to stay online. Hosting is real and costs something small. A $200/month "maintenance plan" that involves nobody doing anything is not.
"SEO included" with no explanation. Ask what that means. If the answer is fuzzy, it means nothing.
Anything not in writing. If it isn't in the quote, it doesn't exist.
If someone quotes you $499 for a "professional website that ranks #1 on Google" — that's not a bargain, that's a warning.
What a good quote looks like
It should tell you, in plain English:
- Exactly what pages you're getting
- What you need to supply (content, photos, logins)
- How long it'll take
- What happens if you want changes later
- The total, fixed, with no "from" in front of it
If a quote can't do that, the project won't go better than the quote did.
So what should you budget?
If you're a local service business in Auckland wanting a site that genuinely brings enquiries: $2,500 to $5,000 is the realistic range. Below that you're buying a brochure. Above that you should be getting something more than a brochure.
And whatever you spend — make sure you own it at the end.
Want to know what your site actually needs? We'll audit it free and tell you honestly — including if the answer is "nothing, yours is fine."
