Hi all,

 

Ive just had a client ask how much i would charge for a content management system with their website design. Usually i keep well away from cms but i figure i should learn this since it could help widen my business. Now im a complete beginner with cms ive never touched it before so i havent a clue which cms im going to use, how it works or how much to charge, right now im looking at wordpress, joomla, and expression engine.

 

Basically im looking at designing the site and coding it in html/css, there will be around 5 - 30 pages (they havent decided yet). I have quite alot of css and html knowledge but very limited php and like i said i wont have a clue what im doing when i begin with the cms.

 

So what should i charge for this and while its on my mind is cms difficult to get the hang of ?

Depends on what CMS you're going for. If you go for something like WP it'll be very easy, as once you've sorted the HTML / CSS template / theme, you can go wild with making new pages.

Okay ive tried both expression engine and wordpress, they both seem great but im more towards wordpress since it seems much easier. The only problem i can see is the difficulty to create your own theme, from what i can gather a theme consists of a style sheet and a php file. I take it the php file will be a sort of template so do i just design a web page as i would usually do in dreamweaver but save it as .php rather than .html or .htm ?

For the cms i was thinking of charging £100 but is this to low, i really dont know how much work is going to be involved so its difficult to come up with a price.

I use CMS Made simple. Easy to use for admin and editors.

 

As for the charge i charge between £300 and £500 for simple sites upto about 10 pages, all depends on how long i think it's going to take me to create the template and then add all the content.

In my opinion £100 is WAY too low. £100 buys you nothing these days.. you gotta earn a living!

^ aboslutely

 

Okay ive tried both expression engine and wordpress, they both seem great but im more towards wordpress since it seems much easier. The only problem i can see is the difficulty to create your own theme, from what i can gather a theme consists of a style sheet and a php file. I take it the php file will be a sort of template so do i just design a web page as i would usually do in dreamweaver but save it as .php rather than .html or .htm ?

For the cms i was thinking of charging £100 but is this to low, i really dont know how much work is going to be involved so its difficult to come up with a price.

 

Wordpress may seem easier for you, but will it fit the needs of the site and the owner who has to maintain it?

 

WP themes are PHP files and styled with CSS, in the WP distribution .zip file you'll find them somewhere - I don't use WP often so can't remember the exact location. Open them up in your editor and modify as you see fit!

 

As for charging, well if you're creating a theme as well you've got a lot of work to do...

 

1. Consultation

2. Design concept

3. Install and configure CMS

4. Create template, upload and test

5. Add initial content

6. Client training and handover

 

... a bit more than £100 worth! In my book there's anything from 20 hours upwards for that lot and charging £100 would mean you were earning £5 hour tops. If, say, you charged £20/hour that would then equate to £400+ for the job which is getting to a more realistic figure.

Ok thanks everyone. I decided to quote them £300 with cms but now they dont want it, im guessing they were expecting me to do it for next to nothing. Maybe £100 would have suited them more but like everyone has said theres quite a bit of work involved in creating the template so it wouldnt be worth my while. Anyway theyve decided to go with the design with no cms at £80

You could still do it for £100 - that's really up to you - It would just mean you'd be working for pennies

Ok thanks everyone. I decided to quote them £300 with cms but now they dont want it, im guessing they were expecting me to do it for next to nothing. Maybe £100 would have suited them more but like everyone has said theres quite a bit of work involved in creating the template so it wouldnt be worth my while. Anyway theyve decided to go with the design with no cms at £80

They baulked at £300 for a CMS, but you were happy doing a design for £80? [ ... does maths in head]

 

Personally I think pricing is a deeply private and personal matter - I would never reveal my pricing on a forum. You need to base you pricing on your own experiences, your own personal living costs, and your own ambitions. Ultimately you need to base your pricing on what you consider YOU are worth, not what other people do or don't charge.

£80 sounds about right to me ? theres approx 3 hours work involved ... ?

 

I just had no idea about cms so i didnt know what to charge but now ive learnt the standard seems to be around £300 - £500. At least ill know for the future

Another way to approach it (and this depends HIGHLY on the client) is to charge them on a per-feature basis. For example if we were to build our own CMS with lets say Wordpress's functionality it would take like 300 hours to do. Probably even more. And the cost of that to do from scratch would be huge. So with that said charging someone for a CMS install at a flat rate using a feature list as your selling point makes the client feel like they are getting an extraordinary deal. At that point, then you charge for billable hours

 

From a business standpoint doing things like this HIGHLY decreases your overhead. This way your non-billable work such as phone-calls, follow-ups, MEETINGS and initial consultations are digested a whole lot easier. Not to mention this also compensates for any slow points in the yearly cycle.

Don't go cheap on CMSs just don't. You will be providing training/support when the F it up. We typically charge $1,000 - $2,500 (I don't know how much that is in Europe moneys) for Joomla setups with full setup and components, training, content (sometimes) and support. If it is someone that NEEDS a CMS they should probably be able to pay you what its worth.

 

 

Good point dark ^^^ also a good way to go. Pay as you go works well and is easier for clients to stomach

Yea I agree, if they went through a professional agency they would be charged a fortune.

 

Don't let them treat you like crap just because you're freelance, there are plenty more clients in the sea. If you charge low now you risk staying low and being treated like crap forever just because you think that's how to do it. IMO a decent client will pay good money (so long as they get a decent end product), a happy client (unlike scrooge) will promote your business for you without even asking them too. The tight arsed ones if anything will harm you.

 

Oh and going too low damages the industry. So don't.