Before you pay anyone to build your website, you should know what you're signing up for: what you pay and when, what you'll be asked to do, and what happens if it goes wrong. This is how a project with me runs, from the first click to launch day and after.
There are two ways in. A website plan is a fixed size at a fixed price. A custom project, such as an app or a store, is scoped and quoted. Most of this post is about the plan; the custom path is near the end. Either way, you work directly with me, and the payment and refund terms below are the ones in the agreement you sign. You can read the agreement before you even create an account.
A website plan, step by step
1. Pick a plan
There are three sizes, each with one fixed build fee: Starter is $2,400 for five pages, Deluxe $4,080 for seven, and Premium $6,720 for ten. Deluxe adds pop-up lead capture, a newsletter signup, a reviews display and a blog. Premium also includes copy written for every page and five blog posts. Every plan includes a customized design, on-page SEO, Google Analytics, a contact form, hosting on Vercel with SSL, and stock photos I source. The pricing page has the full list.
2. Sign up, sign the agreement and pay
At /start you create an account, read and sign the agreement, and pay. Creating an account is free, and nothing is charged before the payment step. You sign by typing your name, and a copy is emailed to you.
You pay the build fee one of two ways:
- In full, for 10% off. Starter is $2,160, Deluxe $3,672 and Premium $6,048.
- Half now and half before launch. On Starter, that's $1,200 now and $1,200 when the build is complete.
Payment is by card or US bank transfer, through Stripe. There's no financing. Your payment method is saved for the $79/mo care plan, which starts the day your site launches and not before.
3. Tell me about your business
Next comes intake, the questionnaire you fill in after paying. It's a few short sections, saved as you go: your business, your site (what it's for, which pages it needs, what it should do), how it should look and feel, and your copy and photos. Only a handful of answers are required, and you can come back to any section before you finish. My post on what to have ready helps here.
Intake asks whether you have the words for your site, some of them, or want them written. Premium includes copy for every page; on Starter and Deluxe, copywriting is $150 a page. Then you upload your logo, photos and any documents, or choose stock photos. Nothing you upload is public: only you and I can open it.
Finishing intake starts two clocks: the timeline and the money-back guarantee. A site takes about 30 days from the end of intake, or 14 with the $500 rush launch add-on. It depends on you too: I can only build with your content.
4. See your design
I design your site and show it to you on a private preview, usually within one to two weeks of intake. You'll get an email when it's ready, and it appears in your dashboard, your account's page on this site.
5. Approve it, or ask for changes
You click Approve in your dashboard, or reply to the design email with the changes you want. Two revision rounds are included; each extra round is $100.
If I show you a design and hear nothing for 14 days, it counts as approved. I remind you on day 7 and day 12 before that happens. This matters because approving the design closes the money-back window (more on that below).
6. The build
Once you approve the design, I build the rest of the site. If I ask for content or a decision and hear nothing for 30 days, I may carry on with stock photos and placeholder text, or pause. After 90 days without a word, I may close the project, refunded only as far as the guarantee allows.
7. The second half, then launch
When the build is complete, I tell you. If you paid half, the second half is due then, before launch: the site doesn't launch until it's paid. If you paid in full, there's nothing more to pay. Then I connect your domain and the site goes live.
If the second half is still unpaid 30 days after I tell you the build is complete, the project closes and the first half isn't refunded. You can reactivate it within 90 days by paying the balance; after that, the files are deleted.
Your domain is yours from the start: you register it in your own name, in your own account with a registrar, and point it to Cloudflare, where I set up and manage its DNS records. Once the build fee is paid in full and the site launches, the design, pages and code are yours too, and I hand over a copy of the code repository whenever you ask after launch. Who actually owns your website goes into the details.
After launch
The care plan is $79/mo from launch day, billed to the payment method you saved at signup. It covers hosting on Vercel with SSL, daily backups, uptime monitoring, and security and dependency updates. It's month to month: either of us can end it with 30 days' written notice, and if you end it, I hand over your code and you can host the site anywhere.
For 30 days after launch, I fix anything that's broken at no charge. That means things that are broken, not new content or changes.
Changes aren't part of the care plan. They're $150 an hour, in 15-minute increments with a 30-minute minimum, invoiced monthly, or $675 for a prepaid block of five hours. Swapping a phone number and two photos is usually half an hour, $75. A new page counts as a change too: billed by the hour, or quoted first or sold as the matching add-on if it's bigger than an hour or two.
The guarantee, and its limits
Your build fee is refundable in full within 30 days of finishing intake, or until you approve your design, whichever comes first. If I haven't shown you a design within 30 days of intake, the window stays open until I do.
The limits, plainly:
- Delays on your side don't extend it.
- Approval closes it, and so do 14 days of silence after I show you a design.
- A refund ends the project. The preview comes down, nothing is handed over, and the money goes back to the payment method you used.
- It covers the build fee. Add-ons are refundable until I start work on them, not once they're delivered.
- Custom work isn't covered. It runs on its own quote.
A custom project
Web apps, Shopify and custom stores, customer portals and anything that connects to other systems are custom projects. They start the same way: an account and a short agreement, then a $500 deposit.
Intake has one extra section: what we're building, roughly how much you have in mind, and when. I read it and write a quote, usually within a few business days. The quote is free, and it sets out the scope, the price and the payment schedule.
Nothing is built until you accept the quote in writing. Until then, the deposit is refundable in full. Once you accept, the deposit counts toward the project price, and the quote sets the terms, refunds included.
Keeping in touch
You get an email as your project reaches each step, and your dashboard shows where it stands. You can change any intake answer from the dashboard and add files at any time. For questions, reply to any email from me, or call 541-512-4600, Monday to Friday, 10am to 5pm Pacific.
Where to start
If a plan fits, compare the three on the pricing page and start at /start when you're ready: one build fee from $2,400, paid in full for 10% off or half now and half before launch, then $79/mo for care from launch day. If you'd rather ask first, send me a question and I'll reply within one business day. If you need an app or a store, start a custom project with the $500 deposit, refundable until you accept the quote.
