Costs
How much does a website cost a painting business in NZ?
Key takeaways
- There are three common routes: build it yourself, pay for a one-off build, or pay monthly for a managed plan.
- Every route has costs beyond the headline price: your domain, your time, changes after launch and hosting.
- Our managed plan costs NZ$3,777 across the first 12 months, before any GST, then NZ$269 a month.
- The cheapest option on paper is often the most expensive in evenings, or in a site that never gets updated.
- Nobody can honestly promise rankings, so be wary of any price that includes a guarantee.
The honest answer is that a painter's website costs either your evenings, a large bill up front, or a steady monthly fee, and the cheapest of the three depends on what your evenings are worth and how often the site needs changing.
This article breaks down the costs of each route so you can compare them honestly, including the costs that don't appear in the headline price. We sell one of those routes, a managed plan, so we show our own numbers in full and describe the alternatives without quoting other businesses' prices, which vary and change. Our figures are on the pricing page.
Costs every painter website has
Whichever route you take, some costs are the same:
- Your domain name. The address of your site, such as a .co.nz or .nz name. Register it in your business's own name and pay the registrar directly, so it stays yours whatever happens with your web provider. It renews every year.
- Email on your domain. An address like jobs@yourbusiness.co.nz looks more established than a free webmail address. It is usually a separate small subscription.
- Photos. You can take good ones yourself on a phone, in daylight, but it takes time on each job to remember.
- Your words. Someone has to describe your services, areas and process. Even when a designer lays it out, you supply most of the information.
Building it yourself
Website builders let you pick a template, drag in text and photos, and publish. The cash cost is usually a monthly or yearly subscription, and many offer a free trial.
The real cost is time. Expect to spend it on:
- Choosing and adjusting a template that wasn't designed for a painting business
- Building a quote form with the right questions and making sure it actually reaches you
- Resizing and uploading photos, and writing captions and alt text
- Setting page titles and descriptions so search engines understand each page
- Coming back every time something changes: prices, areas, phone number, a new service
DIY suits painters who enjoy that kind of work and will keep at it. The risk is a site that is nearly finished in March and untouched by November because the busy season arrived.
Paying for a one-off build
A freelancer or agency builds the site to a brief, you pay for the project, and then the site is handed over. Prices vary enormously with the size of the site and who builds it, so get at least two written quotes that describe the same scope.
Before you compare quotes, check what happens after launch:
- Hosting. Is it included, for how long, and what does renewal cost?
- Changes. Are small edits charged per job or per hour, and how fast are they done?
- Security updates. Who keeps the software patched, and is that an extra fee?
- Ownership. Do you own the design and the files, and can you move the site elsewhere?
- The quote form. Is it built for painting jobs, and where do enquiries go?
A one-off build can be excellent value if you have a clear brief and someone to look after the site afterwards. It can also turn into a site that never changes, because every small edit comes with an invoice.
Paying monthly for a managed plan
With a managed plan, the provider builds the site from your content, hosts it and makes changes for you, for a monthly fee. There is often a setup fee and a minimum term, because the build cost is spread across the first year.
Our plan costs NZ$549 to set up and NZ$269 a month, with a 12-month minimum term. It includes hosting, security updates, up to 5 content edits a month and a monthly enquiry report. Here is how the total adds up over time, before any GST:
Over three years that is NZ$10,233. Be clear-eyed about it: if you plan to keep the same site for many years and rarely change it, a well-built one-off site may cost less in total. A managed plan makes sense when you value having changes made quickly, not maintaining anything yourself, and a predictable monthly cost.
What about GST?
Website prices aimed at businesses are often shown without GST, so check the wording. A business in New Zealand must register for GST once its turnover reaches $60,000 1 in 12 months, and only a registered business adds GST to its invoices. Our prices are shown without GST and labelled "GST may apply" until our registration status is confirmed on the pricing page.
If your own painting business is GST-registered, ask your accountant how GST on business costs like a website is treated in your return.
The costs that never show up on an invoice
The cheapest website is the one that doesn't cost you work. A few things cost painters jobs without ever appearing on a bill:
- A quote form that silently fails, so enquiries never arrive
- A site that shows services you no longer offer, or leaves out the ones you want more of
- Old photos that don't reflect the quality of your work now
- No list of areas, so local customers assume you don't cover them
Whatever you pay, test the quote form yourself every few months and keep the site current. The painter website checklist covers what to keep an eye on.
A word on ranking promises
Be careful with any price that includes "page one on Google" or a guaranteed number of leads. Google's own starter guide says there is no guarantee that any particular site will be added to its index, and that changes can take a few hours to several months 2 to have an effect. A provider can build pages that search engines can read and that customers find useful. Nobody controls where Google puts them.
Questions to ask before you pay anyone a cent
- What exactly is included, and what costs extra?
- Is there a setup fee, a minimum term, or a cancellation fee?
- Who owns the domain, the content and the design?
- How are changes requested, how quickly are they made and what do they cost?
- Where do quote requests go, and how do I know the form works?
- Are prices shown with or without GST?
- What happens to my site if I stop paying or want to leave?
Our answers to all seven are on the cost page, what is in the plan and the plan terms. If you work mainly for builders or commercial clients, the commercial painters page covers what those sites need.
Common questions
Can I start with Facebook and add a website later?
Yes, and many painters do. Just be aware of what a Facebook page can't do. Our comparison of a website and a Facebook page explains the gaps.
Is a cheap template site worse for Google?
Not automatically. What matters more is whether each page clearly describes a service and an area, loads properly on a phone and is kept current. A cheap site that does that beats an expensive one that doesn't.
What does 3,777 dollars buy on your plan?
The build, hosting, security updates, up to 5 edits a month and monthly enquiry reports across the first 12 months. It doesn't include ads, logo design, writing your content or your domain fees.
The bottom line
A painter website costs a subscription and your time if you build it yourself, a larger upfront sum if you pay for a one-off build, or a setup fee and monthly fee on a managed plan. Compare the total over the years you expect to keep the site, include the value of your time and the cost of changes, and check who owns what. If a managed plan suits you, see the full pricing or book a call to talk it through.