Are static sites better?

[CryptoGuru]

I built 2 website so far using Squarespace but clients never use it. When they want to add images or text, they email me the Google Drive link and tell me to do it.

I even spent time showing them how to update their website on their own on Teamviewer.

Is it best to just build static websites instead next time?

 

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[Mike Stoian]

Hello, I guess it depends on the customer. You may wanna have a chat with future clients regarding this when setting up the payments.

In your case I would ask them for a retainer. They need to pay for the hours you end up spending updating their site, otherwise you're doing free work. Either they do it on a hourly basis whenever it is needed, or setup a monthly payment plan where you get some constant cash coming in and they don't have to worry about it.

 

[CryptoGuru]

Hello, I guess it depends on the customer. You may wanna have a chat with future clients regarding this when setting up the payments.

In your case I would ask them for a retainer. They need to pay for the hours you end up spending updating their site, otherwise you're doing free work. Either they do it on a hourly basis whenever it is needed, or setup a monthly payment plan where you get some constant cash coming in and they don't have to worry about it.

For sure, I've been thinking about that.

But these ones insisted on having an admin panel but now they don't want to use it. Squarespace is dead easy too so I don't understand.

 

[Miketing]

You agree to make unlimited updates whenever the client wants for free? Why?

 

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[CryptoGuru]

You agree to make unlimited updates whenever the client wants for free? Why?

I just started doing this so I can't be asking for a lot of money. I just needed them on my portfolio right now.

 

[Lex DeVille]

Doesn't matter what kind of sites you build, but next to make sure the client knows how much it will cost them each time you have to make an update for them. You should get paid for the work you do. If the client doesn't want to pay, then they can make updates on their own.

 

[CryptoGuru]

Doesn't matter what kind of sites you build, but next to make sure the client knows how much it will cost them each time you have to make an update for them. You should get paid for the work you do. If the client doesn't want to pay, then they can make updates on their own.

In know but it's hard to charge for a task that takes 5 mins to complete.

 

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[Lex DeVille]

In know but it's hard to charge for a task that takes 5 mins to complete.

What's so hard about it?

 

[CryptoGuru]

What's so hard about it?

Hard to come up with a price. It's only 5 mins so idk.

 

[Lex DeVille]

Hard to come up with a price. It's only 5 mins so idk.

Last year my air conditioning stopped working in my house. I called a heating and air repair person. When he showed up, he went to my AC unit, flipped a switch from down to up, and handed me a bill for $70 that I paid on the spot.

It doesn't matter how long it takes to solve a problem. Clients will pay whatever price you set if it is important for them to have their problems solved by you.

 

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[Lex DeVille]

Read this

https://www.freshbooks.com/fbstaticprod-uploads/public-website-assets/other/Breaking-the-Time-Barrier.pdf

 

[FactaNonVerba]

Hard to come up with a price. It's only 5 mins so idk.

It’s never really only 5 minutes though, and even if it was, you don’t want to be inundated with 50 of those a day later for zero charge. Service companies have Minimum Charges for a reason.

Basically have 2 options for pricing: subscription/retainer or by the hour with a minimum (eg 30 min minimum).

 

[Lex DeVille]

Below is from a pricing brochure of one of my past web design clients so you can see what they charge for support. These plans are in addition to the cost of their Wordpress web design which starts at $10,000 and goes up to $50,000.

Starter Plan:
Our minimum standard support plan includes 24 hours per year (average of two hours per month) of support for proactive monitoring and updates of your WordPress website. This package ensures your site stays safe, secure and updated. If you need help with site updates, blog posts or training this covers your basic needs. You also have the option to bump up the hours in 12 hour increments as needed to include additional support.

Price: $300 per month

Professional Support Plan​

This package is for medium-sized companies who need pages built, SEO upgrades, integrations and regular weekly content updates. This package can support your marketing team on both the marketing and technical sides and includes 60 hours per year (average of 5 hours a month) of support.

Price: $750 per month

Enterprise Support Plan​

Your enterprise marketing team requires support on both marketing and technical projects. Campaigns require landing page integration into your CRM, blog posts need constant updating and your site needs optimization for SEO. Whatever the tasks are, 40 hours a month, supports your marketing team and helps ensure the success of your enterprise web marketing goals.

Price: $6,000 per month



With the above pricing, they are booked full for months at a time, and that was before I upgraded their brochures with good copy.

 

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[CryptoGuru]

Below is from a pricing brochure of one of my past web design clients so you can see what they charge for support. These plans are in addition to the cost of their Wordpress web design which starts at $10,000 and goes up to $50,000.

Starter Plan:
Our minimum standard support plan includes 24 hours per year (average of two hours per month) of support for proactive monitoring and updates of your WordPress website. This package ensures your site stays safe, secure and updated. If you need help with site updates, blog posts or training this covers your basic needs. You also have the option to bump up the hours in 12 hour increments as needed to include additional support.

Price: $300 per month

Professional Support Plan​

This package is for medium-sized companies who need pages built, SEO upgrades, integrations and regular weekly content updates. This package can support your marketing team on both the marketing and technical sides and includes 60 hours per year (average of 5 hours a month) of support.

Price: $750 per month

Enterprise Support Plan​

Your enterprise marketing team requires support on both marketing and technical projects. Campaigns require landing page integration into your CRM, blog posts need constant updating and your site needs optimization for SEO. Whatever the tasks are, 40 hours a month, supports your marketing team and helps ensure the success of your enterprise web marketing goals.

Price: $6,000 per month



With the above pricing, they are booked full for months at a time, and that was before I upgraded their brochures with good copy.

The clients must be super large in order to afford these kind of prices.

 

[Lex DeVille]

The clients must be super large in order to afford these kind of prices.

So sell to larger businesses in the future if that is what you believe.

 

[CryptoGuru]

So sell to larger businesses in the future if that is what you believe.

I wanted to do that but I find large businesses very annoying to sell to.

I managed to get a meeting with a marketing manager once and it was really frustrating. I wasted a whole month dealing with them and lost it because in the end we had trust issues.

I think that employees want to minimize risk and expenditure, which makes it very hard to land good deals.

With some really good sales skills I might pull it off though. That's why I'm practicing with some lower hanging fruit right now.

 

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[AppMan]

I built 2 website so far using Squarespace but clients never use it. When they want to add images or text, they email me the Google Drive link and tell me to do it.

I even spent time showing them how to update their website on their own on Teamviewer.

Is it best to just build static websites instead next time?

Static websites are fast , cheap to be hosted (even free ) .
Now the downside is maintainability, I did that to some customers but they were angry when they learned how hard is updating them , so from that time I moved to use WordPress even for simple websites.

 

[Kid]

First thing:
don't explain to them how to upload or edit something on a website. They won't.

Second.
I would go to "not overcharging" crowd here.
Tell them that they have 5 edits per year free for first 2 or so years.
Or tell them that its $10 a pop b/c it takes little time to do but still takes some time.

Its true what Lex is saying but not everyone is ready/willing to deal with high worth clients. They are different beast.

So to answer OP question about static websites directly: in my opinion they are better than being tied to Wix, SquareSpace or any other of this kind.

 

[CryptoGuru]

First thing:
don't explain to them how to upload or edit something on a website. They won't.

Second.
I would go to "not overcharging" crowd here.
Tell them that they have 5 edits per year free for first 2 or so years.
Or tell them that its $10 a pop b/c it takes little time to do but still takes some time.

Its true what Lex is saying but not everyone is ready/willing to deal with high worth clients. They are different beast.

So to answer OP question about static websites directly: in my opinion they are better than being tied to Wix, SquareSpace or any other of this kind.

Yes I found that they don't even log into their account.

I think for my next client I'll setup a static website because I'm the one who'll update it anyway. I'll also experiment with a retainer.

 

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[eramart]

Regarding prices - you can always work out what you would need to pay to your employee for this job, taxes, overhead and all, and still be profitable as a company. Usually that would be more than you expect.

Edit: oh, and about static pages - I tend to use them if I do not really need dynamic content and frequent updates, for simplicity.

 

[EN_VY]

Yes I found that they don't even log into their account.

I think for my next client I'll setup a static website because I'm the one who'll update it anyway. I'll also experiment with a retainer.

Man, don't make it a habit to offer your time for free. I had clients which would do this and they would have the nerve to call me night time/weekends to make changes for free. They themselves would not lend their time like that. Screw all that. Even though you work from a desk, it's still a skill. I charge 120 an hour, so if it takes 2 minutes, I will charge them for that time. I mean, not instantly but I will let the time accumulate and then send them an invoice.

If a client is not okay with this, then this isn't a client you want anyways. Who wants to spend their time doing things for free?