Web Design Packages: How to Build and Price 3 Tiers
How to build three web design packages, decide what goes in each tier and price them from hours.
Robbert Veer, Founder
8 min read
Web design packages are fixed bundles of website work sold at a set price, most often in three tiers. A good set does two jobs. It lets a business owner compare options inside your offer, and it lets you quote in minutes. This guide shows how to build the three tiers, what to put in each and how to price them.
Business owners search for web design packages too. If that is you, the tier table below shows what a well-built package should spell out.
What is a web design package?
A web design package is a website project with a fixed scope, a fixed price and a fixed timeline. The buyer picks it from a list, and nobody writes a custom quote.
Most packages hold the same core work. That is design, build, a content management system, basic on-page SEO, launch and a training session. Hosting, upkeep and copywriting are sometimes inside the package and often sold beside it.
A package is a product. You sell it the same way each time, you build it the same way each time, and after a few jobs you know what it costs you.
Why do packages come in three tiers?
Three tiers give the owner a comparison inside your own offer. With one option the question is yes or no. With three it becomes which one. Each tier has a job.
- The first tier sets the floor. It is the smallest site you are willing to put your name on.
- The middle tier is the one you expect to sell. Build it for your most common client.
- The top tier is for the bigger problem. It also gives the middle tier something to be compared with.
More than three is hard to compare on one screen. If you sell to two different kinds of client, make two sets of three.
How do you decide what goes in each tier?
Build each tier around what the finished site will do, and treat the page count as a limit. A page count tells the owner how big the site is. It says nothing about whether the site will bring in customers.
A website can be judged in ten areas, from design and speed to trust and technology. They are the 10 domains that Twip, the AI inside Leadodo, scores a website on. They also make a clean way to split three tiers, with one row for each area.
| Area | Starter | Standard | Complete |
|---|---|---|---|
| Design | Your template with the client's logo and colors | Custom home page, templates for the rest | Custom layouts throughout |
| Speed | Built to Google's marks for a good page | Same | Same, with a second test 30 days after launch |
| Mobile | Every page checked on a phone | Same | Same |
| Security | HTTPS, backups and updates at launch | Same | Same |
| SEO | Titles, descriptions and redirects | Plus one page per service | Plus one page per service and per town |
| Accessibility | Contrast, alt text and a keyboard check | Same | Plus a written accessibility review |
| Content | The client supplies the text | You edit the client's text | You write the text |
| Conversion | Click-to-call and one contact form | Plus a quote or booking form | Plus call and form tracking |
| Trust | Reviews and license details on the home page | Plus a team page and project photos | Plus two written customer stories |
| Technology | Your standard CMS setup | Plus one integration | Plus up to three integrations |
| Limits | 5 pages, 1 round of changes | 10 pages, 2 rounds | 20 pages, 3 rounds |
The table is a pattern to adapt. Your own tiers will hold different work.
Notice which rows say "Same". Speed, mobile and security do not change from tier to tier, because no price is low enough to justify a slow or unsafe site. A cheaper tier should be a smaller site, never a worse one. What grows from tier to tier is the work that wins customers, which is content, conversion, trust and search.
Give every tier a standard the owner can test
A promise such as "fast and modern" cannot be checked. A number can. Google's marks for a good page are a Largest Contentful Paint of 2.5 seconds or less, an Interaction to Next Paint of 200 milliseconds or less and a Cumulative Layout Shift of 0.1 or less (web.dev).
Write those three marks into the package. Test the site at launch with Google's PageSpeed Insights and send the owner the result.
One caution. Google measures those marks on real visits, at the 75th percentile of page loads, so a new site has no such data on launch day. Your launch test is a lab test. Say so on the package page.
How do you price each tier?
Price each tier from its hours. Count the hours, multiply by your cost per hour, add direct costs and divide by one minus your margin. Our guide on how much to charge for a website works through each step.
Here is a made-up example. Fieldstone Web Studio is invented, and so are its numbers. Its cost per hour is $100 and its margin is 20%.
| Tier | Hours | Cost | Price, cost ÷ 0.8 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Starter | 36 | $3,600 | $4,500 |
| Standard | 68 | $6,800 | $8,500 |
| Complete | 124 | $12,400 | $15,500 |
Run two checks before you publish.
The hours are an average. A package price is a bet that the next ten clients will need about the same work. Track your real hours on every package job, and reprice the tier when the average moves.
The steps must make sense. In the example, Standard costs $4,000 more than Starter and holds 32 more hours of work. An owner should be able to see where that money goes. If the step up buys only "more pages", the middle tier is hard to justify.
What should stay out of a package?
Leave out work whose hours you cannot predict, and work that never ends. Sell the first as an add-on with its own quote and the second as a monthly plan.
| Keep out of the package | Sell it as |
|---|---|
| Hosting, updates and backups after launch | A monthly plan |
| Copywriting from scratch | An add-on per page |
| Photography and video | An add-on per shoot |
| An online store with a product catalog | A custom quote |
| Ongoing SEO and ads | A monthly retainer |
| Moving hundreds of old pages | A custom quote |
Our post on website maintenance plans covers the monthly side. For the difference between a project price and a retainer, see our comparison of agency pricing models.
Put the limits in writing too. State the pages, the rounds of changes, who supplies the text and by what date. Every limit you leave out becomes unpaid hours. The web design proposal template has a scope section you can reuse.
How do you match a prospect to a package before the first call?
Open the prospect's current website and count the areas where it falls short. The weaker the site, the higher the tier it needs.
A site that loads fast and reads well but has no quote form needs a small fix. A site that breaks on a phone, hides the phone number and has no service pages needs the full rebuild. You can see all of this before you speak to the owner, and our website audit checklist lists what to look at.
This changes your first message. You write about the one thing you found, and your package page shows the fix and its price. The owner does not have to ask what it costs.
Leadodo does the looking for a whole search at once. Twip scores every website in the search out of 100, and sites below 40 form the shortlist. Twip's findings become the opening line of each letter and email in your Outbound Machine.
Should you publish your package prices?
Publish them if most of your work fits the three tiers. A listed price answers the owner's first question, and it turns away budgets far below your floor before anyone books a call.
Keep one line under the tiers for custom work. "Larger sites and online stores are quoted separately" is enough.
Listed prices matter more when you reach out cold. An owner who gets your letter will look at your site before replying. If the site shows what you sell and what it costs, the reply can be about their business.
Questions
What is included in a web design package?
A package holds design, build and a content management system. It also holds basic on-page SEO, mobile testing, launch and training. Hosting, upkeep, copywriting and photography are often sold beside it. A good package also lists its limits, such as the number of pages and the rounds of changes.
How many pages should each package include?
Set the page count as a limit that matches your hours. The made-up tiers in this guide stop at 5, 10 and 20 pages. Which pages you build matters more than how many, and one page per service gives each service its own place to be found.
Are website design packages better than custom quotes?
Packages are better for work you repeat. They cut quoting time and make your costs predictable. A custom quote is better when the hours are unknown, as with an online store or a large site move. You can offer both on one page.
Should a web design package include hosting and maintenance?
Keep them out of the build price. A web design package is a one-time project, and hosting and upkeep go on every month. Offer them as a monthly plan the owner adds at launch.
Can clients pay for a package monthly?
Yes, if you treat it as a payment plan and write down the terms. State the number of months, who owns the site during the term and what happens if payments stop. The web design contract template is the place for those lines.
Next step. The quickest way to pick the right tier for a prospect is to read their current site first. Leadodo finds businesses, scores their websites and runs outreach to the ones with the weakest sites. See the features.
