We will create designs for the look-and-feel, layout and functionality of your web site. This contract includes one main design plus the opportunity for you to make up to two rounds of revisions. If you’re not happy with the designs at this stage, you will pay us in full for all of the work that we have produced until that point and you may either cancel this contract or continue to commission us to make further design revisions at the hourly rate set out in our original estimate.
HTML/CSS layout templates
If the project includes XHTML or HTML markup and CSS templates, we will develop these using valid HTML5 markup and CSS3 for styling. We will test all our markup and CSS in current versions of all major browsers including those made by Apple, Microsoft, and Mozilla. We will also test to ensure that pages will display visually in a similar, albeit not necessarily an identical way, in Microsoft Internet Explorer 7 for Windows as this browser is now past its sell-by date.
We will not test these templates in old or abandoned browsers, for example Microsoft Internet Explorer 5, 5.5 or 6 for Windows or Mac, previous versions of Apple’s Safari, Mozilla Firefox or Opera unless otherwise specified. If you need to show the same or similar visual design to visitors using these older browsers, we will charge you at the daily rate set out in our original estimate for any necessary additional code and its testing.
Text content
We are not responsible for writing or inputting any text copy unless we specified it in the original estimate. We’ll be happy to help though, and in addition to the estimate we will charge you at $75 per 300-word page, including a free initial consultation, for copy writing or content input.
Photographs
If needed, you will supply us photographs either in digital or printed format. If you choose to buy stock photographs we can suggest vendors of stock photography, and additionally we will provide stock photography up to the budgeted amount specified in the website design estimate. Any time we spend searching for or taking appropriate photographs will be charged at $100 per hour, after a free initial consultation to determine if this is the best route to take.
Changes and revisions
We know from plenty of experience that fixed-price contracts are rarely beneficial to you, as they often limit you to your first idea about how something should look, or how it might work. We don’t want to limit either your options or your opportunities to change your mind.
The estimate/quotation prices at the beginning of this document are based on the number of days that we estimate we’ll need to accomplish everything that you have told us you want to achieve. If you do want to change your mind, add extra pages or templates or even add new functionality, that won’t be a problem. You will be charged the hourly rate set out in the estimate we gave you. Along the way we might ask you to put requests in writing so we can keep track of changes.
Online visibility, SEO, traffic
Making a website and publishing on the internet does not mean that anyone will show up to look at it. If you have a marketing plan to get your website noticed, great. If not, we are expert at search engine optimization (SEO) and digital marketing, and we would be happy to put together a plan for you, and engage in a monthly agreement with you for a minimum of six months to help your website gain traffic and show up better in web searches. Your website design project includes the usual minimum levels of SEO, such as telling the search bots to index your site, and structuring your content in a search-engine friendly way. An intensive, measurable effort to show up for specific keywords, or in the online map results, is not part of the web design project.
Technical support
You may already have professional web site hosting, or you might even manage that hosting in-house; if that’s the case, great. If you don’t manage your own web site hosting, we can set up an account for you at one of our preferred, third-party hosting providers. We will include the installation your site on this server, plus any statistics software such as Google Analytics.
After that, regular backups, software updates and security for the site are available for $34 per month, on a month-to-month basis. If you choose not to sign up for the $34/month maintenance, we are not responsible for hacking, viruses, or other degradation or failure of your site due to lack of updates and security measures.