A pay monthly website package is the build, the hosting and the looking after, rolled into one figure you pay every month. The useful thing about that is there is one number instead of six. The unhelpful thing is that two providers can quote the same number and mean completely different things by it, and the page they put it on rarely tells you which.
This is what is normally inside a package in the UK, what usually sits outside it, and the four questions that separate a fair one from a tight one. It is written to be used on somebody else's pricing page as much as on ours.
What is normally included?
Most packages worth looking at cover the same core. If any of these are missing, that is not automatically bad, but it should be reflected in the price.
- The design and build, to a set number of pages.
- Hosting, on a server the provider manages.
- An SSL certificate, so the site shows the padlock. This should not be a line item in 2026.
- A domain, often a .co.uk free with the package and other endings charged at cost. Ours works that way.
- Business email, on your own domain rather than a free address.
- Mobile layout, which is not a feature, it is the minimum.
- A contact form and basic search setup, meaning page titles, descriptions and a sitemap.
- Updates and backups, handled by them rather than by you.
Beyond that core, packages start to differ. Galleries, FAQ sections, reviews, a floating call bar, a booking request form, a blog. Ours include the gallery, the FAQ section, customer reviews, the floating call bar and a redesign every year, which is worth checking for on any package because a redesign is otherwise a rebuild.
What is usually extra?
Not hidden, exactly, but normally a paragraph further down the page than the price.
- Extra pages beyond the tier. Typically £10 to £25 a month each. Ours are £20 a month, excluding VAT.
- A blog section, often a small monthly add on. Ours is £15 a month.
- Online booking or a quote calculator, usually £15 to £30 a month as a bolt on, or a custom price if it has to talk to your diary.
- Copywriting. Almost never included. Either you write it or you pay for it, and it is the most common reason a launch slips.
- Photography. Never included. Your own photos are usually better anyway for a local business.
- Search and advertising work. A different service on a different invoice. Be wary of any package that blurs the two, because it makes the website look expensive and the marketing look free.
- Selling products. A shop is its own tier everywhere, priced by how many products you list.
The four questions that tell you whether a package is fair
1. What does it cost to change something?
This is the question that matters most and gets asked least. Your prices will change, your staff will change, a service you offer will stop. If every one of those is a chargeable job, the real cost of the package is much higher than the headline and, worse, you will stop bothering and the site will go stale.
Ask specifically: are text, price and photo changes included, is there a limit, and how do I request one. With us, content changes are unlimited and free for as long as you rent. Design changes are a different thing: one design revision comes with the build, and the bigger changes belong in the yearly redesign.
2. What is the minimum term, and what does leaving cost?
Packages vary from rolling monthly to three year contracts, and the three year ones are not always the more expensive looking. Get the term, the notice period and the exit cost in the same sentence. Ours is the first three months paid up front to start, then cancel any month with a month's notice.
3. Can I buy it, and for how much?
If you might one day want to own the site, find out now what that costs and whether the figure is fixed. A clear multiple is easy to plan for. A vague "we would work something out" is not. Ours is twelve times the monthly price, as a separate one off payment that is not reduced by the rent already paid, so it is the same figure whenever you decide.
4. Whose name is the domain in?
It should be your business, with you as the registrant contact, whoever pays for it and whoever manages it. This is the single most common way small businesses get stuck with a provider they want to leave. There is more on this in choosing a domain name.
How are the tiers usually priced?
Almost always by page count for brochure sites, and by product count for shops. Page count is a rough proxy for work, which is why it is used, but it is a bad way to choose. Two five page sites can be an afternoon apart in effort depending on what the pages do.
A better way to pick your tier is to write down the jobs the site has to do, then see which tier covers them. For reference, ours run Starter one page at £49, Essential three pages at £79, Professional five pages at £99 and Business ten pages at £149, all per month and all excluding VAT. Shops are priced by product count instead, starting at £99 a month for up to twenty five.
If you are between two tiers, take the smaller one. Adding a page later is a monthly add on. Paying for four pages you never wrote is money gone.
Where pay monthly packages go wrong
Three failure modes, in the order we hear about them.
The site that never launched. Almost always the words. The design was ready in a fortnight and then everything stopped for four months waiting for copy. Fix this by writing the words first, or paying someone to, before the design starts.
The site nobody changed. Either changes were chargeable, or the process was awkward enough that nobody bothered. Two years later the prices are wrong and a member of staff who left in 2024 is still on the team page.
The tie in nobody read. A long minimum term with an exit fee, signed without reading, discovered when the business moved or closed. This is the reason to ask question two properly.
None of these are arguments against paying monthly. They are arguments for reading four specific lines before you sign, which is also true of a one off build. The wider list is in ten things to check before you pay a web designer.
What happens if you stop paying?
The honest answer, on any rental anywhere, is that the site comes down. That is what renting means, and any provider who is vague about it is doing you no favours. What matters is what you still hold afterwards, and you should know the answer before you start rather than during a bad month.
Three things should always remain yours, whoever you rent from:
- The domain, registered in your business name, so you can point it at something else the same afternoon.
- Your content, meaning your words, your photographs and your logo. Keep your own copy of all of it somewhere that is not the website. A folder on your computer is fine.
- Your Google Business Profile, which is a separate thing from your website entirely and is often the bigger source of local enquiries. Make sure it is in an account you control.
Do that and the worst case is inconvenient rather than serious. Skip it and you can end up in the genuinely nasty position of having to rebuild from scratch on a new address, which loses you the search history as well as the site.
Are shops priced differently?
Yes, everywhere, and for a good reason. A brochure site is mostly design work that finishes. A shop has payments, stock, orders, tax settings and a customer who will ring you when a card fails, and the ongoing side of that never really stops.
So shop packages are priced by product count rather than page count, and the running cost sits higher. Expect to see payment processing charged separately by the payment provider on top of any package, because that is their fee, not the website's. Anyone who quotes you a shop without mentioning card fees has left something out.
Comparing two packages properly
Put them side by side on one sheet of paper with these rows, and fill in every box before you look at the price again.
- Pages included, and cost per extra page.
- Hosting, SSL, email: in or out.
- Content changes: included, limited, or chargeable at what rate.
- Design revisions with the build, and what the yearly position is.
- Minimum term, notice period, exit cost.
- Buyout figure, and whether it is fixed.
- Domain ownership.
- Anything payable at the start on top of the first month.
- What happens if you need help on a Tuesday afternoon, and how you ask for it.
Nine rows, ten minutes, and the cheaper looking package is not always the one still winning at the bottom of the sheet.
One more thing worth doing before you sign anything: look at two or three sites the provider has actually built, on your phone rather than on a laptop. Time how long they take to appear, see whether the phone number is obvious, and read a page of the words. A package is a promise about the future, but the sites already out there are evidence, and they are free to look at.
Is a package the right shape for you at all?
Packages suit businesses whose website needs to do a normal job well: explain what you do, prove you are real, make contact easy, be findable locally. That is most small businesses, and paying monthly for it is a reasonable way to buy.
They suit you badly if the website is the product, if you need something genuinely custom, or if you have the cash and the inclination to own an asset and look after it. In that case buy a build outright and budget properly for the running. The two sides are set out in should you own your website or rent it, and the mechanics of the monthly model are in pay monthly websites and how they actually work.
If you want to see what a package would cost for your size of business, you can price up your website without giving anyone your email address, and take the number away to compare with whatever else you are looking at.
