Blog · Websites
Websites: cost, redesigns and who owns them.
What a website or a redesign should cost, when a redesign is worth it, and who actually owns the site, the domain and the logins.
Five domains, three business names, and a reputation nobody could find
Twenty-four five-star reviews, four books, and seven of eleven articles set to noindex. What it took to put one business back into one place.
I built this website in 2020. Six years later it sold
Built from nothing, run for six years, then sold — and the company that bought it kept me on to manage it. What actually makes a website worth buying.
His "Free Estimate" buttons dialed the wrong number
One digit off, silently, for years — plus a competitor's name still sitting in his homepage copy. What the audit found, and what I told him he didn't need.
A website redesign that produced bookings she'd never had
A 5.0 rating, ten years of results, and a site that never mentioned half of what she treated. In her words: a new booking most days, and 68% more traffic.
¿De quién es su sitio web, de verdad?
Pagar no lo hace dueño. Y en Florida se presume que usted conoce lo que firmó, aunque el contrato estuviera en inglés.
A name, a logo and five pages. The best part was what we took out
He came with a weed-eater and a customer list. The research found the one job every other crew turns down — so that became the business.
What a website actually costs, and why quotes vary by 20x
Three quotes for the same job: $900, $4,500, $28,000. Nobody is necessarily lying — and this names the red flag that applies to my own pricing.
Do you own your website? Paying for it isn't enough
Under US copyright law the creator owns the work, not the person who paid. And "work for hire" is the wrong clause for a website entirely.
Is a website redesign worth it? What the 2026 research says
Almost every article on this was written by someone who sells redesigns. Here's the version with the sources attached — including the parts that argue against spending.
Browse by question
Whatever brought you here, it's probably one of these.
About your website
Do I actually own my website? Most asked My designer won't give me my logins Why are the quotes so different? Do I even need a redesign? Can I see work you've actually done?About AI search
Why doesn't ChatGPT know my business? Most asked Should I be paying for AI SEO? Does schema markup help with AI? Why does AI recommend my competitor? How do I check if AI mentions me?About getting found
Why don't I show up on Google Maps? Most asked How many reviews do I actually need? Why did my Google reviews disappear? Do I need a business tax receipt in Indian River County? How do I report a fake listing on Google Maps? Are Angi and Thumbtack worth it? Does a rebuild actually bring in more work? How do I stop paying for leads? Where does my contractor license number have to go? What does local SEO actually cost? Should I mark my business temporarily closed for a storm?Ready to go beyond the article?
Three next steps. Pick the one that fits.
Whether you've got no website, a website that isn't working, or a Google listing nobody's ever finished — there's a version of this that costs nothing to find out about.
If you have no website
Get a real price, published
Websites from $800, monthly plans from $150, every number on the site with a buy button next to it. No quote form, no discovery call before you know the cost.
See the price list →If your site isn't working
Find out if you even need a rebuild
Sometimes the site is fine and the Google listing is the whole problem — which is the cheaper half to fix. The redesign page starts by talking you out of it.
Website redesign →If you want to see the work first
Eight builds, written up honestly
What each business came in with, what changed, and the results where they exist. Where there aren't any yet, it says so instead of inventing them.
Case studies →Free, takes about ten minutes
Rather just ask someone?
Send me your business name and I'll look up your Google listing and tell you what's missing from it. No pitch, no obligation, and if it's a ten-minute fix you can do yourself I'll tell you which ten minutes.
