Websites for knifemakers?

[R.C.Reichert]

People are confused by the pricing. Working at $20/hr you can have a basic, fully expandable (as many pages as you want), site in 3-4 hours. Working some design kinks out might take a day (nonbillable). Email support is constant and continuous, the client (you) takes responsibility for the web hosting costs ($3-4/monthly).

I know you can charge $300+ for a simple website, I just don't think it's right to charge that much for something so simple, especially from people who aren't making the website a full time retail workhorse.

Thanks for the clarification. $100 an hour does seem a bit steep if you look at it that way.

 

[Josh K]

Josh the $20 dollars an hour is for an employee wage though. When you buy the software, use up your own time, put you name on the line as far as quality, support after you close the deal, your time and effort are worth more than $20 an hour. I understand what you are trying to say though. I still think it is a fair deal, and not an unheard price. If you rented an office and worked out of it, paid insurance and employee wages then prices go up. It kind of sounded like you were looking for trouble by posting a one line negative comment. You should have elaborated a little bit more on why you thought what you said. Anyways wordsmith you should upgrade your membershipto avoid further problems like this.

-frank

I simply thought it was steep. How much an hour do you make on knives?

Prices would go up if you rented an office, paid insurance and other employee's, but the fact of it is very few web designers do. It's too costly. You can't support them unless you have an established piece of proprietary software (vBulletin) that you charge a premium for.

Being in this field you look at some of the sites and it's a Wordpress (WP) install (free) coupled with some plugings. It's like building a knife from a kit and charging a custom price for it.

 

[R.C.Reichert]

I simply thought it was steep. How much an hour do you make on knives?

Prices would go up if you rented an office, paid insurance and other employee's, but the fact of it is very few web designers do. It's too costly. You can't support them unless you have an established piece of proprietary software (vBulletin) that you charge a premium for.

Being in this field you look at some of the sites and it's a Wordpress (WP) install (free) coupled with some plugings. It's like building a knife from a kit and charging a custom price for it.

I like your last sentence. That made me laugh. Like building a kit-car Ferrari F-40 with a K-car engine and charging $200,000 for it. Nevertheless, the $300 website sounds like a better deal than what my friend's sister offered me. And that's coming from a friend!:grumpy:

 

[panch0]

I simply thought it was steep. How much an hour do you make on knives?
Prices would go up if you rented an office, paid insurance and other employee's, but the fact of it is very few web designers do. It's too costly. You can't support them unless you have an established piece of proprietary software (vBulletin) that you charge a premium for.

Being in this field you look at some of the sites and it's a Wordpress (WP) install (free) coupled with some plugings. It's like building a knife from a kit and charging a custom price for it.

About $2 an hour
The fact is I am a Project Manager for a large Network and Infrastructure company and have many friends and co-workers who design and make web pages. $300 is not an over the top price. I am sure you can find a better deal if you look hard enough. As for me a 12 pack will upgrade my crappy website, but I don't like to share.

 

[R.C.Reichert]

My fiancee is actually extremely good at computers and she said she'd make me a website. Of course no charge. I find the hardest part is just coming up with a good business name.

 

[Josh K]

About $2 an hour
The fact is I am a Project Manager for a large Network and Infrastructure company and have many friends and co-workers who design and make web pages. $300 is not an over the top price. I am sure you can find a better deal if you look hard enough. As for me a 12 pack will upgrade my crappy website, but I don't like to share.

Put it in perspective though. He's marketing specifically to knife makers. You make $2 an hour, so it's a hobby, it's fun, right? He wants $300 for a website, how many shop hours does it take to pay that off? 150 shop hours just to pay off the website, but how many hours can you put in a week? If you work a full 40 hour week, expect less then 20 a week.

Being optimistic (20 hours a week, $3/hr) it's going to take you five weeks to pay off that website. Is that worth it? Do you have the ability to sell that many knives? What is the revenue generated per hit?

He's talking about SEO, meaning type "knife maker" into Google and yours will be ranked higher. How many custom knife makers are there? Chances are you're going to spend $300 and receive nothing more then a glorified scrapbook.

 

[panch0]

I understand what you are saying, and I can get a website done by a friend for nothing. Two knifemakers jumped at the chance so there might be people who make more an hour than I do making knives, and saw a good deal. I bought a grinder, drill press, and a heck of alot of equipment. So what you are saying is that I shouldn't have bought it cause I will take 100yrs to make my money back? If that was the case I would never have started making knives. Its a hobby, some guys do it for a living and there are always expenses involved. It is also a good thing for a knifemaker to have a website. It gives people interested a chance to do research on a person and look at past knives he has made. I don't do this as a business, and I don't have a need to pay for a website, but as the guys who jumped at the deal showed I am not the norm.

edited to add it was only one knifemaker wanted to know more and the others thought it was a good deal.

 

[Josh K]

I understand what you are saying, and I can get a website done by a friend for nothing. Two knifemakers jumped at the chance so there might be people who make more an hour than I do making knives, and saw a good deal. I bought a grinder, drill press, and a heck of alot of equipment. So what you are saying is that I shouldn't have bought it cause I will take 100yrs to make my money back? If that was the case I would never have started making knives. Its a hobby, some guys do it for a living and there are always expenses involved. It is also a good thing for a knifemaker to have a website. It gives people interested a chance to do research on a person and look at past knives he has made. I don't do this as a business, and I don't have a need to pay for a website, but as the guys who jumped at the deal showed I am not the norm.

It's a hobby, so you bought tools for your hobby. I don't see how that compares to a website. Hell go to Shutterfly and create a free site with all the pictures you can handle.

Hobbies aren't about making money, but with terms like "SEO" and "paypal integration" he's pitching it as a way to make money when in reality it's not.

 

[Shaughnessy]

When I pumped gas in highschool I was a "petroleum transfer engineer"....

Seriously tho,
I don't see why you need more than a place to store pics of your work and contact info.

Just my 2 cents on it....not tryin to crap up anyones thread.

Larry

 

[panch0]

If you look at my website you can see the difference with free and one that someone makes with proper software and know how. Mine was free and "is" a glorified scrap book. I understand about the SEO and you know maybe someone could have sent a visitors message to him to explain it and not poop on his thread. He did loose it a little, and that was his bad. Oh well he got infracted and you got your point made so I will gracefully exit this back and forth exchange as it is not any of my business to begin with. Wordsmith is a good guy and I was just drawn into this cause I thought you were looking for trouble. Thanks for your point of view on this matter.

-frank