Three quotes on your desk. Say they come back at $1,900, $6,000, and “starting at $14,000,” which is not a price, it’s a mood. All three use the phrase “custom WordPress website.” The questions to ask a web designer before hiring are supposed to sort this out, and they will, but only if you know what a good answer sounds like.
That’s the part nobody hands you. A list on its own is half a tool: without an answer key you nod along, take notes, and hire whoever was warmest on the phone.
So: twelve questions, and under each one what a real answer sounds like, what a dodge sounds like, and mine. Our numbers are already on the pricing page, calculator and all, so I don’t get to hide behind “it depends.”
Why most of these lists don’t help
Because they have no answer key.
Any vendor can produce a confident-sounding sentence on demand, and confidence is not information. You’re testing whether the person across from you has done this enough times to answer in numbers and nouns. Someone who can’t tell you how they work is telling you something.
The money questions
1. Is that a fixed price or an estimate?
Good answer: a number, the word “flat” or “fixed,” and a clear statement of what would change it.
Dodge: “It depends on scope” after you’ve already described the scope.
Mine: our Launch package is $2,400 flat. Not “starting at.” Bigger builds have a floor because complexity varies: booking sites from $5,500, online stores from $8,500, memberships from $9,500, a custom platform from $15,000. When I say “from,” I owe you a real number after a real conversation. Run your own numbers with the calculator on the pricing page. The long version lives in what a small business website costs.
2. What is specifically not included?
Good answer: an actual list. Copywriting. Photography. Hosting fees. Stock images. Ongoing maintenance.
Dodge: “Everything you need is in there.” That sentence has ended more relationships than it has started.
Mine: the $2,400 covers a brand kit, custom design, the full build, ten pages populated, on-page SEO, and training so you can update your own copy without calling me. Hosting is a separate bill, and you’ll know before you sign whose account it sits on. Want us to write the pages instead of populating what you send? That’s $275 to $375 per page. Ongoing SEO lives with our sister studio, ZealousGrowth, and is billed separately. The services page has the rest.
3. What makes this price change mid-project?
Good answer: named triggers. New pages, new functionality, a third round of revisions, you changing your mind on the ecommerce plugin in week five.
Dodge: “We’ll figure it out as we go.” You will. On the invoice.
Mine: if the work grows, you get a written number before anyone touches a keyboard. Nothing gets built and then billed after.
The ownership questions
4. Whose name is on the domain and the hosting account?
Good answer: the domain is registered to you, full stop. Hosting is either in your name or billed to you openly, and they tell you which without being asked twice.
Dodge: “Oh, we handle all of that for you.” Handling is fine. Being the account holder is a different thing, and you want to know which one you’re getting.
Mine: the domain, the hosting, the design files and the content stay in your name from day one, the site runs on standard WordPress, and there is no platform lock-in. Hosting we’ll either set up in your name or bill you for openly, and you’ll know which before you sign. Picture year three: the only way to get your own business name back is negotiating for it. Entirely avoidable at signup.
5. Whose name is on the plugin and theme licenses?
Good answer: yours, on your account. Or an honest “ours, under a developer license, and here’s what happens if you leave.”
Dodge: a blank look. Most people never ask this one.
Mine: ours, on a developer license. Gravity Forms and ACF Pro get renewed on our account across every site we maintain. You get the list of licenses your site depends on before you sign, and if you leave you can buy your own. Nothing stops working the day you go. The updates do, at the next renewal.
That’s the general shape of it. Most premium plugins are annual subscriptions tied to somebody’s account, so if that account isn’t yours, updates stop whenever the license lapses. Sometimes quietly, months later, which is worse. Nobody notices until something breaks.
The process questions
6. What do you need from me, and by when?
Good answer: a specific list with dates on it. Logo files, photos, service descriptions, logins, and one human allowed to make final decisions.
Dodge: “Just send stuff over whenever you’re ready.”
Mine: you get a kickoff list in week one, short on purpose. What stalls websites is almost never the code. It’s the About page nobody wants to write and the photos living on somebody’s old phone. And look, if this project is the thing that keeps sliding to Sunday night, that is the argument for hiring out. You’re not buying pixels. You’re buying somebody whose job is to carry the list and defend the launch date while your week does what your week does.
7. What happens if I go quiet for two weeks?
Good answer: a stated policy. The timeline shifts, the project pauses, maybe there’s a restart fee. Whatever it is, they say it before you sign.
Dodge: pretending this never happens. It happens constantly.
Mine: the schedule moves and I tell you the new date instead of letting it drift. And if writing ten pages is what’s making you avoid my emails, buy the per-page copywriting instead. Hand us the bottleneck. That’s what it’s priced for.
The build questions
8. Page builder or custom build, and can I edit pages myself?
Good answer: either one, explained plainly, plus a live demo of what your editing screen will look like.
Dodge: “You won’t need to edit anything, just email us.” That’s a subscription you never agreed to.
Mine: WordPress, always. We built on Divi for years and now build custom themes with ACF Pro, which in plain English means your edit screen is just a set of labeled boxes (“Headline,” “Button text,” “Photo”) instead of a wall of drag-and-drop tools you’re scared to touch. Training is in the package. Ask any vendor to screen-share that editor before you sign. Thirty seconds beats an hour of talking.
The AI question nobody asks out loud
9. Did a machine write my content, and where else did you use AI?
Good answer: specifics about where it starts and where it stops.
Dodge: vague talk about an “AI-powered process.” Also probe the other direction: a proud claim that they never touch it. Fine if true. Ask what that costs you in hours, and ask about their subcontractors.
Mine: yes, we use AI in the build, mostly for scaffolding code and first drafts, and no, nothing goes live on a client site without a human rewriting and fact-checking it. That’s a rule with a reason: we found AI leftovers in our own published posts and cleaned them out, post by post. Humbling.
Here’s the honest shape of these tools, whether you’ve used them for a year or you’re hearing about them for the first time. AI is genuinely good at producing a starting point. Fast, cheap, often decent-looking. What it does not produce is a finished business asset. It writes confident sentences about your company that aren’t true: an award you never won, a service you don’t offer, a stat with no source. It has no opinion about which of your services actually pays the mortgage. And it doesn’t touch the invisible half of the job. Page speed. Accessibility. Redirects from your old URLs. Forms that deliver to an inbox someone reads.
If you’ve already tried one of these and walked away thinking “it’s close, but it doesn’t look right” – you weren’t doing it wrong. You found the line where the tool stops. The stretch between generated and good is craft, not a better prompt, and it’s the thing you’re actually hiring for. Your name goes on that page, not the tool’s. Ask every vendor who checks.
The after-launch questions
10. What does month two cost?
Good answer: a number, said immediately.
Dodge: “We can talk about that closer to launch.”
Mine: Care is $300 a month, Grow is $650, Dedicated starts at $5,000. Month to month, no contract, cancel whenever. Hosting is billed separately either way. You can read what’s in each tier before you ever talk to me. That’s the point. And if a vendor waves month two off because “WordPress just runs,” ask who applies the security patches, who holds the backups, and who notices when the contact form quietly stops sending. Somebody does that work, or nobody does.
11. Who fixes it when the contact form breaks on a Friday night?
Good answer: a named person and a realistic response window.
Dodge: “Submit a ticket.” From a three-person shop, that’s support desk cosplay.
Mine: honestly, a small studio is not a 24/7 operations center, and one that claims otherwise is describing a version of itself that hasn’t slept. Retainer clients reach me directly, not a queue. Same business day for anything broken, and yes, I’ll answer a truly dead site on a weekend. Checkout down, forms not sending, site offline: those jump ahead of homepage tweaks. I don’t sell a contractual SLA and I won’t pretend to. Ask every vendor what “urgent” means in hours.
The exit question
12. If we stop working together, what exactly do I walk away with?
Good answer: everything. Site files, database, admin credentials, the domain, and a list of every license the site runs on.
Dodge: “Well, we’d hate to lose you.” Not the question.
Mine: you already own the files, the database, the credentials, the domain and the content, so there’s nothing for me to release. The licenses on our developer account are the one exception, and you get that list on the way out. I’d charge for the move itself, $700 to $1,800 depending on size. I’d rather earn month thirteen than trap you into it.
The scoring sheet for three calls
Get three quotes. Two isn’t enough to spot an outlier, five becomes a research project you never finish. Print it, one point per row, and ask all three the same twelve things so you compare answers instead of personalities. Nobody hits a clean 12 on a live call. The pattern of gaps is the signal, not the total.
| Ask | Point if they | A | B | C |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Fixed or estimate? | Say a number, and what changes it | |||
| What’s excluded? | List it without being pushed | |||
| Change orders? | Name the triggers in writing | |||
| Domain owner? | Say “you,” instantly | |||
| License holder? | Know the answer at all | |||
| What do you need from me? | Give a dated list | |||
| If I go quiet? | Have a stated policy | |||
| Builder or custom, and can I edit it? | Show you the edit screen and include training | |||
| Where’s the AI? | Answer specifically | |||
| Month two cost? | Say a monthly number | |||
| Who fixes it Friday night? | Name a person and a response window | |||
| If we part ways? | Hand you everything |
A few things people ask me on these calls
What should a website proposal include?
A price, a deliverables list, an exclusions list, a timeline with your deadlines in it, payment terms, ownership language, and what happens after launch. If it’s two paragraphs and a total, that’s a quote, not a proposal. Ours runs long on purpose.
Is it rude to ask for references or to see live sites they built?
No, and the reaction is the test. Anyone proud of their work has links ready. Ask for a site that launched a year or two back and is still being updated, which tells you more than a shiny new one. Ours are on the work page.
Should I just take the cheapest quote?
Only if it covers the same list. Line up content, revisions, training, ownership, and who maintains it in month two. Sometimes the gap is scope, not price. More often the cheap number is cheap because three of those rows are blank, and you buy them later at retail, mid-project, with no room to negotiate.
And whatever you trim to hit a budget, don’t trim maintenance, backups, or security. That’s the column where the cheap version costs the most: a site that gets defaced or sits offline for a week takes your phone number, your booking form and your search rankings with it, and the emergency rebuild always costs more than the plan would have. Cut a page. Cut the photoshoot. Phase the ecommerce. Not that.
One last thing
You’re not being difficult by asking any of this. Any designer worth hiring will be relieved you did. Projects rarely go sideways over design taste. They go sideways over an assumption nobody said out loud in week one.
So here’s my ask. Run all twelve at me. Grab a call from the contact page, bring the scoring sheet, and hold me to the same standard as the other two. If you’d rather see numbers first, the pricing calculator gets you a real range in about a minute, and the small business websites page lays out what actually ships in a build. Ask all three the same questions. I like our odds when the questions are this specific.