How much does an e-commerce site cost, beware of hidden fees?

Are you a Freelancer or E-commerce Manager and want to start your online business and want to learn more about how much an e-commerce site costs and hidden fees?

Can't wait to start selling online? Well before you pull out your credit card maybe a little crash course on e-commerce costs is in order to avoid finding yourself with an empty bank account at the end of the month.

You are just in the right place! Appvizer explains in this article what elements determine the cost of your e-commerce site.😉

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What is the cost of an e-commerce site?

If before you go on a trip you have to put a lot more than airfare into account, in the same way creating an e-commerce site means anticipating expenses that are not obvious, depending on your needs you can open it starting from a few hundred euros up to thousands. The cost of your e-commerce site will depend on the goals you want to achieve.

You must also consider that the cost of an e-commerce site is not just the initial cost, as you will always have to invest in running costs and adding new features to improve the customer experience on your site.

A website needs a large initial budget, if the site from the beginning has multiple features it will be able to last over time and will need less intervention once the site is online.

The price of your e-commerce will depend on the technical solutions you choose so it is difficult to set a budget.

What will the cost of your e-commerce site depend on ?

As you can see, the price differences between one e-commerce site and another depend on many factors, but mainly on the scope of the project and the options, the more you will need functionality the more the cost of your e-commerce site will be high.

The number of customers you have determines the technological needs you need.If the number of customers is large you will need to create a platform that can handle a lot of traffic simultaneously.

Another element you need to take into consideration is how many pages you want to create in your e-shop as the more pages there are the more the cost increases as you will have to take into consideration coding processes, copywriting, etc.

Also the more features you will need the higher the cost will be.

You will also have to invest in coding processes and if you want your site to last you will have to employ specialists in the IT field in order to have a dynamic, intuitive site that is easy for customers to use.

Another element to take into consideration is the part related to copywriting for which you will decide whether to use external staff or take care of it.This means that

If you can establish from the beginning all your needs you will be able to reduce costs, as often e-commerce site owners realize afterwards the need for a feature or the fact that they had added an unnecessary feature that magnified the cost of the site while being useless.If, on the other hand, you have knowledge about how to create a site and the coding processes you will be able to save a lot.As you will be the one who will be in charge to a large extent of the creation of your site.

Another element is the cost related to advertising and marketing campaigns for the site, if you decide to integrate SEO features to your site this will cost more. However this is a very important and useful element if you decide to make your Brand known and acquire new customers.

You should also know that certainly the site will have an initial cost, but later on if you need new features there will be additional costs.That is why we cannot propose you a total cost since this will depend on your needs.

First of all, you should tell yourself that your goal is not to create a site for online sales that costs as little as possible, but to create a site that can solve your problems and that can meet your needs and goals.

In addition, in order to be able to determine a better price and be able to save money, it is a good idea to know the basics of how the creation of a site is done, because once you have the basic knowledge it is much easier to determine the right web solution and to have an idea of approximately how much it might cost.

What questions should you ask yourself to determine the final cost of an e-commerce site?

To help you determine more precisely how much it costs to create an e-commerce site here are the questions you should ask yourself to determine the cost of your e-commerce site:

• What resources do you need?
• How many pages will there be on your site?
• How many products are available on your site?
• Do you need the help of an agency?
• Who will take care of the e-commerce site after it is activated and what will be their salary?

Creating an e-commerce site and determining the final cost is complex as you have to consider several questions and different aspects.

Once you have answered all these questions, you will know the needs of your online store and whether it requires specific web development, so you will be able to identify whether only one page is needed or whether you need more pages, whether a showcase site with a landing page is sufficient or a more complex site is needed.

You should also know:

• Whether you plan to allocate a large budget or prefer to choose a cheaper solution. If you choose to allocate a low budget, the risk is that the functionality will be very limited.

• What are the features you will need and how much work time it takes to implement them.

• Do you want to administer your site independently (without depending on an outside agency).In case you are confident that you are able to create a website without needing help and being accompanied you can afford to save a large sum of money. However in case of doubt you should consult a specialist.

• How much time can/will you spend on the design and management of your site.Site design is the brand image must fit the product you sell and must be personalized to allow you to stand out from competitors and mark the memory of consumers. It may seem trivial to you, but design is one of the elements that subconsciously can attract many customers so it is advisable to devote time and set an appropriate budget and in case it is appropriate to use a graphic designer.

In this way, once you have completed this reflection, you will have all the cards in your hand, and clear ideas, to serenely select the best web solution for your project, also it is important to think about the additional costs that there may be in order to best choose the best solutions from the beginning.

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How web hosting affects e-commerce costs.

Every e-commerce site needs web hosting i.e., a place where the website files are stored. In a nutshell it involves buying space on a server.

Depending on the server you choose, prices vary, as servers that can handle more traffic have a higher cost.

You can choose from:

• Shared hosting:in which servers are shared with other users.
• VPS:is a virtual private server and although there may be multiple VPSs on the same server each has a space dedicated to it.
• WordPress hosting: is designed for users of WordPress.
• E-Commerce hosting: a system designed for e-commerce sites.
• Private server: The server is dedicated entirely to your e-commerce.

If you want to have quality hosting the best solution is to choose paid hosting as for most cases the performance of free hosting is of low quality.

Conclusion

Although apparently creating an e-commerce site might seem inexpensive.

If the ambitions are high you have to invest a lot on the site to make sure you have a service that matches the customers.

This is why it is difficult to determine the cost of the site as the latter can be higher or lower depending on the functionality you will need.