How long does a corporate website take?

Duration is set not by page count but by two things: how many external systems are involved and when the content is ready. At Galata Media a corporate site with no integrations and content supplied up front generally runs six to ten weeks from design to launch — and the item everyone waits on is almost always copy and imagery, not code.

Where does the price gap between a template and a custom design go?

The gap does not go into looks but into three things: page structure built around your actual content, the technical work for speed and accessibility done from the start, and the ability to add new page types as you grow. A template has decided all three in advance, independently of your content; where it fits, it is very reasonable, and where it does not, it produces cost on every new page.

How should payment be staged?

Tying payment to deliverables rather than to dates protects both sides: scope sign-off, design sign-off, end of development, launch. Date-based payment runs the same way regardless of who caused a delay, and it produces arguments on projects waiting for content. Leaving the last instalment until after launch is what makes handover actually complete.

Is refreshing my current site cheaper than a new one?

Sometimes, but less often than assumed. Working on top of an old system means buying its limits as well; on a platform that has not been updated in three years even a small change takes longer than expected. The test is not age: how many days does adding a new page type take, are security updates still shipping, and can the content team publish a page without asking you.

What does a corporate website cost, and why do quotes differ?

Short answer

How much does it cost to have a website built?

Five things set the price of a corporate website: the number of pages, the number of external systems it must connect to, who produces the content, how many languages it carries, and whether the design is built from scratch. Quotes for the same job can differ fivefold, because they are not pricing the same scope. Galata Media does not quote before the scope list is settled.

Key takeaways

Most of the gap between quotes is scope, not quality; three quotes collected without a shared page inventory cannot be compared at all.
What inflates the calendar and the budget most is not design but the external systems the site has to talk to — a single ERP or booking integration generates a week of work on its own.
If it is not written down who produces the content, that job quietly lands on the client, and it is the single biggest cause of delay.
Domain, hosting and analytics accounts must sit in the company's name, not the agency's; otherwise changing supplier means rebuilding the site.
The annual cost is invisible in a quote but real: domain, hosting, certificates, updates and fixes. A contract signed without asking produces a surprise in year two.

What actually sets the price of a website?

What sets the price is not how good the design looks but how much work there is. Five items decide it, and if you are reading a quote without knowing where each of the five stands, the figure in front of you is not a price but a guess.

Five cost drivers and how each one moves the number

Page count
Small scope
8–12 unique page templates
What inflates it
A separate template for every service, city and product
External systems
Small scope
Contact form and analytics
What inflates it
ERP, CRM, booking, payments, inventory
Content
Small scope
Copy and images supplied by the client
What inflates it
Writing, photography and translation done by the agency
Languages
Small scope
One language
What inflates it
Every extra language adds copy, measurement and maintenance
Design
Small scope
Branding applied to an existing system
What inflates it
A design system and component library built from scratch

Five cost drivers and how each one moves the number
Driver	Small scope	What inflates it
Page count	8–12 unique page templates	A separate template for every service, city and product
External systems	Contact form and analytics	ERP, CRM, booking, payments, inventory
Content	Copy and images supplied by the client	Writing, photography and translation done by the agency
Languages	One language	Every extra language adds copy, measurement and maintenance
Design	Branding applied to an existing system	A design system and component library built from scratch

The second row is what stretches the calendar. Drawing screens is predictable work; trying every external system the site has to talk to is not — a single payment provider generates a week of verification on its own.

Why can nobody give you a single number?

Because "corporate website" is a job description, not a product name. A twelve-page brochure site and a site with a dealer login, an ERP connection and four languages are described by the same phrase and are not the same work. That is why the price ranges circulating online are useless: they never say which job they are pricing.

We do not print a range here either, for a simple reason: no institution publishes a verifiable average for the Turkish market. Writing a number with no source behind it would break the rule every other number on this site obeys. What we can write is how a price is built and where a quote falls short.

How do I compare quotes?

Putting three quotes side by side and taking the cheapest means comparing the prices of three different jobs. The only way to make them comparable is to hand all three agencies the same input:

A page inventory: which pages exist, and how many need a unique template. A price given without the list belongs to the site the agency imagined.
An integration list: which systems it connects to, and whether those systems have API documentation. "It will connect to accounting" is a wish, not a scope.
Content responsibility: who writes the copy, who shoots the photography, who translates. All three need a name against them.
The language list, and whether each language will genuinely be translated.
A definition of delivery: what has to be handed over for the job to count as finished — launch, training, first month of support.

Should I ask for a fixed price or a discovery first?

On a project with settled scope a fixed price protects you: the risk sits with the supplier and you know a number. But asking for a fixed price before the scope is settled forces the supplier to write the risk into it, and the quote for the same work comes back markedly higher than it would after discovery.

The right order is two stages: a short, paid discovery, then a fixed price against a settled scope. The discovery output must belong to you — it has to remain in your hands whether or not you continue with that agency. Writing that clause in is what makes discovery a deliverable rather than a sales device.

Which annual costs does a quote not show?

Domain renewal and DNS management — small, but the site goes dark when it is forgotten.
Hosting and traffic: visitor spikes during campaigns can exceed a fixed plan.
SSL certificates: free with most hosting, but a separate line in sectors that require an organisation-validated certificate.
Security and platform updates: a system that never takes a version upgrade eventually becomes un-upgradable, and at that point the cost is the cost of a rebuild.
Content updates and fixes: how many hours a month, with what response time. A contract that omits this turns every small change into a new quote.

Five signs of what a cheap quote is leaving out

Out-of-scope items are not written down. If what is excluded is not enumerated, every job that surfaces later is a new quote — and nearly every dispute comes from work missing off that list.
Account ownership is unstated. If the quote does not say in whose name the domain, hosting and analytics accounts are opened, the default answer tends to be the agency's.
Whose job the content is remains vague. If copy and images are expected from the client, the contract must say so; when it does not, the project stalls on that item for months.
Mobile appears as a separate line item. In 2026 mobile is not an add-on but the site itself; priced separately, the quote was copied from an old template.
No source files at handover. If the transfer of design files and, where relevant, source code is not written down, changing agency means having the site built again.

Frequently asked

How long does a corporate website take?: Duration is set not by page count but by two things: how many external systems are involved and when the content is ready. At Galata Media a corporate site with no integrations and content supplied up front generally runs six to ten weeks from design to launch — and the item everyone waits on is almost always copy and imagery, not code.
Where does the price gap between a template and a custom design go?: The gap does not go into looks but into three things: page structure built around your actual content, the technical work for speed and accessibility done from the start, and the ability to add new page types as you grow. A template has decided all three in advance, independently of your content; where it fits, it is very reasonable, and where it does not, it produces cost on every new page.
How should payment be staged?: Tying payment to deliverables rather than to dates protects both sides: scope sign-off, design sign-off, end of development, launch. Date-based payment runs the same way regardless of who caused a delay, and it produces arguments on projects waiting for content. Leaving the last instalment until after launch is what makes handover actually complete.
Is refreshing my current site cheaper than a new one?: Sometimes, but less often than assumed. Working on top of an old system means buying its limits as well; on a platform that has not been updated in three years even a small change takes longer than expected. The test is not age: how many days does adding a new page type take, are security updates still shipping, and can the content team publish a page without asking you.

Sources

01Web Vitals — LCP, INP ve CLS eşikleri — web.dev, Google, 2026
02Understanding page experience in Google Search results — Google Search Central, 2026

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