"Refresh" and "rebuild" get thrown around a lot, and they don't always mean the same thing from one web designer to the next. If you own a small service business and you're thinking about fixing your website, it helps to know what you're actually paying for.
Here's how I handle it at Mahoney Digital, in plain terms.
The short version
A refresh keeps the bones of your site and fixes what's holding it back. Better first impression, clearer message, faster, easier to call you from a phone.
A rebuild starts over. New structure, new pages, new setup underneath. It's for sites where patching would cost more time and money than starting fresh.
Neither one is automatically better. The right choice depends on what's wrong with the site you have now.
What a refresh includes
My website refreshes start at $499. The price depends mostly on how many pages need work and how much of the writing needs to change.
A refresh usually covers:
- A new homepage. This is the page most people see first, so it gets the most attention. Clear headline about what you do and where, your phone number up top, real photos, and an obvious next step.
- Cleaned-up key pages. Usually services, about, and contact. Updated wording, consistent layout, and current information.
- Mobile fixes. Making sure everything reads well and works on a phone, including a phone number you can tap and buttons that aren't hidden behind other things.
- Speed work. Shrinking oversized images, cutting scripts you don't need, and getting the page to show up faster.
- Contact and form checks. Making sure calls, texts, and form messages actually reach you.
- Basic search setup. Page titles, descriptions, and local details like your service area, so Google understands what you do and where.
- Accurate business info. Hours, services, and service area matching what you actually do today.
What a refresh usually doesn't include: a brand-new structure, a lot of new pages, online booking or payment systems built from scratch, or moving to a different platform. If you need those, we're talking about a rebuild.
What a rebuild includes
New sites and rebuilds run $999. That's a bigger project, and it covers more.
A rebuild usually means:
- Planning the site from scratch. What pages you need, what order they go in, and what each one is supposed to get the visitor to do.
- A new design across every page, not just the homepage.
- New pages, such as separate pages for each main service or each area you serve.
- Moving to a better setup if your current one is slow, hard to update, or locked to a company you don't want to keep paying.
- Bringing over what's worth keeping, like good photos, existing pages that already show up in Google, and your domain name.
- Forms, booking links, or other features built in from the start instead of bolted on later.
How to tell which one you need
A refresh is usually enough when:
- The site basically works, it just looks dated or feels cluttered.
- You can still log in and make changes yourself, or someone can.
- Your services haven't changed much.
- The main complaints are "it's slow," "it's hard to read on a phone," or "I can't find the phone number."
A rebuild usually makes more sense when:
- You can't log in, or nobody knows who set it up or where it's hosted.
- The site is built on something old that breaks every time anything gets updated.
- Your business has changed a lot. New services, new areas, new name.
- Every fix you try causes two new problems.
- You don't own your site or your domain, and you want to.
- You need features the current site just can't handle, like online booking tied into how you actually schedule jobs.
If you're somewhere in between, that's normal. I'll tell you which way I'd lean and why. Sometimes the honest answer is that a refresh now and a rebuild later is the better use of your money.
What happens after it's done
A website isn't a one-time thing. Hours change, services change, photos get stale, and software underneath needs updates.
That's what care retainers are for. Plans run $79, $149, or $250 a month depending on how much ongoing work you want. That covers things like updates, small edits, keeping an eye on whether the site is up, and making sure forms keep working. Some owners want that. Some would rather handle it themselves or call when something comes up. Both are fine.
Questions to ask any web designer
Whether you work with me or someone else, ask these before you sign anything:
- Will I own my domain and my website when we're done?
- Can I make small changes myself, like hours or photos?
- What exactly is included, and what costs extra?
- What happens if I want to leave later?
- Who do I call if something breaks?
Clear answers to those tell you a lot about who you're dealing with.
Not sure which one you need?
I'm Jeremy, a veteran running Mahoney Digital out of Chillicothe. If you send me your site, I'll take a look and tell you straight whether I think it needs a refresh, a rebuild, or just a few fixes. No pressure either way.
You can reach me through the contact page.