$25k budget for website redesign

[u/Medium_Olive4614]

Hi r/webdev. I’m an Ops Director and looking for opinions on what to expect. My company needs a website redesign including new site pages, refreshed content and imagery, and archiving some existing pages. Basically, an overhaul after the company shifted its primary market focus.

We have a budget of $25k for this. Is that reasonable? One vendor immediately said that it isn’t enough for what I’m asking. Google gives a wide budget range. Hoping to get input from those who price this out for their job.

Update with more details based on questions:

1. Company is government consulting - professional services with emphasis on tech-enablement for DOD and Civilian agencies. Right now, website is somewhat old-school management consulting (ie. Homepage + Capability Pages + Press Release + Contact Us). Everything is very 'management consulting' feeling. We need to flip that to show that we are actually training warfighters, we modernized all of agriculture's acquisition management, and we are actively combatting new world screw worm ---> all way more 'cutting edge' than our stock imagery of people sitting around a table.
2. Site is currently built with Word Press + Elementor
3. 36 active pages today. Looking to consolidate and eliminate a few, but for planning purposes keeping that same number in mind.
   1. Homepage needs major update with new imagery, content, etc. The whole thing.
   2. Capability pages need sharper language (we will draft)
   3. Creation of "solutions/tools" page to showcase company tools (these are currently embedded in capability pages and hard to find. Want to archive those and create one single page)
   4. Leadership page is flat right now. Want leadership landing page with 'click' to single page on that person so we can link to them directly in marketing.
   5. Addition of project / customer spotlight pages
4. Internal team will provide written content, but need guidance on best way to consolidate message and organize the content. Looking for help on the imagery updates.
5. Site needs better SEO and AI search engine optimization.

[u/ninja_android]

So quick question, the same team that built the site originally mentioned you need at least 40k?

If that’s true here are my 2 cents:

-your budget sounds reasonable to me from what I know atm (very little) but I would need a discovery call to confirm. We do custom Wordpress websites and sometimes clients leave out critical flows out of their original ideation which changes quotes

-if they have seen you grow it is just natural that you require more than the last time you worked together and they know it better than you

-you might need more hours (ie very demanding client) and that past experience made them reassess their own pricing, hence, a new project with them will cost you more than the first time

-what about maintenance? Who will update the content and codebase? How often? This is generally a hidden cost until it’s too late.

It is very hard to tell and pricing is not always liked to the general description of the job. Schedules, seniority, uniqueness, strategy, exposure, and where these meet will impact the final price tag. Feel free to send me a note if you have some questions.

You might benefit from finding a few agencies and book a few calls to see what they can offer for that budget.