When a redesign is the answer and when it is not, what a redesign includes here — the copy rewritten by us, on-page SEO, and the addresses that already rank kept or redirected — which package fits, and the $750 audit that decides before you spend anything on a rebuild.
A website redesign is sold more often than it is needed. Sometimes the site really is the problem: it does not work on a phone, the copy is about you rather than the customer, or nobody can change it. Often the site is fine and the problem is an empty Google Business Profile, an offer that asks for nothing, or a form that stopped arriving. Nobody knows which until they look, so the honest first step here is the Site & Business Audit, $750: a written report in three business days that says what is actually costing you customers before you pay anyone to change it, including us. If the answer is a redesign, it is built at the same fixed, published prices as a new site.
Broken on a phone, no offer on the first screen, a site nobody can edit, eight services on one page, or a platform you cannot leave.
An empty Business Profile, wrong hours, a broken form, or a "free estimate" that attracts tire-kickers. Those are fixes, and they are cheaper.
Copy rewritten by us, on-page SEO, the addresses that rank kept or redirected, the form tested, and everything in your name.
Waiting on content, scope that grows, and a launch that throws away the pages Google already knew. Each is avoidable, and each is listed below.
The site does not work on a phone, and most of your visitors are on one. The first screen gives the name of the business and a slogan and does not say what you do, for whom, or what to do next. Every service is on one page, so none of them can rank on its own. The site is slow because of a theme and forty plugins added over six years. It was built by someone who has gone, on a platform you cannot log into, and nobody can change the hours. Or the domain and hosting are in a previous designer's name, which is the case where a rebuild is really a rescue.
The local SEO page is blunt about the map pack: the ranking is driven mostly by your Google Business Profile — categories, completeness, review volume, consistent listings, activity — not by how good the website looks. If the profile is empty and the site is fine, a redesign changes nothing. The SEO page lists the boring, fixable reasons local businesses lose search traffic: no Business Profile, missing pricing and service pages, slow pages, and a name, address and phone that differ across listings. Some of those are pages to add, not a site to rebuild. A form that stopped arriving is a fix. An offer that says "free estimate" and fills the phone with tire-kickers is a copy problem, and why a calendar link beats a free estimate is the article for it. None of those needs a redesign.
The Site & Business Audit is $750, paid once, with a written report in three business days. Every page is scanned against 190+ technical, SEO, local and conversion checks — indexing, speed, security, schema and links; the local pack, reviews, citations and AI search — and then a person reads your copy, your offer and your ads. The report ranks what to fix by impact against effort, with the exact fix, and it is yours to keep or hand to any agency, including one that is not us. If the top of the list is a redesign, you will know why and what it should include. If the top of the list is three fixes and a Business Profile, you will know that instead, and you will have spent $750 rather than $2,499 finding out. If the question is specifically about rankings, the SEO page's Audit & Roadmap, $1,500 over two weeks, goes deeper on keywords and competitors.
We write the copy on every project, and on a redesign we have more to work from than on a new build: your existing site, your Google Business Profile, your reviews and listings, and one recorded twenty-minute call. The draft comes to you marked up, and you correct it by clicking on the draft and typing. Our article on why website projects stall explains why the direction of that first draft is the whole difference between a project that ships and one that sits in an inbox.
Unique titles and descriptions on every page, local schema that tells Google what the business is and where it is, a page per service where the old site had one page for all of them, a sitemap, analytics, and the Business Profile pointed at the new site. These are included in the build, not sold as a retainer afterwards.
An established site has pages Google knows. A redesign that gives every page a new address and forgets the old ones throws that away, and how long a website should take names migrating an established site as one of the few things that genuinely takes time, because the redirect map matters more than the design and rushing it costs traffic you never get back. On a redesign here, every existing address is listed before launch: kept where it can be, and otherwise redirected to the page that replaces it. The domain stays the same, and the name, address and phone stay identical everywhere.
Mobile-first, fast by construction, the form tested end to end into your inbox, click-to-call, and hosting set up in your account. The web development page describes the engineering. Code, content, domain and every login are in your name from day one, which matters most on a redesign, because a redesign is where they usually were not.
A redesign is priced as the site it produces, at the same published prices as a new build. The full cards are on the web design page.
A three-page site rebuilt: home, services, contact, with the lead form, click-to-call, on-page SEO and Google setup. Right when the old site was small and the problem was that it did not work on a phone or could not be changed. It can be paid as $149 a month for twelve months instead; at the twelfth payment the payments stop and the site is yours outright, with hosting, updates and edits included the whole time. If you stop early the site comes down, we hold it for 90 days, and the buy-out stays open.
Five to eight custom pages, which is where most redesigns land, because the usual reason a site is not working is one page for eight services. Copywriting, on-page SEO, local schema, reviews and analytics. Half now, half at launch.
If the redesign is the moment to add a tool — an instant quote, a booking flow, an intake bot — this is everything in Business plus one custom tool. The app development page says what "one custom tool" covers.
Managed hosting and security, monthly edits and updates, uptime and performance monitoring, so the new site does not become the one you just replaced. Optional; the website maintenance page lists what it covers.
How many pages, which is the main driver and the one you control. Whether you need a custom tool, and how many of your existing systems it has to talk to. Whether the content exists — and on a redesign it usually does, in the old site, the photographs and the price list, which makes a redesign faster to build for than a new site. And your deadline.
We write the copy; you do not hand us finished text and hope. Three rounds of revisions are included, and anything after that is quoted before a minute of work happens. A fixed price and a date in writing before you commit, and no hourly meter. You own all of it at the end: code, content, domain, accounts. Cancellation before work starts is a full refund of the deposit; after work starts you pay only for work done. What Grand Rapids web designers charge puts these prices against published local rates.
Photography and logo design — a redesign is often when a business wants a new logo, and that is quoted separately; your domain and third-party fees; hosting after launch unless you take a care plan, though a static site can be handed to you to host free; and regulated copy that needs a specialist to sign off.
Why website projects stall is the general case: build time is days, calendar time is months, and the gap is waiting on content. A redesign adds its own failures, and each is avoidable.
The content wait, again. The old site has copy, so there is no reason for a redesign to wait on a questionnaire. We draft from what exists and you correct it.
"While we are at it." Scope grows a page at a time until the fixed price is not fixed. The proposal names the pages, and anything added is quoted before it is built.
Trickled feedback. The article describes four hours of revisions spread across five weeks of texts and calls. Three rounds are included here, each in one place — click on the draft and type — with a date.
New addresses, no redirects. The most expensive one, and the one that shows up as lost rankings a month after launch. The redirect map is written before launch, not after.
The move that breaks email. A site moved to a new host without the domain's mail records being carried over, and the business's email stops the same afternoon. The fix is dull: list the domain's records before anything is switched, and check email still arrives afterwards.
The old designer holds the keys. If the domain or the hosting is in someone else's name, that is the first thing sorted, in writing, before the build starts.
Tracking and the form not carried over. Analytics, the pixel, the form's destination: each is checked on launch day rather than assumed, and a test submission of the form is the last thing done before the old site is switched off. If some of your customers are older or navigate by keyboard, the accessibility page lists what we test for on every page we publish, which is also worth knowing before a redesign that inherits an old site's habits.
The production work on a five-to-seven-page site is two to five working days. How long a website should take puts a reasonable standard at draft content back to you in two to three days, a first working preview within a week, and a live site in two weeks assuming you reply. A redesign with an established site to migrate takes longer, because the redirect map is written and checked, and a large site with hundreds of ranking pages is the one case the article says not to rush. The date is fixed in writing once the scope is, and the audit's report is what the scope is built from.
The audit first, then a fixed proposal, a draft you comment on by clicking, and a launch with the redirects in place.
$750, paid once. A written report in three business days that says whether a redesign is the answer and what it should include. Yours to keep, or to hand to anyone.
The pages by name, the price, the date, and the list of existing addresses to keep or redirect, in writing. 50% to start.
We rewrite the site from what you already have. Click anywhere on the draft and type. Three rounds of revisions are included.
Old addresses redirected, form and tracking checked, domain and hosting in your name. 50% on launch.
It is where we start, because it is the only way to know whether a redesign is what you need, and the $750 report is yours whatever you decide. If you already know the site has to be rebuilt, say so; the price is then fixed from the call, the same as any build.
Not if the addresses Google already knows are kept or redirected, which is part of every redesign here. Every existing address is listed before launch, kept where it can be and otherwise redirected to the page that replaces it. A launch that gives every page a new address and forgets the old ones is how rankings are lost, and it is the most expensive mistake on this page.
When a site already runs on one of them and it is doing its job, we work inside it. For a rebuild our default is hand-written HTML, CSS and JavaScript served from a content delivery network, because it is faster, cheaper to host, and has no plugin stack to patch. If you need a store or an editor-friendly CMS, we say so in the quote.
As raw material, yes. We rewrite the copy from your existing site, your Google Business Profile, your reviews and one call, and you correct the draft. Photographs are yours to supply; photography and logo design are not included, and a new logo is quoted separately.
The same as a new site: a Starter Site from $999, a Business Site from $2,499, and a Growth Site with one custom tool from $4,999, with a fixed quote in writing before work begins and 50% to start, 50% on launch. The $750 audit comes first and its report is yours to keep.
Send me the address. I'll tell you honestly whether a redesign is what I'd do, or whether three fixes and a Business Profile would do more — and if the current site is fine, that's a valid answer and I'll give it.