Building a website shouldn’t feel mysterious, stressful, or full of fine print. This page covers the most common questions we get about how Audubon Website Services works. We touch on everything from pricing and timelines to edits, hosting, and ongoing support. If you don’t see your question answered here, that’s not a problem. Reach out and we’ll talk it through.
Both options include the same custom design and development process. The difference is how you pay for and manage your website.
The Managed Option is $95 per month with no upfront cost and includes hosting, maintenance, routine updates, and ongoing support.
The Ownership Option starts at $2,900 and allows you to purchase your website outright and take full ownership upon final payment. Optional Website Care is available if you'd like us to continue hosting and maintaining your site after launch.
It depends on how you prefer to pay for and manage your website. The Managed Option is a good fit if you want to avoid a large upfront cost and prefer to have hosting, maintenance, routine updates, and support handled for you. The Ownership Option is ideal if you prefer to pay upfront, own your website outright, and choose whether you want ongoing Website Care after launch. Both options include the same custom design and development process.
Yes. If you start with the Managed Option and later decide you'd like to own your website outright, contact us to discuss purchasing the site. We'll provide a clear buyout price based on your website and the amount you've already invested through the Managed Option.
Yes, we design custom Ecommerce websites tailored to your business rather than relying on one size fits all templates. Because every online store has different products, payment requirements, shipping needs, and integrations, Ecommerce websites are quoted individually.
If you're planning to sell products online, we'd be happy to discuss your project and provide a personalized quote.
No problem.
If your website grows beyond the 5 pages included with your site, additional pages can be added at any time for a fixed per page fee.
We'll always discuss pricing with you before any additional work begins, so there are never any surprises.
We offer a range of add on services that allow your website to grow and adapt over time without needing a full rebuild. These services include things like adding additional static pages, setting up a blog or adding blog posts, logo or icon design, search engine optimization improvements, conversion analysis and performance recommendations, domain purchase and setup, and third party integrations such as online ordering or scheduling tools. We also offer general development work billed at an hourly rate for custom requests that fall outside standard offerings.
Every add on is quoted clearly before work begins, and you are never obligated to purchase services you do not need.
The timeline depends on the size and complexity of your project, as well as how quickly we receive your content and feedback.
Most standard business websites are completed within a few weeks, while larger or more customized projects may take longer.
Before work begins, we'll provide an estimated timeline so you know what to expect throughout the process.
To get started, we'll ask for information about your business, services, branding, and goals for the website. We'll also discuss any photos, logos, written content, or examples of websites you like.
Don't worry if you don't have everything prepared. We'll guide you through the process and let you know exactly what we need before development begins.
Absolutley not!
All pricing is discussed and agreed upon before any work begins. If you request work that falls outside the original scope of your project, we'll explain exactly what is involved, provide a quote, and wait for your approval before moving forward.
You'll never receive an unexpected invoice for work you didn't authorize.
Our Managed Option is designed to provide more than just the initial website build.
The Managed Option is more than a payment plan for your website. Your monthly payment includes ongoing hosting, maintenance, routine updates, and support to keep your site running smoothly after launch. Instead of simply building your website and handing it off, we continue to manage the technical side of it so you can focus on your business.
Yes. If you prefer to make an upfront investment rather than pay monthly, our Ownership Option allows you to purchase your custom website outright. Ownership projects start at $2,900, with 50% due upfront and the remaining 50% due before launch. Once the project is paid in full, you own the website and can optionally add Website Care if you'd like us to continue hosting and maintaining it.
The Managed Option is an ongoing service, so monthly payments continue for as long as you want us to host, maintain, and support your website. There is a 12-month minimum commitment, after which you can cancel the service according to the terms of your agreement. If you prefer to own your website outright, our Ownership Option may be a better fit.
After the 12-month minimum commitment, you can cancel the Managed Option according to the terms of your agreement. Because the website is provided as part of an ongoing managed service, hosting, maintenance, updates, and support will end when the service is canceled. If you'd like to keep and own your website, contact us before canceling to discuss purchasing it outright.
For the Managed Option, we do not require a deposit. We start working on your site as soon as we have all the required content from you. We bill you based on the day that we put your final website live.
We do our billing on the first day of every month. So you won't get a bill until the first day of the month following your website going live. That first bill will include a prorated amount going back to the day your site was put live.
For the Ownership Option, we generally require 50% payment to begin work, then the remaining 50% when you approve of your final website version.
We accept common electronic payment methods and physical checks. Specific payment instructions will be provided before your project begins.
SEO stands for search engine optimization. It refers to the practices used to help search engines understand your website and determine when it should appear in search results.
SEO matters because search engines are one of the primary ways people discover businesses online. A well optimized website is easier for search engines to read, faster to load, more accessible to users, and more likely to appear when potential customers search for relevant services.
At its core, SEO is about clarity and structure. When a website is built properly, with clean code, logical organization, and useful content, both users and search engines have a better experience. Good SEO does not guarantee instant traffic or top rankings, but poor SEO almost guarantees that your site will struggle to be found.
Every website we build includes foundational on page SEO as a standard part of development.
This includes things like proper page titles, meta descriptions, semantic HTML, mobile responsive design, accessibility best practices, XML site map generation, etc.
We don't believe these should be optional extras. They're simply part of building a professional website correctly.
SEO is both a one time setup and an ongoing process. The foundation of SEO is established when your website is built. Proper structure, clean code, accessibility, performance, and on page optimization are set once and form the baseline for how search engines understand your site. That part does not need to be constantly redone.
Ongoing SEO comes into play as your business, content, and competition change. Adding new pages, publishing content, refining keywords, and improving performance over time can all impact how your site ranks. That work is optional and depends on your goals, not a requirement just to have a functional website.
SEO results take time and vary widely based on several factors. For a new website, it can take weeks or months before search engines fully index the site and begin showing it consistently in results. Meaningful improvements in visibility or rankings usually take longer, especially in competitive markets.
Factors like your industry, location, competition, content quality, and how active your site is all play a role. SEO is not instant and it is not guaranteed, but it is cumulative. A well built website with good fundamentals puts you in a strong position, and steady improvement comes from consistency over time rather than quick fixes.
No. If someone is giving you specific guarantees about future rankings, they're lying to you. No one can guarantee specific rankings on Google.
Search engine rankings are controlled by Google and depend on many factors outside of any developer’s control, including competition, user behavior, and algorithm changes.
What we do guarantee is that your website is built correctly. That means clean code, proper structure, strong on page SEO, fast performance, and accessibility best practices. Those elements give your site the best possible foundation to perform well in search results, but rankings themselves are never guaranteed.
Nt by itself. SEO helps your website get found, but getting found is only one part of the process. Visitors still need a clear message, a professional presentation, and an easy way to take action once they arrive. Even strong rankings do not matter if the site does not convert visitors into inquiries or sales. Think of SEO as building the road to your business. Your website, messaging, and offer determine whether people actually walk through the door.
On page SEO focuses on elements within your website, such as content, page structure, headings, metadata, internal links, accessibility, and performance.
Off page SEO refers to signals outside your website, including backlinks, online reviews, local citations, and your overall reputation across the internet.
Every website we build includes strong on page SEO. Off page SEO services can be discussed separately if they align with your business goals.
Answer Engine Optimization (AEO) is the practice of organizing your website so AI-powered tools like ChatGPT, Google AI Overviews, and other answer engines can more easily understand and reference your content. While traditional SEO focuses on helping your website rank in search results, AEO focuses on making your business information clear, structured, and easy for AI systems to interpret when answering users' questions.
AEO also places a stronger emphasis on clear communication. We organize content around the questions your customers are likely to ask, write concise and informative answers, use logical page structure, create helpful FAQ sections where appropriate, and implement structured data that provides additional context about your business. These practices help AI systems better understand your website while improving the overall experience for your visitors as well.
Yes, we can help with Google Business Profile optimization as an add on service. This can include reviewing your profile setup, ensuring your business information is accurate and consistent, helping optimize descriptions and categories, and providing guidance on best practices for photos, posts, and reviews. A well managed Google Business Profile is especially important for local search visibility.
Getting visitors to your website is only half the battle.
Conversion analysis focuses on what visitors do once they arrive. We evaluate how people interact with your website and identify opportunities to encourage more phone calls, contact form submissions, appointment requests, or purchases.
The goal isn't simply more traffic—it's turning more of your existing visitors into customers.
A conversion is any action on your website that moves a visitor closer to becoming a customer.
What counts as a conversion depends on your business and your goals.
Common examples include submitting a contact form, calling your business, booking an appointment, signing up for a newsletter, or completing a purchase. For some businesses, simply clicking to get directions or viewing a key page can also be considered a conversion. During conversion analysis, the first step is defining what actions actually matter for your business. Once that is clear, the website can be evaluated and improved around those goals.
User behavior is analyzed using a combination of analytics tools, site data, and practical observation. This typically includes reviewing page views, traffic sources, time spent on pages, and how users move through the site. We also look at where users click, where they pause, and where they tend to leave. When available, this data helps reveal patterns such as confusing layouts, missed calls to action, or pages that are not performing as intended.
After we do this analysis, you'll get a nice summary report from us which will include our recommendations for improvements.
Every website we build is custom designed and hand coded using HTML, CSS, and JavaScript. We do not use page builders such as WordPress, Wix, Squarespace, or other drag and drop platforms.
Building websites this way gives us complete control over performance, accessibility, responsiveness, and long term maintainability. The result is a faster, more reliable website tailored specifically to your business rather than a modified template.
Page builders can be a good fit for some situations, but they often rely on large themes, plugins, and unnecessary code that can slow websites down and create maintenance challenges over time.
Our approach is different. We build websites from the ground up using clean, custom code. This allows us to create websites that are faster, more secure, easier to maintain, and free from the limitations that often come with page builders.
No, we will not perform work on WordPress, or any other page-builder websites.
We specialize exclusively in custom, hand coded websites and do not provide maintenance or development services for WordPress or other page builder platforms.
If you currently have a WordPress website that you like, we'd be happy to rebuild it from scratch using our custom development approach while preserving the design elements that work well for your business.
It depends on which option you choose. With the Ownership Option, you own your website outright once the final payment is made. With the Managed Option, the website remains part of our managed service for as long as your subscription is active. If you later decide you'd like to own your Managed website, contact us to discuss purchasing it outright.
You always own your domain name and all of the content you provide, including your text, images, logos, and branding.
Yes! Your domain is always registered in your name or your business's name. Even if we help purchase or configure it, ownership remains yours. We never take ownership of client domains or hold them hostage.
With the Managed Option, hosting is included and managed by us as part of your monthly service. With the Ownership Option, you have more flexibility over where your website is hosted. We can host and manage it for you through our optional Website Care service, or you can arrange your own hosting after the website is completed and paid in full.
Just contact us with the changes you'd like to make. The Managed Option includes up to one hour of routine website edits each month. Ownership clients with Website Care can also request routine updates as part of their service. For clients without an ongoing service, updates and larger changes can be quoted separately as needed.
Design is a collaborative process.
Before your website goes live, you'll have the opportunity to review the design and provide feedback. We'll work with you to make reasonable revisions so the finished website reflects your business and your goals.
If a requested change significantly alters the original project scope, we'll discuss the options with you before moving forward.
Yes. All our websites are designed for mobile devices from the start. Sites are built using responsive design principles so they adapt naturally to phones, tablets, and desktop screens. Mobile usability is not treated as an afterthought or a separate version of the site. This approach ensures your website is accessible, readable, and functional on the devices most people actually use.
Your website is built to load fast, feel smooth, and work reliably on modern devices and browsers. We focus on performance from the start by using clean custom code, lightweight structure, responsive design, and best practices that support speed, accessibility, and on page SEO. That usually results in a noticeably faster and more stable site than template based or plugin heavy builds. Actual performance can still vary depending on things like image sizes, third party tools you choose to integrate, and the hosting environment. When those factors matter, we will recommend the best options to keep things fast and consistent.
Yes! That's what's great about custom coded websites that do not rely on plugins, themes, or large third party frameworks - there's really nothing to hack.
Security also depends on the hosting environment. We use reputable hosting providers and standard protections such as HTTPS and basic server level safeguards. While no website can be guaranteed to be immune from all threats, this approach significantly reduces risk compared to plugin heavy or poorly maintained systems.
Yes, blogs are available as an optional add-on service. We can build a blog that's fast, easy to manage, and optimized for search engines. Whether you plan to write your own articles or have us assist with content, we'll recommend the setup that best fits your goals.
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Ready to Build a Better Website?
If you’re looking for a website that is fast, reliable, and built with care, we’d love to hear about your project. Reach out to start a straightforward conversation about your goals and next steps.
