Scope and price this specific site before you touch a keyboard

A designer quotes ₦150,000 for a restaurant's website. Five pages, four weeks.

Then: "can we add the menu as a PDF as well?" Yes. "my cousin says we need a booking system." Fine. "can customers pay a deposit online?" That is bigger, but he does it. "we've decided to add the second branch."

Five months later he has built something worth about ₦600,000, been paid ₦150,000, and both of them are quietly resentful. The client thinks he became slow. He thinks she took advantage.

Neither is true. Nobody did anything wrong at any single step. Every request was small, every yes was reasonable, and there was never a moment where a line was crossed — because there was no line.

You already know how to price a package and write a simple contract; that was Branding 7.4. This lesson is about the part specific to building a website: deciding what this particular site is before anybody agrees a number.

Words in this lesson

Scope creep is drift, not villainy

Clients are not trying to get free work. They genuinely do not know that "just add a booking system" is a different project from "add a page".

Why would they? To them both are things that appear on a website. The distinction lives entirely in your head — which means if you have not written it down, it does not exist.

So the job is not to defend yourself against clients. It is to make the shape of the project visible to somebody who has never built one.

Decide the site before you price it

You have already learned the three questions that decide what this build actually is. Answer them before quoting, because each one changes the price by a multiple.

A designer who quotes before asking these is guessing, and the guess is always low — because the client describes the simple version and the complicated version arrives later.

Write the scope as a page list

Your page list from Module 3 is the scope. Convert it directly:

Included: Home, Services & Prices, About, Contact — four pages. Contact form with entries saved. WhatsApp buttons on every page and beside each price. Opening hours. Map with directions. Brand colours, fonts and logo applied from the existing brand guide. Images optimised. Site tested on a phone on mobile data.

Not included, and can be quoted separately: online payments, online booking with live availability, a blog, additional pages, product photography, copywriting beyond editing what you supply, a second language.

That second list is the one that saves the project. It is not defensive — it is informative. It shows the client the menu of what else exists, which is genuinely useful to them and makes later requests a normal conversation rather than an awkward one.

Name the things they are most likely to ask for. You know from Module 5 what those are: payments, booking, a blog. Naming them in advance turns "can we just add" into "yes, that's the one we said we'd quote separately".

Three things specific to a website build

These are not in the branding contract, and each one causes a real dispute.

1. Hosting and domain are theirs

From Module 2: the client buys the domain and the hosting, in their own account, with their own card.

Put it in the quote explicitly, with the renewal price rather than the first-year price:

"Hosting and domain are paid directly by you — about ₦38,000 a year. That is not part of my fee, and it renews annually."

Two disputes avoided: they never think your fee included their hosting, and they are not surprised in eleven months.

2. The content deadline, with a consequence

From Module 3.1, this is what actually delays projects. Every time.

So the content inventory gets a date, and the agreement says what happens when it passes:

"If content has not arrived by [date], the project pauses and resumes when it does. Restarting may mean a new slot in my schedule."

Not a penalty. A description of reality. Without it, a delay caused by missing photographs becomes "the designer is slow", and you have no way to show otherwise.

3. Revisions on a build are different from revisions on a logo

Branding 7.3 covered handling revision requests. A website adds something a logo does not: rounds of layout changes, and content changes after launch are a separate thing entirely.

Be explicit:

"Two rounds of changes are included before launch. After launch, small content changes are part of the monthly plan, or charged at [rate]."

That sentence does two jobs at once — it bounds the build, and it introduces the retainer as a natural part of the arrangement rather than a sales call later.

Introduce the retainer now

From Module 7.5: raise it before the site is finished, not after.

The quote is where it belongs. One line in the same document:

"Build: ₦X. Ongoing care: ₦Y a month, covering updates, backups, monthly checks that the contact form is still delivering, and renewal reminders. Optional, and I'll show you how to do it yourself if you'd rather."

A client who sees that on the quote treats it as part of how websites work. A client who hears it eight weeks later hears a salesperson.

When they ask for something extra

They will, and it is not a problem. Say yes — to a quote.

"Yes, we can do online booking. It's not in the four pages we agreed, so let me price it separately — I'll send you a figure tomorrow. Do you want it before launch, or as a second phase?"

Four things that does: agrees rather than refusing, names it as outside without accusation, gives a next step, and offers to defer, which frequently turns out to be what they wanted anyway.

The version to avoid is "sure, no problem" — said once, it is generous. Said four times, it is the restaurant.

Common mistakes

The short version

• Scope creep is drift, not villainy. Clients cannot see a line you never drew.
• Decide the site before you price it: CMS or static, catalogue or shop, which booking level. Each changes the price by a multiple.
• Your Module 3 page list is the scope. Write it as included and not-included.
• Name what they are most likely to ask for — payments, booking, a blog — so later requests are normal.
• Hosting and domain are theirs, quoted at the renewal price.
• The content deadline needs a consequence, or their delay becomes your reputation.
• Bound the rounds before launch, and say what happens to changes after it.
• Put the retainer on the quote, not in a conversation eight weeks later.
• To a new request: yes — to a quote. Agree, name it as extra, give a next step, offer to defer.

Try it yourself

Produce the actual quote you would send your chosen business. One page, written for them to read.

It must contain:

1. The three decisions, stated as facts about their business — not as options. "You update your prices weekly, so this is a CMS build."
2. The included list, taken directly from your Module 3 page list
3. The not-included list, naming at least three things they are likely to ask for
4. Hosting and domain as their cost, at the renewal price, stated as annual
5. A content deadline and one sentence on what happens if it passes
6. Rounds included before launch, and what happens to changes after
7. The build fee, and the monthly fee as an optional line

Then do the part that decides whether any of it works: read the whole thing aloud, to a person. Not to yourself.

Watch for the place where you start explaining or apologising. That is the clause you do not yet believe in, and it is the one that will collapse first in a real conversation. Rewrite it until you can read it straight through in a level voice.

From Branding 7.4: say the price, then stop talking. This is the same lesson, arriving for the last time, about a bigger number.

You'll know you've got it when a client asks for something extra and your first instinct is "yes, let me price that" rather than "sure, no problem" — and neither of you finds the conversation awkward.