A Ferrari for the cost of a Ford????!!!!!!!

Over the past couple of weeks we've been contacted by a number of prospects that wanted a website designed and developed from scratch. Or in some cases, they were looking to have their website redesigned. So we discussed their requirements, what they were hoping to gain from the website, and looked at some sample sites that they liked.

In one case, a gentleman walked us through his competitor's site. He said he wanted a site with the same functionalities as his competitor but obviously with his company's branding. So we said that it could be done. Next question, as you can imagine, was the budget question. He said he didn't have one, but that he had visited a site that was offering to build an ecommerce website for about $500!!!!!! To make a long story short, his competitor's website was a database-driven website with, I'm sure, a management system on the backend and all the bells and whistles...in other words, a Ferrari of a website. His competitor easily made an investment on this site of at least $50,000.

As you can imagine, this prospect did not end up being a client of ours.

I guess the big question is, why is it that people out there are so unrealistic as to how much it cost to design and develop a professionally built website? Why is it that people are trying to get a Ferrari for the price of a Ford?