A free website with a monthly plan — where's the catch?

How it works

The studio pays the build cost up front and earns it back over the length of the relationship. That is the whole model. It is the same shape as a phone on contract or a coffee machine that comes with the beans.

It works because most of the cost of a website is the first month and most of the value is the following thirty-six. Charging for it in the shape the value arrives makes the maths easier for both sides.

The real catches, plainly

• Over three or four years you generally pay more than a one-off build would have cost. That is the price of not paying it all in month one and of having someone on the hook afterwards.
• There is usually a minimum term. Ours is three months. Anything much longer than that starts to be about locking you in rather than covering the build.
• You often licence the site rather than own it outright while on a plan. What matters is what happens when you leave — see below.
• If the ongoing work is vague, you are renting a website at a bad rate.

The question that matters most: what happens when you leave

This is where these deals are won or lost, and it is the one thing to settle before signing rather than after.

Get the exit in writing, before you start: what you keep, what it costs to buy the site outright, and how much notice you need to give. A studio that will not put a number on that today will not be more generous on the day you want to leave.

Your domain should be yours from day one, registered in your name, not the studio's. Your content and your customer data should be yours without negotiation. If any of those three are unclear, that is the catch, and it is a serious one.

Who it is genuinely wrong for

If you have the cash, want one artefact and no relationship, and genuinely will not need changes — buy a one-off build. You will spend less and you will be happier.

It is also wrong if your business is seasonal enough that you would want to switch it off for four months a year. Monthly plans do not pause well.

Five questions to ask any monthly plan

• What specifically happens in a month where I request nothing?
• What does it cost to buy the site outright, as a number, today?
• Is the domain registered in my name?
• What is the minimum term, and what is the notice period after it?
• Who do I contact when it breaks at 6pm on a Friday, and what have they promised about answering?

Any studio worth paying will answer all five in a sentence each. Ours are in the plan and payment terms, in writing, before you pay.