Question 1

How much does a small business website cost in Canada?

Accepted Answer

A custom small business website in Canada typically costs between $500 and $15,000 for the one-time build, with the realistic range for most service businesses sitting between $1,500 and $5,000. At Elevate, our Starter websites are $599, Professional builds are $1,995, and Custom builds with e-commerce or memberships start at $2,995. Ongoing monthly costs (hosting, SSL, security, backups, minor updates) typically run $50 to $200 per month. The biggest cost variables are the number of pages, whether copywriting is included, the complexity of integrations like online booking or e-commerce, and whether the agency is using a template platform or building custom from scratch. Cheaper template builds ($500 to $1,500) often skip SEO foundations, accessibility, and Canadian compliance like CASL, which costs more to retrofit later than to build in correctly the first time.

Question 2

How long does it take to build a small business website?

Accepted Answer

A standard small business website takes between 3 days and 12 weeks to build, depending on scope and how quickly you provide content. Template-based sites with prepared content can launch in 3 to 10 business days. Custom 5 to 10 page sites with copywriting, SEO, and integrations typically take 2 to 4 weeks. Larger custom builds with e-commerce, multi-location dispatch, or membership features take 6 to 12 weeks. The longest single delay on most projects is waiting for the business owner to send photos, write copy, or sign off on revisions, not the actual build. At Elevate, our Starter sites launch in 3 to 5 business days and Professional sites in 7 to 10 business days because we draft your homepage in 48 hours before you commit, then handle copywriting in parallel with design.

Question 3

Is Wix or a custom website better for a small business?

Accepted Answer

For most small businesses that depend on Google traffic, a custom website outperforms Wix on speed, SEO control, and total cost of ownership over three years. Wix is a reasonable choice for hobby projects, event pages, or businesses that genuinely cannot invest more than $500 upfront. Wix Business plans run roughly $300 to $900 per year in Canada, which adds up to $900 to $2,700 over three years before app plugin costs. A custom site at Elevate is $599 to $2,995 one-time plus $69 to $199 per month, with no platform lock-in. Wix sites also cannot be exported, which means switching platforms later requires rebuilding from scratch. The biggest disadvantage of template builders is page speed, which directly impacts Google rankings in competitive Canadian markets like Toronto, Vancouver, and Calgary.

Question 4

What's the difference between a custom website and a template?

Accepted Answer

A custom website is designed and coded from scratch for your specific business, while a template is a pre-made design you customize with your content and branding. Custom websites give you full control over layout, performance, SEO, integrations, and ownership of the codebase. Templates trade flexibility for speed and lower upfront cost, but they often share code with thousands of other sites, which hurts page speed and makes truly distinctive design hard. Templates also lock you into the platform that hosts them, so you cannot export and move the site if you outgrow it. For a one-person operation that just needs to be findable, a well-chosen template can work. For any business that competes on Google rankings, sells online, or wants the website to reflect a specific brand, custom is the correct investment.

Question 5

Do I need a website if I already have social media?

Accepted Answer

Yes. A website is the only digital asset you actually own. Social media accounts are rented, and platforms can suspend, throttle, or change pricing without warning. A website gives you a Google-indexable presence so customers searching for your service can find you, a place to host long-form content that establishes authority, and direct lead capture without relying on a platform's algorithm. Search-driven leads also convert at much higher rates than social leads because a Googler is actively looking to buy, while a scroller is being interrupted. A common pattern for small businesses in Canada is to use social media for top-of-funnel awareness and brand voice, then drive traffic to a website that converts visitors into bookings, quotes, or sales. If you have to pick only one channel, the website wins for revenue.

Question 6

Why is my website not ranking on Google?

Accepted Answer

Most small business websites do not rank on Google for one of five reasons: the site is too slow on mobile (Core Web Vitals failing), there's no Google Business Profile or it's poorly optimized, the pages are not built around what people actually search (intent mismatch), there are no backlinks from other Canadian sites, or the technical SEO foundations are broken (missing schema, indexability issues, weak internal linking). For Canadian local businesses, an optimized Google Business Profile with consistent NAP (name, address, phone), real reviews, and category-correct service pages is usually the highest-leverage fix. For service businesses outside the map pack, dedicated service-area pages targeting '[service] [city]' searches do most of the heavy lifting. Most ranking problems are solvable in 3 to 6 months with the right combination of on-page SEO, content, and Google Business Profile work.

Question 7

What's included in a small business website build?

Accepted Answer

A complete small business website build should include design and layout, mobile-responsive coding, copywriting or copy editing, basic SEO setup (meta tags, sitemap, schema markup, page-speed optimization), Google Business Profile claim or rebuild for local businesses, lead capture forms with email notifications, analytics installation, SSL certificate and hosting setup, and 1 to 2 rounds of revisions before launch. At Elevate, every plan also includes Cloudflare CDN hosting, automated daily backups, security patches, and monthly minor content updates as part of the monthly maintenance fee. Items commonly excluded from base pricing across the industry are professional photography ($200 to $2,000 add-on), advanced e-commerce setup beyond basic Shopify or Stripe, custom illustrations, video production, paid advertising management, and ongoing SEO retainer work. Always ask for a written scope of work that lists exactly what's included before you pay a deposit.

Question 8

Should I redesign my website or build a new one from scratch?

Accepted Answer

Redesign your existing site when the current platform is healthy, the URL structure is working, and the issues are mostly visual or content-related. Build from scratch when the platform is outdated (old WordPress with broken plugins, abandoned site builder), the site is unrecoverably slow, the URL structure damages SEO, or the brand has fundamentally changed direction. A redesign typically costs 40 to 70 percent of a new build and preserves your existing Google rankings, backlinks, and analytics history. A rebuild lets you start clean on a modern stack but requires careful URL migration and 301 redirects to avoid losing rankings during the transition. For most small businesses, the deciding factor is the underlying platform: if it's WordPress or Squarespace, redesign is usually the right call. If it's an abandoned builder or hand-coded HTML from 2014, rebuild.

Question 9

Do I need to pay monthly for hosting and maintenance?

Accepted Answer

Yes for most setups, but the amount varies widely. Bare-bones hosting on shared servers runs $5 to $20 per month and covers only server space and SSL. Managed small business hosting with backups, security, and minor content updates runs $50 to $200 per month and is what most Canadian web designers include with a build. Self-hosted WordPress on a VPS gives more control but typically costs $30 to $60 per month for hosting plus $200 to $500 per year in plugin licenses, plus your time managing it. At Elevate, our monthly plans are $69 to $199 and cover Cloudflare CDN hosting, SSL renewal, daily backups, security patches, uptime monitoring, priority support, and 30 minutes to 2 hours of monthly minor content updates. You can cancel anytime with 30 days notice and keep all your files.

Question 10

What should I look for when hiring a web designer in Canada?

Accepted Answer

Look for five things: a portfolio of real launched sites in your industry or adjacent industries, third-party reviews on Google or Clutch (not just testimonials on their own site), clear written pricing posted on the website (agencies that won't quote without a sales call usually overcharge), an explicit scope of work including what's not included, and ownership terms that give you the full codebase and domain at the end of the project. Avoid designers who lock you into proprietary platforms you cannot export, charge for routine post-launch fixes, or require multi-year contracts. For Canadian businesses, also verify the designer understands CASL compliance for email capture, AODA accessibility requirements in Ontario, and PIPEDA privacy law. A 15-minute call should be enough to assess whether the designer asks substantive questions about your business or just talks about their process.

Question 11

Do you build websites outside of Toronto?

Accepted Answer

Yes. Elevate builds custom websites for small businesses across Canada and the United States. Our home base is Toronto, Ontario, and we have dedicated service-area pages for major Canadian metros including Vancouver, Calgary, Edmonton, Ottawa, Mississauga, Vaughan, Markham, Brampton, Oakville, and Winnipeg, plus tier-2 cities across Ontario, BC, Alberta, Manitoba, Quebec, and the Maritimes. Working remotely is the default. We use Loom video updates, Figma reviews, and scheduled calls in your timezone so the process is the same whether you're across town or across the country. For US clients, we adjust schema and copy to target US-specific search behavior and handle currency display, sales tax fields, and US payment processors. Pricing is the same regardless of location: no Toronto-only premium and no remote-market markup.

Question 12

What's the difference between web design and SEO?

Accepted Answer

Web design is the one-time work of building the site (layout, code, content, integrations). SEO is the ongoing work of getting that site to rank on Google over time (content creation, technical optimization, backlink earning, Google Business Profile management, rank tracking). Every well-built website includes foundational on-page SEO at launch (meta tags, schema, sitemap, page speed, mobile optimization) because those are part of how the site is coded. But foundational SEO is not the same as ongoing rankings work. To actually move from page 3 to page 1 of Google in a competitive Canadian market, you need monthly content, ongoing technical SEO, and steady review collection over 3 to 6 months minimum. At Elevate, web design and SEO are separate line items on purpose: building one well doesn't replace the other.

Web Design Questions, Answered Straight.

Have a question that isn't here?

Ready to start?