New website for a business: redesign or start over?
A new website for a business costs DKK 12,000–30,000 from a freelancer and DKK 35,000–90,000 from a web agency, excluding VAT, while a website builder has no build fee at all. If your current website is hard to edit, slow on a phone or full of old information, it’s time. The most important part of the switch is keeping the addresses Google knows, so you don’t lose the visitors you already have.
When is it time for a new website?
It’s time when the website keeps customers away instead of bringing them in. The usual signs are:
- It’s hard to read and use on a phone.
- You can’t change an opening time or a price yourself, but have to call someone. More in can’t update my website myself.
- It loads slowly, or the browser says “Not secure” next to the address.
- The texts describe services, prices or staff you no longer have.
- You pay every year for a service agreement or hosting without knowing what it covers.
- The design looks older than your business, and you wince a little when you give out the address.
Should you redesign or start over?
Redesign if the content works and customers find what they’re looking for. Start over if you sell something else now, have a new audience, or the system behind the site can’t be changed without a developer.
| Redesign | Start over | |
|---|---|---|
| What changes | The look: colours, fonts and layout. Texts and pages stay. | Everything: pages, texts, structure and often the platform. |
| Fits when | The content is still right but looks dated. | Services, prices or audience have changed. |
| Risk on Google | Low, when the page addresses stay the same. | Higher. Needs a plan for the old addresses. |
| Your work | Less: the texts are reused. | More: new texts and often new photos. |
| On Striive | Move your website and choose “as close as possible”. | Move your website and choose “a new design”, or let AI build from your answers. |
Many end up somewhere in between: the same content, tidied up and shortened, in a new design.
How do you keep your place on Google when you switch websites?
You keep it by giving the important pages the same address on the new website, such as yourbusiness.dk/prices. Google knows your pages by their address. When the address no longer exists, visitors land on an error page, and the page loses its ranking over time.
- Write down every address on the old website. The sitemap, often yourbusiness.dk/sitemap.xml, lists them.
- Find the pages that get clicks from Google. Google Search Console shows it for free.
- Give those pages exactly the same address on the new website.
- If an address has to change, point the old one to the new one with a permanent redirect (301).
- Keep the same domain. A new domain starts from scratch on Google.
- Submit the new sitemap in Search Console once the new website is live.
In Striive, a blog post is redirected automatically when you change its address. Redirects you set up yourself for other pages are part of the planned SEO tools, so keep the same page addresses where you can when you move to Striive. The rest of the work with Google is in get found on Google.
How do you switch to a new website, step by step?
Build the new one next to the old one, and switch only when everything is checked:
- Back up the old website, and gather your logins: domain, hosting and website.
- Make the list of addresses from the section above.
- Build the new website while the old one is still online.
- Go through texts, prices, opening hours and the contact form, and try it on your own phone.
- Point the domain to the new website. From that moment, visitors see the new one.
- Check the important addresses one by one, and submit the sitemap in Search Console.
- Cancel the old hosting and service agreement once the new website has run for a while without errors.
What does a new website cost?
A new five-page website costs DKK 16,000–46,000 in the first year with a freelancer and DKK 44,000–124,000 with an agency, running costs included. On Striive it’s DKK 1,500–2,500 in the first year, because there’s no build fee. More figures in website prices.
| Freelancer | Web agency | Striive (you build it) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Build | DKK 12,000–30,000 | DKK 35,000–90,000 | No build fee |
| Running per year, from year 2 | DKK 4,500–15,500 | DKK 9,000–34,000 | DKK 2,000–3,000 |
| First year in total | DKK 16,000–46,000 | DKK 44,000–124,000 | DKK 1,500–2,500 |
| Three years in total | DKK 26,000–77,000 | DKK 62,000–192,000 | DKK 5,500–7,500 |
All amounts exclude VAT and come from our website cost calculator, built on Danish hourly rates: about DKK 500–900 an hour for freelancers and DKK 900–1,400 for agencies. Running costs are hosting, a domain, licences and a service agreement. Striive is DKK 99 a month incl. VAT for the first 4 months, then DKK 249 a month incl. VAT, plus your domain.
Can you get a new website without starting from a blank page?
Yes. With move your website, you give Striive the address of your current website, and Striive rebuilds the pages so you can edit them in the visual editor. It works whether the old one was made in WordPress, Wix or coded by hand, and you don’t need a login to it.
- Comes along: your texts page by page, menu and footer, photos, colours and fonts, prices, services, opening hours and contact details.
- Stays behind: blog posts, a web shop, logins and booking systems, and anything that runs on the old server.
- Legal pages are made new for your Striive website.
Striive keeps no copy of the old website afterwards, so make your own backup before you switch.
Frequently asked questions
With a freelancer or an agency it usually takes weeks from agreement to launch, because texts, photos and changes go back and forth. If you build it yourself, it’s hours: 8–16 for five pages.
Not if you keep the domain and the same page addresses. The risk is in addresses that disappear without a redirect, and in pages that get deleted.
Yes, and you should. The domain is yours wherever the website lives. In Striive, you connect it with two DNS records at your domain provider. See custom domain.
With a freelancer or an agency it depends on how much needs redoing, so ask for a fixed quote. To see the figures for a completely new website, try our website cost calculator.
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