Question
How long does a website take?
About four weeks from the first call to live for most business sites, and five where a Welsh version is translated. Most of that time is waiting for photographs and answers that only you can provide; the build itself takes days, and what takes months is Google after launch, not the site.
Answered by Daniel Stoychev, Webso Digital · 4 September 2026
Where the four weeks go
Week one is the audit, the call and the quote. We read what you have and who is above you, talk for forty minutes, and send a fixed price. Weeks one and two are yours: the checklist asks twenty questions in your own words and lists the photographs to take on a phone. Every site that runs late runs late here, because the owner is busy running the business, and there is no way around it except a short checklist and a nudge.
Weeks two and three are the build, on a private link you can send to anyone. Pages, forms, the Google profile matched, every screen tested on a phone. Changes go back and forth until it is right. Week three, if the site is bilingual, is the translation: the signed-off English goes to the translator, the Welsh comes back within days, a second reader checks the pages that matter, and the Welsh site is built beside the English one.
Week four is launch: the domain pointed, the forms tested to your phone, Search Console and Analytics set up with consent, both languages live on the same morning. A redesign takes the same four weeks with one extra step, the list of old addresses and the redirects, done before launch so nothing that ranked is lost.
What takes longer, and why it is not the site
Google. A new site is found for your own name within days to weeks, and for your town once the Google profile agrees with it. The searches for the work itself, the trade with the town, the cottages with the place, take three to six months to settle and longer in Cardiff or Swansea, because the businesses on page one have been there for years and a new page needs reviews, mentions and more pages beside it before it moves. That is the monthly work, and it starts the day the site goes live.
How to make it faster
- Answer the checklist in one sitting; imperfect answers on day two beat perfect ones on day twelve.
- Take the photographs on the first dry morning: the shopfront from the pavement, the workshop, the team, the last three jobs.
- Decide the Welsh question on the first call, so the translator is booked in week one.
- Have the domain login and the Google account to hand at the start, not at launch.
Related questions
- Can it be done in a week?
- A small site with photos and answers ready on day one, yes, and we have done it. A site whose owner has not decided what they sell cannot be done in a month.
- Does an online shop take longer?
- Usually two to three weeks more, for the products, the delivery rules, the checkout and the test orders. The product photographs are the slow part, again yours to take.