Web design for financial services, bought on evidence

Agencies with a verified published price

How to scope a regulated site build

1. Start with the review path, not the homepage. Decide who signs off copy, how changes are recorded, and how fast an update can ship. A design that cannot survive compliance review becomes a site nobody updates, which is the most expensive outcome available.
2. Treat disclosures as design elements. Disclaimers, risk statements and material connections need to be readable where the claim is made. The FTC guidance on advertising and marketing is explicit that disclosures must be clear and conspicuous, not tucked into a footer nobody reads.
3. Specify accessibility up front. The Department of Justice guidance on web accessibility explains that businesses open to the public are expected to make their sites usable by people with disabilities. Retrofitting that after launch costs more than building it in.
4. Test on real devices and real connections. Core Web Vitals cover loading, interaction and layout stability. Ask for measured results on a mid-range phone rather than a desktop score, because that is where most first visits actually happen.

What moves the price

Three things drive the quote. Page count and content complexity come first: a five-page advisory site is a different job from a lender with product pages, calculators and state-by-state disclosure variants. Integration comes second, because a form that hands a lead to a CRM, a portal login, or a calculator producing a personalised figure each carries security and testing work that a static page does not. Governance comes third, meaning roles, approval workflow and version history, and it is the line item most often missing from cheap quotes.

What should not move the price is a redesign for its own sake. If the existing site converts and is merely dated, the higher-return project is often fixing speed, forms, disclosures and accessibility on the current template. An agency that starts by asking what your enquiry rate is, rather than what look you want, is thinking about the same thing you are paying for.

Evidence a regulated buyer should demand

Ask for two live financial services sites the agency built, then inspect them yourself. Look at whether disclosures appear next to the claims they qualify, whether forms explain what happens to the data submitted, whether pages load quickly on a phone, and whether headings and contrast make the site usable with a screen reader or at high zoom. These are all checkable in minutes and no proposal deck can fake them.

Then ask the process questions. Who wrote the compliance-facing copy on those projects, the agency or the client? How long did a routine content change take after launch? What content management system was used, and does the client control it? A design partner that hands over a site your marketing team can update without a support ticket is worth materially more than one that does not, and the difference rarely shows up in the visual comparison.

Questions people actually ask

Do we need an agency that specialises in financial services?

You need one that has shipped regulated work before. The specialism that matters is not the sector logo, it is experience with review workflows, disclosure placement, accessibility and data handling. A generalist who can show those things on live sites is a reasonable choice; one who treats compliance as your problem is not.

How long does a financial services website take?

Content approval usually sets the schedule rather than design or build. Firms that name their reviewers early and write to a template tend to launch far faster than those that begin drafting after the design is signed off. Ask any agency for a realistic timeline that includes review rounds.

Should the site be rebuilt or improved?

Improve first when the current site converts and its problems are speed, forms, disclosures or accessibility. Rebuild when the structure blocks the pages you need or the platform prevents your team from publishing. A good agency will tell you which case you are in before quoting the larger project.

Who should own the site after launch?

You should, including the domain, the hosting account, the analytics property and the content. Ask about this explicitly. A site rented from an agency is a compliance and continuity risk in a regulated business, whatever the monthly fee looks like.

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