Should I put my prices on my website?
The short answer
Almost always yes. Hiding prices does not create curiosity, it removes you from the comparison — someone weighing three options does not message for a range, they close the tab. Publish a starting figure or a band with the variables named. The exception is genuinely bespoke work where any number would mislead, and even then a typical project range beats silence.
On this page
What actually happens when prices are hidden
The reasoning is familiar and reasonable-sounding: if they see the price before the value, they will judge on price alone. Get them talking first.
What happens instead is that they never talk. Somebody comparing three businesses at 9pm has three tabs open. Two published a starting figure. One says "contact us for a quote".
They do not message. They compare the two that answered, and the third is not in the decision at all. You have not created intrigue — you have removed yourself from a shortlist and never learned it happened. That is the expensive part: the cost is entirely invisible.
The objection, taken seriously
"My prices vary too much." Most do. That is what a range with named variables is for: "Full colour from [X] — final price depends on length and thickness." Honest, non-binding, and it keeps you in the running.
"I will look expensive next to cheaper competitors." You will look expensive to people who were only ever going to buy on price, and they were not your customers. Meanwhile you look credible to everyone else, and you stop spending time quoting for people who were never going to proceed.
"I want to explain the value first." Then explain it on the same page, next to the number. A price with a reason beside it does the job you wanted the conversation to do — and it does it at 9pm when you are asleep.
"My competitors do not publish theirs." That is an argument for publishing, not against it. You become the only one who answered.
What to publish, by business type
| Business | What works |
|---|---|
| Restaurant, café | The full menu with prices, as text |
| Salon, barber | Service list with "from" prices and the variables named |
| Gym, studio | Membership tiers, contract length, joining fee |
| Trades | Callout fee, hourly rate, typical bands for common jobs |
| Professional services | A typical project range, or a clear hourly rate |
The only genuine exception is work so bespoke that any figure would mislead — and even there, "most projects fall between X and Y" beats silence, because it lets someone self-select before either of you spends an hour.
What it saves you
The underrated benefit is not more customers, it is fewer wrong ones.
Publishing prices filters out people who cannot afford you before they reach your inbox. Every enquiry you then receive is from someone who has already seen the number and is still interested. That changes the tone of every conversation you have, and it removes the awkward part.
Businesses that start publishing prices usually report fewer enquiries and more bookings. That is the trade, and it is a good one.
How to display it
- As text, not an image. A price list as a picture cannot be found by search, read by an assistant, or read aloud.
- Keep it current. A wrong price produces an argument at the point of payment, which costs the margin and the goodwill together.
- Name the variables where price depends on them, rather than hiding behind them.
- Put it where people look — its own page, linked from the main navigation. "Prices" is one of the most-clicked links on any small business site.
The objection nobody says out loud
The reasons above are the ones people give. There is a fourth that goes unsaid, and it is the most common: prices are not on the site because changing them is somebody else's job.
Once that is true, publishing prices stops being a marketing decision and becomes a liability. A price you cannot correct on the day it changes is a price that will eventually be wrong — and a wrong price on a website is worse than no price at all. The customer arrives expecting one number and hears another, and the trust you were trying to build is exactly what you spend.
So the honest sequence is the other way round from how it is usually presented. Get to where changing a price takes a minute, then publish them. On Helm that is a field you edit and press Go Live on, in both languages if you run in both. It sounds like a small thing beside the argument above about transparency. It is the thing that decides whether that argument is actionable or theoretical.