When an agency resells development work from a white label partner, the hardest question is not who builds it. It is what to charge the client. Price too low and you work for free, because the partner’s invoice and your own time eat the margin. Price too high and you lose the project. This guide gives you a way to work it out, using clear steps rather than a magic percentage.
Start with the margin you need
Most agencies price by adding a percentage on top of what the partner charges. That is a reasonable starting point, but it hides the real question: what does this project have to earn for your agency to be worth doing? Before you quote, decide on the margin you need after everything you spend on it, and work backwards from there.
Your costs on a resold website are more than the partner’s invoice. They also include:
- Sales time: calls, proposals and follow-ups
- Project management: briefs, feedback rounds and status updates
- Design direction or review on your side
- Client support after launch
- Payment fees, software and a share of your overheads
- A reserve for the unexpected, such as a client who changes the scope
If you only count the partner’s cost, every project looks more profitable than it is.
A worked example (illustrative numbers)
Say a partner builds a client’s website for a fixed $2,000. You also expect to spend about 10 hours of your own time on the sale, the briefing and the client conversations, and your time is worth $60 an hour to you. That is $600, so the real cost to your agency is $2,600 before overheads. If you want to keep a healthy margin on top of that, you quote well above $2,600, not $2,200. The numbers here are only an example, so use your own, but the method is the point: count your time.
The main pricing models
- Fixed price per project. The client pays one price for a defined scope. It is easy to sell and easy to compare against the partner’s fixed price. It works best when the scope is written down in detail.
- Packages. You offer a small number of clear tiers, such as a starter site, a growth site and a store. Packages make quoting fast and help clients choose without a long conversation.
- Monthly retainer. The client pays a regular fee for ongoing work: updates, fixes and small builds. This gives you predictable income and pairs well with a partner’s monthly team.
- Hourly. Simple, but it rewards slow work and makes it hard for clients to budget. Many agencies avoid it for builds and use it only for open-ended support.
Many agencies mix them: a fixed price or package for the build, then a monthly care plan for everything afterwards.
Match the model to the partner’s model
Your pricing is easiest to manage when it mirrors how your partner charges you. If you pay a fixed price per project, quote fixed prices and packages. If you pay a flat monthly fee for a team, a retainer for your clients fits naturally, because both sides are predictable. Our dedicated team is a flat monthly price, and our website projects are fixed scope and fixed price, so you can match your quotes to either. The pricing page shows both.
What to include in every quote
- A written scope: pages, features and what is not included
- The number of revision rounds
- What the client must supply, such as text and images, and when
- Hosting, domain and plugin costs, shown separately
- What happens if the scope changes
- Support after launch, and how changes are charged
Clear quotes protect your margin because they reduce the arguments that eat it.
Mistakes that quietly cost agencies money
- Copying a competitor’s price without knowing their costs
- Leaving out project management time
- Giving unlimited revisions
- Forgetting that every free fix, every extra call and every “quick change” is time
- Never reviewing a project’s real profit once it is finished
Review after every project
After each project, compare the price you charged with the real cost: the partner’s invoice and the hours you actually spent. If a type of project keeps coming out thin, change the package, raise the price or tighten the scope. Pricing is a habit of adjusting, not a one-off decision.
How to present the price to the client
Clients buy outcomes, not hours. Describe what they get, such as a site that explains the business clearly, works on phones and is easy to update, and keep the partner out of the conversation. Name your packages after what they do for the client, not how many pages they have. Show what is included in plain words, and put optional extras on a separate line so the client can choose.
Handling changes and extras
Most margin is lost after the quote, when “one small thing” becomes ten. Agree a simple change process before work starts: any request outside the written scope is noted, priced and approved before it is done. It keeps relationships friendly because nobody is surprised by an invoice.
Pricing the monthly plan on top
A care plan or retainer is where agencies build steady income. Price it by listing what it covers, such as updates, backups, security checks and a set of small changes, and then work out what that costs you to deliver, including your own time. A clear plan with a fair price is easier to sell than vague “support”, and it keeps the client with you after launch. If you use a partner for this, our white label maintenance service is built for it.
A simple pricing worksheet
- List what the project includes, page by page and feature by feature.
- Add the partner’s price for that scope.
- Add your own hours for sales, briefing, feedback and handover, at the rate you want to earn.
- Add payment fees, software and a share of overheads.
- Add a reserve for revisions and surprises.
- Compare the total with the price your client will accept, and adjust the scope, not your quality, if they do not match.
How to start
Pick your two or three most common project types, price them as clear packages using the method above, and test them on the next few proposals. For more on what drives partner costs, read our guide to white label WordPress development costs, and our comparison of white label vs in-house if you are weighing a hire.