Knowledge · Custom Web Design
Web Design for Agencies Hiring White-Label: Process + Pricing
Marketing agencies and consultancies that need website builds for their clients increasingly outsource the build to white-label partners. The math works when the agency owns the relationship and the client doesn’t care who’s behind the build. Here’s what white-label web design with us looks like — pricing, process, and the cases where you should NOT white-label.
№ 01Who hires white-label web design
Two main categories: marketing agencies that don’t have an in-house dev team (most $1M-$5M agencies don’t), and consultancies whose primary offering is strategy but who occasionally need to deliver a website as part of the engagement.
In both cases, the client wants ‘one throat to choke’ and the agency wants to keep the relationship without building a development capability. We become the dev team that’s invisible to the client.
№ 02How white-label engagements work
Operationally: you brief us, we build under your project management (ClickUp, Asana, Basecamp, whatever you use). Communication runs through your team to your client. We don’t have access to the client. Deliverables ship branded as your agency. Your team gets the credit; we get the wholesale margin.
What we need from you: brand brief, content (or a clear copy scope), design direction (or a ‘here’s what they like’ mood board), and a single point of contact for revisions. The cleaner your brief, the faster we ship.
№ 03White-label pricing
15% wholesale discount on Starter and Standard tiers. Authority tier and above retain full pricing (the margin gets thin at scale). Pricing:
- Starter ($3,000 direct) = $2,550 white-label
- Standard ($5,000 direct) = $4,250 white-label
- Authority ($8,000 direct) = $8,000 (no discount; margin too thin)
Volume discount kicks in at 4+ concurrent projects: an additional 10% off Standard tier. Available with a signed master services agreement.
№ 04Where white-label breaks
White-label works when the client doesn’t care about the build process. It breaks when:
- The client expects in-person strategy sessions. Hard to do without revealing the white-label structure.
- The project exceeds $40K. At that size, the client typically expects direct dev-team access. Hire a contractor instead.
- The client has unusual technical requirements. Custom apps, headless setups, complex integrations — these need direct client-developer conversations, not Telephone-Game-via-the-agency.
- The relationship goes 18+ months. Eventually the client wants to know who’s building.
№ 05The MSA + onboarding process
For agencies running 2+ projects per year with us, we sign a Master Services Agreement covering NDA, IP transfer, project-level SOWs, and payment terms. Setup is 1 week. After that, individual projects are scoped via SOW and started in 3-5 business days.
Most agency partners settle into a 1-2 builds per quarter cadence. Some run more — the highest-volume agency partner is currently shipping 4 builds per quarter through us. We can scale to 6-8 concurrent agency partners before adding capacity.
⚠What to avoid
- Marketing ‘web design’ as part of your agency offering when you don’t have an in-house dev team and don’t have a white-label partner. You’re selling something you can’t deliver consistently.
- Marking up the build 200-300%. Clients sense it. Especially with us — we publish our pricing, and tech-savvy buyers compare. Standard agency markup is 30-50% on top of wholesale.
- Trying to learn web development to bring it in-house mid-engagement. Your client deserves a finished site, not your learning curve. Hire white-label, ship the project, then make the in-house decision.
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