The verdict in three sentences
A Douglas dental practice should redesign its website when the emergency, opening hours and fee pages no longer match what reception tells patients on the phone. A fixed-grid redesign with Kolonell costs £2,300 (Starter), £3,900 (Growth) or £6,900 (Premium) and is delivered in 3 to 4 weeks once content is ready, while online booking and practice software links are quoted separately. On the island, the real danger is a badly planned cutover: a domain switch late on a Friday that leaves a patient with toothache unable to find the out-of-hours number.
What signals that the redesign is due?
On the Isle of Man, patients search the practice name or an emergency query, tap the first result and call: whatever page Google kept becomes your front desk.
| Signal on the current site | Why it matters in Douglas | Priority |
|---|---|---|
| Out-of-hours arrangement only in a PDF or an image | Unreadable on a phone, invisible to search engines | High |
| Opening hours differ from the Google Business Profile | Patients arrive at a closed door on Bank Holidays or during TT road closures | High |
| Contact form asks for date of birth or medical history | Health data collected through an open form | High |
| Hygiene and recall pages unchanged for years | Your preventive offer, the core of the practice, is buried | Medium |
| Expired SSL certificate or browser warnings | Patients abandon before they reach the phone number | High |
| Only the original developer can edit the site | Every holiday closure notice becomes a paid ticket | Medium |
Beyond three ticked lines, patching often costs more than a redesign.
What does a redesign cost in Douglas in 2026?
The ranges below are 2026 ballparks drawn from typical agency quotes and public rate pages, not a survey. They assume a site of 10 to 25 pages.
| Option | 2026 ballpark | Typical timeline | Points to check |
|---|---|---|---|
| Freelance designer, island or UK mainland | £1,500 to £5,000 | 4 to 10 weeks | Redirect map and post-launch checks often extra |
| Isle of Man agency | £5,000 to £14,000 | 8 to 14 weeks | Face-to-face meetings, local network |
| North West England agency | £6,000 to £18,000 | 8 to 16 weeks | Travel or video meetings, UK-centric assumptions |
| Kolonell Starter | £2,300 | 3 to 4 weeks | Essential pages, redirects, 3 months of support |
| Kolonell Growth | £3,900 | 3 to 4 weeks | Fuller treatment and fees section, news, analytics |
| Kolonell Premium | £6,900 | 3 to 4 weeks | Advanced design; the multilingual tier, languages set in the quote |
| Booking, patient portal, recall reminders, software links | On quote | Varies | Embedded or linked, never rebuilt |
Every Kolonell tier includes a project manager reachable in your time zone, native English copywriting and 3 months of support. The scope of each tier is detailed on the international offer page.
How long does it take, phase by phase?
The longest part is gathering content and planning how the cutover is announced.
| Phase | Duration | Owner | Cutover safeguard |
|---|---|---|---|
| URL inventory and audit | 2 to 3 days | Kolonell with the practice manager | Export of every indexed page and every PDF |
| Content: treatments, fees, emergency wording | 1 to 3 weeks, before the build clock starts | Practice | Out-of-hours text approved by the principal dentist |
| Design and build | 2 to 3 weeks | Kolonell | Staging site, not visible to Google |
| Compliance review of marketing content | 2 to 4 days | Practice principal | Specialist titles, claims, testimonials, photos |
| DNS, redirects and go-live | 1 planned morning | Kolonell with your registrar or IT provider | TTL lowered 48 hours ahead, email records copied |
| Post-launch monitoring | 2 weeks | Kolonell | Search Console, Google Business Profile, form tests |
What are the risks, and how do you reduce them?
- Emergency information disappearing. During cutover week, the homepage carries a visible banner with the out-of-hours arrangement, the same wording appears on the Google Business Profile, and the voicemail message is checked against it.
- Email outage. Mail records on the domain are copied before any nameserver change, then tested on the morning of go-live.
- Downtime. The old site stays live until the new one is approved; DNS time to live is reduced to around five minutes two days earlier, so a rollback takes minutes, not a day.
- Lost search visibility. Every ranking treatment and fee page gets a 301 redirect to its new address and the sitemap is submitted in Search Console.
- Compliance. Dentists on the island are registered with the General Dental Council, whose guidance on ethical advertising applies: no superlatives, specialist titles only where the dentist is on a specialist list, testimonials and before-and-after photos only where permitted and with consent. The island has its own data protection legislation and Information Commissioner; forms collect name, contact and a short reason for visit only, and tracking tags on treatment pages are reviewed with your privacy adviser. This is not legal advice.
- Timing. Go-live on a Tuesday or Wednesday morning, outside the busiest recall weeks and away from Bank Holidays.
What stays on quote, and what should you ask a provider?
Online booking, a patient portal, recall reminders and links with practice management software stay on quote. They are embedded or linked from the tool you already use, never rebuilt inside a fixed-grid site. Before signing with anyone, ask:
- Who writes the 301 redirect map, and is it in the price?
- Who changes the DNS, and on which day and hour?
- How is the out-of-hours information kept visible during the switch?
- Who owns the domain, hosting and content after delivery?
- What does support cost after the included period? With Kolonell, maintenance after the 3 included months is on quote.
Need a professional website?
Kolonell builds websites that attract clients, optimized for the Sénégalese market. Free quote in 2 minutes.
When is a local agency the better choice?
If you want meetings in the practice, photography on site in Douglas or a supplier that already runs your IT and phones, an island agency is worth its higher fee. A remote studio fits when content is ready and the budget is fixed.
Mini case study
Illustrative example, fictional practice: Fiona runs Cronkbourne Preventive Dental, a hygiene-led practice in Douglas.
- Kolonell Growth: £3,900
- Local photographer, third-party cost: £450
- Fiona's own time on content, 12 hours valued at £25 per hour (assumption): £300
- Total: £4,650
- Midpoint of a typical island agency quote: £9,500, so the gap is £4,850, before any booking integration, which stays on quote in both cases.
FAQ
How long will the site be offline during the switch?
With a lowered TTL and the old site kept live, visible downtime is usually under 30 minutes.
Can we keep our current domain and email?
Yes. The domain stays yours, and email records are copied before go-live so the practice inbox keeps working on day 1.
Do we lose our Google position on fee pages?
Not if each of the old URLs, often 15 to 40 on a practice site, has a 301 redirect and Search Console is monitored for 2 weeks.
Can online booking be added later?
Yes. The booking tool is embedded or linked on quote, at launch or months later, without rebuilding the £3,900 Growth site.
Which tier suits a single-site practice?
Most single-site practices start with Starter at £2,300 or Growth at £3,900; Premium at £6,900 suits practices needing advanced design or several languages.
Let's scope your project. Tell us your page count, emergency arrangements and preferred go-live week, and we will return a fixed price within the £2,300 to £6,900 grid. See the international offer or request a free quote: detailed reply within 48 hours.
Mohamed Bah
Fondateur, Kolonell
Passionate about digital and entrepreneurship in Africa, Mohamed has been helping Sénégalese businesses with their digital transformation since 2020. Founder of Kolonell, he believes every SME deserves a professional and accessible online présence.
