A marketing manager at a mid-size B2B company posted this on Reddit a couple of months ago:
“We got billed last month for changing a CTA from ‘Book a demo’ to ‘Get a demo.’ I am not kidding on this.” In the same thread they laid out the bigger problem: “A one line copy change is a ticket, a quote, and anywhere from two days to two weeks.”
Obviously, I run a web agency, so you’d probably expect me to immediately tell you to fire your company, come work with us, and it’ll be all “roses and butterflies.”
And that is true! Tune in next time for more exhilarating content from yours truly!
…..In a drastic turn of events, I’m still here and will not actually recommend that. In my experience a lot of the people stuck in this spot have an agency that’s just the wrong fit for how they want to work, and that has a very different fix than a bad agency does.
When every website change requires you to jump through hoops you think aren’t right, I wasn you to start off with three questions before you trash your agency or plan a rebuild:
- How was your website built?
- What role is the agency playing for you?
- What type of contract are you on?
Most of the frustration with a web agency comes from a mismatch between the plan you’re on and what you’re asking that plan to do.
How was my website built?
You hear of a lot of popular content management systems (WordPress, Webflow, Squarespace, Wix, etc…..). There are also a number of other options that are not as well-known (Craft, Statamic, etc.). Lastly, some websites were built using completely proprietary methods and don’t have an easy way to have non-technical folks edit the website.
When going through a build/re-build process, it is absolutely essential to know how the foundation of your website will be built. Most of the issues that I see come up when I am talking to potential clients about how hard their website is to edit, fall under two buckets:
- They didn’t really know the type of website they were getting
- Their website has gotten bloated with a lot of features and has become unstable
If you were promised an editable website, and you can’t upload a blog post or edit page content, ask the simple question of “why.”
If you were promised an editable website, and you can’t upload a blog post or edit page content, ask the simple question of “why.”
What role is your web agency playing for you?
In general, web agencies fall on two sides of a continuum, with some gray area in between.
On one side you have strategic partner agencies. They typically don’t do as much of the in-the-weeds work (they don’t have formal ticketing systems set up, because they normally work on new projects for you on a regular basis). You’re looking to them for strategy, structure and how to do things, and they tend to be expensive because they’re also helping you decide what risks to take and what outcomes those risks need to achieve.
On the other side you have execution-focused agencies. They’re intensely focused on getting work done, and they typically don’t sit in the strategy seat. These folks typically have organized ticketing systems because they deal with a large number of clients at any given time (and they need ways to keep it organized).
Neither one of these is wrong. The trouble starts when you hired one kind and expect the other, like paying execution rates and wondering why nobody’s bringing you ideas, or paying for strategy and getting frustrated that a headline swap takes a week.
What type of website contract are you on?
This is the second question, and it explains a lot of billing surprises. There are a few standard ways agencies contract website work:
| Contract type | What you’re paying for | Where it tends to break |
|---|---|---|
| Pure hourly | Work is done ad hoc. If you want something done, you’re charged. | Every change (however small) is a line on the invoice. You carry no monthly risk, but nothing is set aside for you either. |
| Maintenance plan (typically under $1,000/mo) | Either a small amount of development hours or a limited number of tweaks to your website. | For active marketers, they could run out easily, because they’re relatively small buckets. |
| “Legit retainer” (typically $1,500 a month and up) | A bucket of hours set aside for your work. | You can move on ideas much faster because the agency has allotted those hours to you. It costs more, and it only pays off if you use it. |
So that “Book a demo” to “Get a demo” invoice? On a pure hourly contract, that work is billed because that’s the arrangement that has been setup. It feels ridiculous because the change is tiny, and I’d be annoyed too. What it tells you is that the contract and the way you want to work don’t match.
How do you know if your agency plan doesn’t match what you’re asking for?
Put your two answers side by side: what type of plan are you on, and what are you asking them to do?
I see a lot of folks say they aren’t getting enough out of their agency when the agency was built for simple maintenance and bug fixes, and the client is asking it to create new functionality. A maintenance plan with a few hours a month will very rarely exceed expectation when you ask them to build out a whole new feature on your website. A larger agency with a larger retainer will feel like the wrong fit when you ask them to just swap some text, because their team is setup (in general) to do larger projects on a consistent basis.
If your answers line up (and you’re still unhappy), that’s useful information too. It points back at the agency’s capacity (the other agency owner’s point about taking on too much work).
How do you have a level-setting conversation with your web agency?
Sometimes the fix is simply a level-setting conversation about expectations, and it’s worth having before anybody talks about switching. Bring your answers to the two questions and say them plainly: “This is the role we thought you were playing, this is the plan we’re on, and this is what we’ve been asking for.” Often that’s enough to show everybody where the gap is, and a good agency will tell you honestly whether a different plan with them fits better.
When is it time to move on from your web agency?
When your needs have changed and the agency can no longer help you in the same capacity. And…. that’s OK. It’s about finding the agency that fits what you’re looking for, and sometimes the fit that was right for years stops being right.
We had a client we worked with in depth from 2019 to 2025, we were an integral part of their team, and we made amazing strides with their marketing crew on the website. Then their needs changed. They shifted priorities for the marketing department, and having a “moving and grooving” website wasn’t as essential anymore. Nobody did anything wrong. The work they needed just changed shape.
If you’re paying for a strategic partner and you really only need to keep the lights on, move to something lighter. If you’re on a small maintenance plan and your team wants to ship new things every month, you need either a bigger bucket of hours or a site your team can run without filing a ticket.
How do you stop needing a developer for small website changes?
It’s all about how the website is built. If you’re up for a redesign, you should know how the backend of your website will function when it launches. I see so many clients get burned by not fully understanding how the editing experience will be like before signing a contract. The same Reddit manager put it better than I could:
“I want my team (none of them code) to be able to ship copy and new sections themselves, on brand, without the ability to nuke the live site.”
They also said they were “trying to avoid trading one bottleneck for a worse one,” which is exactly what happens if you switch agencies and keep the same kind of site.
On the sites we build, we put our focus on a block library with every building block laid out, named and described, plus locked-in styles on the small pieces. All your headers (H1 through H6) have an exact font family, size and styling. Paragraphs have stock styling, so a paragraph looks the same wherever you put it. Font sizes have names (small, large, extra large) that you pick from a drop-down, so nobody is typing specific pixel values. And buttons come in three pre-designed styles: solid, outline, or plain text. The person building a page doesn’t have to think about any of that, and the easier it is, the easier it’s going to be for people to maintain their website long term.
Changing “Book a demo” to “Get a demo” on a site like that is something your marketing crew can do on a Tuesday afternoon: open the page, edit the words, hit save. I talk a lot more about how to let a marketing team edit the site without breaking it, and on who should hold the keys once your team can edit in who should be able to edit your company website.
Where to start this week
Answer the two questions from earlier: (a) What role is your agency playing, and (b) what type of contract are you on? Then look at the previous three months of requests you sent in and ask whether that plan was ever built for them. If it wasn’t, you’ve got a level-setting conversation to have, and you’ll walk into it knowing what you’re asking for.
If you’ve done that and you want a second opinion on whether it’s the plan, the agency or the site itself, book a call with Classic City. We’ll talk through which one it is.
FAQ
Is it normal for a web agency to charge for small text changes?
On an hourly contract, yes. That’s how the contract works: if you want work done, they charge you for it. Some agencies wouldn’t bill for a one-word change, but if your contract is hourly, you shouldn’t be surprised when yours does.
How much does a website maintenance plan cost?
Maintenance-oriented plans typically run somewhere around $250 to $700 a month and cover either a small amount of development hours or a limited number of tweaks. A “legit retainer,” a bucket of hours set aside for your work, tends to start around $1,500 a month.
Should I switch web agencies if every change takes two weeks?
Maybe, but check the fit first. If you’re on a small maintenance plan and asking for new functionality, a new agency on the same kind of plan will feel just as slow. Have a level-setting conversation, and if your needs have outgrown what they’re built for, it’s OK to move on.
What’s the difference between a website retainer and hourly billing?
Hourly means you pay for work as it happens, with no month-to-month commitment. A retainer means the agency sets aside a bucket of hours for you every month, so you can move on ideas faster.
Can my marketing team edit our WordPress site without a developer?
Yes, if the site is built for it. That means a library of pre-built blocks and locked-in styles for headers, paragraphs, font sizes and buttons, so the person editing picks from options that already match the brand.
