What this actually costs
Here are the real ranges for all seven things IG Digital Lab builds, what sits inside each one, and what moves a job from the bottom of a range to the top. The audit that produces your exact number is free.
The short answer
Most IG Digital Lab projects land between $2,500 and $15,000, priced by scope of work rather than by seats or pages. One process costs $2,500 to $6,000. Several systems connected together cost $6,000 to $15,000. Custom software built from scratch starts at $15,000. Support after launch runs $300 to $1,500 a month.
| Service | Typical range | What that buys |
|---|---|---|
| Custom software | $2,500–6,000 $6,000–15,000 from $15,000 |
A single internal tool or integration at the low end. Several systems joined into one in the middle, including private AI over your own documents. A product built from scratch at the top. |
| Websites and web apps | $2,500–6,000 $6,000–15,000 |
A typical business site: design, build, content structure, analytics, launch. The upper band is for portals, e-commerce and web apps with logins, payments or a custom back end. |
| AI for calls and chat | $2,500–6,000 | A voice agent or website chat assistant deployed and integrated: your scripts, your data, your calendar and CRM, tested against real calls before it goes live. |
| AI workflow automation | $2,500–6,000 $6,000–15,000 |
One process end to end: phone, forms, CRM, calendar, documents on one path. The upper band adds several systems, exception handling and monitoring. |
| Servers and support | Care $300–500/mo Active $750–1,500/mo hosting from $50/mo hourly $150–200 |
Hosting, monitoring, backups, updates and incident response on Care. Active adds continuous development and DevOps. One-off work is hourly. |
| Devices and smart spaces | $2,500–6,000 $6,000–15,000 |
A small fleet of kiosks, locked-down tablets, signage or check-in screens, configured and enrolled. Larger rollouts sit in the upper band. Ongoing management runs under Care or Active. |
| SEO and AEO | launch $2,500–6,000 then $300–500/mo or $750–1,500/mo |
Technical fixes, content structure and entity work so you show up in Google and in AI answers. Monthly work keeps it moving; results are typical, not guaranteed. |
Separate product: FirstReply, our own flat-rate AI receptionist, is $500 setup plus $549/mo and is not part of the implementation pricing above.
Full descriptions of each service are on the services overview.
What changes the number
Two jobs that sound identical on a phone call can be four times apart in price. These are the things that actually move it, in plain language:
- How many systems have to talk to each other. One is quick. Five, each with its own login and its own idea of what a customer record is, is a project.
- Whether the tools you already own can do it. If your CRM has a usable API, we connect it. If the missing piece does not exist, we build it, and that is a different band.
- How messy the data is. A clean export is fast. Scanned PDFs, an inbox and a spreadsheet somebody maintains by hand are not.
- How many exceptions your team handles manually. The happy path is the cheap part. Every "except when the customer is out of state" adds work.
- Access and compliance rules. Private hosting, signed agreements and restricted data handling all add real hours.
- What already exists. Reusable work lowers the price. A half-finished build nobody can log into raises it, and usually starts with a takeover first.
- How fast you need it. A normal schedule is priced normally. Compressing it costs more, and we say so before you agree.
The three implementation bands
Every build we do is priced into one of three bands. The band is decided by scope of work, not by which features you pick from a list.
One workflow, running end to end.
- Phone, forms, CRM and calendar connected
- Or a voice agent deployed and integrated
- Or a website or web app, built and shipped
- Or an SEO and AEO launch engagement
Several systems made to work as one.
- Private RAG over your own documents
- Multiple integrations and internal tools
- A fleet of kiosks or managed devices
- Secure deploy, CI/CD and monitoring
Custom software, built from scratch.
- Bespoke software and complex RAG
- Multi-system builds over a longer schedule
- Full DevOps and security review
- Dedicated ongoing support
Not sure which band you are in? That is what the free audit is for.
What does ongoing support cost per month?
Support from IG Digital Lab is $300 to $500 a month on Care and $750 to $1,500 a month on Active. Care covers hosting, monitoring, backups, updates and incident response for what we built. Active adds continuous development: new workflows, changes and DevOps. Hosting on its own starts at $50 a month.
Care: $300 to $500 a month
For a system that is finished and needs to stay up. Uptime and error monitoring, backups, security and dependency updates, small fixes and content changes, and a named person to call when something breaks. This is where most Sacramento clients sit after launch, and it is the plan behind our local IT support work.
Active: $750 to $1,500 a month
For a system that is still growing. Everything in Care, plus a standing block of development each month: new automations, new integrations, changes as your process changes, and infrastructure work such as CI/CD, scaling and security review.
When do you bill hourly?
Hourly work is $150 to $200 an hour at IG Digital Lab, and it is for jobs that do not need a project around them: reviewing code somebody else wrote, a one-off fix, sitting in on a vendor call, training your team on a tool, or an afternoon of scoping. Anything larger belongs in a band.
What's free?
Three things cost nothing: the audit, the scoping call and the written estimate. In the audit we look at how the work moves through your business now and where people are doing what software should do. Then we tell you which band it lands in, in writing.
There is no charge and no obligation attached to any of it. If the honest answer is that you do not need a build, or that a $50 tool solves it, we say that. Free audits are useful to us because a scoped project is worth more than a guessed one. That is the whole trade.
No "contact us for pricing"
Most agencies hide the number until they have you on a call. We think that mostly wastes your time and ours. The numbers on this page are the same ones we say out loud, and they come from the same place every time: how much work the job is.
What we will not do is pretend a range is a quote. The band tells you whether we are in your budget at all, which is the question you actually have right now. The exact figure comes after the free audit, in writing, with what is in it and what is not.
If you are comparing us with someone else, useful places to look next: what we do, web design in Sacramento, IT support in Sacramento, or taking over a site somebody else built.
Frequently asked questions
The questions people ask before they book the audit.
Why don't you publish a fixed price per page?
Because a page is not the unit of work. Two five-page sites can differ by four times, depending on integrations, logins, payments and how the content is produced. IG Digital Lab prices by scope: what has to be built, connected and maintained. A typical business site lands at $2,500 to $6,000.
Do you require a retainer?
No. Support plans start after launch and are optional: Care is $300 to $500 a month, Active is $750 to $1,500. Nothing on the project side obligates you to a monthly plan. Many clients run the build themselves for a while, then add a plan when they want us watching it.
What's the smallest project you take?
About $2,500: one process automated end to end, one small internal tool, or a straightforward site. Below that, hourly work at $150 to $200 usually makes more sense for both sides, and hosting or a small managed service on its own starts at $50 a month.
Do you do payment plans?
We use milestone-based invoicing. The project is split into stages, usually scope, build and launch, and each stage is invoiced when it is delivered, so you are never paying far ahead of the work. Support plans are billed monthly. We accept invoice, ACH and card.
What's not included?
Our price covers our work, not third-party costs. Domains, phone numbers and call minutes, paid ad budgets, licensed software, premium plugins and per-seat fees for tools you keep are yours directly. Every one of them is listed in the written estimate before you agree to anything.
Get the exact number, not the range.
Book a free 30-minute audit. We look at the process, tell you which band it lands in, and send the estimate in writing.
No commitment. If you do not need a build, we will tell you that.