Custom WordPress, shipped on a calendar.
Bespoke WordPress sites, WooCommerce stores, membership and LMS platforms, custom plugin work, and headless front-ends on Next.js. The work happens at Seahawk Media, the agency the HostList team also runs. Twelve years in WordPress production, 5,000+ sites shipped, every project fixed-quote with a calendar week for kickoff. No discovery phases that bloom into invoices, no scope creep absorbed quietly, no junior engineers handed your spec while a senior signs the proposal.
Six common scopes. Most projects sit inside one.
Brand-led builds from Figma or a wireframe. Custom block patterns, ACF where it earns its keep, full performance configuration before launch. Most landing pages and content sites ship in 4 to 8 weeks.
Full e-commerce builds, payment integrations, subscription products, B2B pricing rules, shipping logic, tax automation. We ship WooCommerce stores that handle real money without panicking on launch day.
Paid member sites, course platforms, gated communities. MemberPress, Restrict Content Pro, LearnDash, Tutor LMS, or a custom build when off-the-shelf has too much friction. Recurring billing wired to Stripe or Paddle, dunning included.
Plugin development for specific business logic. Integrations with CRMs, ERPs, accounting systems, custom REST endpoints, scheduled tasks. Code is yours, hosted in your own repository, no vendor lock-in.
WordPress as a content API with a Next.js or Astro front-end. ISR or full SSG for performance, with the WP admin staying as the editor experience your team already knows. Suitable for sites where Core Web Vitals targets are tight.
Sites buckling under traffic, failing Core Web Vitals, or stuck with a slow admin. Database tuning, object cache configuration, image delivery, query optimisation, hosting plan recommendations backed by HostList data.
Five phases. Fixed quote at phase two.
Send the goal in a paragraph. We come back inside two business days with a scope, a fixed quote, and a calendar week for kickoff. No discovery phase that turns into a separate invoice.
We agree the build, the deliverables, the milestones, and the payment schedule. Standard split is 30 percent up front, 40 percent at staging, 30 percent at launch. Larger projects break into smaller fixed-quote phases.
Weekly demos on a staging URL you can review at your own pace. Async-first communication: Slack or email, never a recurring weekly meeting unless you ask for one. Issues tracked in a shared Linear or GitHub project.
Pre-launch checklist runs: Core Web Vitals, accessibility (WCAG AA), schema, redirects, sitemap, analytics. Site goes live on a low-traffic window. Forty-eight hour watch period before handover.
You receive admin access, a runbook, the staging environment, and the source repository. Optional: move into a maintenance plan or a dev retainer with monthly hours rolled forward.
The tools we trust on every build.
We deliberately limit the stack so every site we ship can be picked up by another senior WordPress engineer without a learning curve. No vendor lock-in, no abandoned frameworks, no JavaScript SPA bolted onto WordPress just to look modern.
- WordPress core (current stable)
- PHP 8.2 or newer
- WooCommerce, MemberPress, LearnDash where appropriate
- Custom blocks via @wordpress/scripts
- ACF Pro for editor-friendly structured fields
- Twig (Timber) or PHP templates depending on team preference
- Plain CSS or Tailwind, no abandoned framework lock-ins
- Next.js 16 for headless front-ends
- Cloudflare or Bunny for CDN + image optimisation
- Sentry for production error tracking
- GitHub Actions or Bitbucket Pipelines for CI
- Composer for plugin and dependency management
Development questions, answered.
How long does a typical custom build take?
A bespoke marketing site lands in 4 to 8 weeks from kickoff. A WooCommerce store with 50 to 200 products, payment integrations, and standard shipping logic is 6 to 12 weeks. A custom membership platform with recurring billing and a gated community is 8 to 16 weeks. Plugin development scopes from one to four weeks depending on integration count.
Do you work in our existing repository or create a new one?
We work in your repository when it exists. When it does not, we set up a clean structure (Composer-managed plugins, a custom theme repo, a deployment pipeline) and hand it over on launch. You own the code, you own the CI, you can fire us and the next team picks up cleanly.
What happens to performance during a custom build?
Core Web Vitals are part of the scope, not a paid add-on. LCP, INP, and CLS targets are agreed at scope time, measured continuously during build, and gated as part of launch. Most builds land at LCP under 1.8 seconds and CLS under 0.05 on mobile, on the hosting plan we recommend.
Can we keep our existing hosting?
Usually yes. Sometimes the current host is the bottleneck and we will say so on the call. Because we rank 28,000+ hosts at hostlist.io and accept zero affiliate revenue on the rankings, our hosting recommendation comes from the algorithm, not a commission deal. You buy the hosting directly from the host.
How do you handle scope changes mid-build?
Small changes (the kind that fit in a one-hour estimate) are absorbed. Larger changes are quoted as a fixed change order, agreed before work begins, billed separately. We do not negotiate scope inside an existing invoice line. Most builds end with one or two change orders, never a surprise.
Who actually writes the code?
Senior WordPress engineers on the Seahawk Media team, in London and across our partner offices. No subcontractors hidden behind a brand layer. The engineer writing your code shows up on the launch call.
Tell us what you want to build.
A paragraph is enough to scope. We come back with a fixed quote and a calendar week for kickoff inside two business days.