Polls: How longdoes it typically take you to make a webpage from scratch?

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It seems like a pretty straight-forward question at first glance: How long?
Interestingly, it's easy to see that the more experienced web designers said it took them longer to make a web page.

Inexperienced page designers will simply layout a page, insert a few graphics and set the text layout to suit. Concerns such as SEO - many inexperienced page designers avoid the head tag altogether - keywords, and competition can be forgotten.
(The worst is subcontracting to someone who has sold a web page/site design to a client from all Flash, but that's another post..)

Experienced page designers are aware that every page is in competition with other pages all over the Net with the same topics and similar content. A good designer will keep this fact in mind and research competing pages from keywords and search listings.
To ignore the basics of SEO when designing a web page is hardly fraud but it comes close. At best, it's unprofessional. Without SEF considerations, a web page is just a prototype or mock-up. If that's what the client is paying for, good. But an ethical designer will tell them they don't have a functional web page no matter what widgets or devices are included.

27% of the poll respondents indicated they could make a web page in 'an hour or so' or less.

46% indicated it took 'half a day' or 'a day or two' to design a web page from scratch. If the page is in XHTML using good software, that sounds about right.
Now, if there are other considerations, such as scope creep (Client or designer keeps adding new things and ideas.), or the page is intended to work with a CMS or embedded devices that are integral to the presentation, a page can take longer.
It's a good rule of thumb that you can add the number of scope creep plus the number of devices as a percentage to the increased cost of a web page. Any total over 10 means the cost doubles - which often means adding a new page or two.

Pricing alone quickly becomes a sticking point, especially when there is a wide disparity between the skill level of the designer and the client. Price and useability (as the client understands it) can quickly push the time required into the 'a week' and 'more than a week' categories from the poll.
A better professional position for the designer is to avoid adding to the scope creep, even if it's hard to manage the creative juices burning inside. Somewhere between the unhappy knot of understating "Give the client what they want.", and those creative juices is a happy compromise for all.

It's a paradox of human nature that the web pages that take the longest are probably those where the designer is given free reign, - no matter what the price!
Designing for oneself is probably the worst example. The designer cannot keep the scope creep under control.
Designing for someone who has already paid - even if it's a small price - with freedom of design is a close second. The showmanship of the designer comes into play. S/he cannot avoid the tendency to want to show what they can do. Time constraints be damned.
It becomes a no-sum game between the goal(s) of the page and the skills of the designer.
Next comes the situation where it is the first work done for a large, prospective long-term client. The designer has to remember that the work follows the bureaucratic model: Whatever you do becomes expected, and you have to build from there (- which may be impossible...)
These situations take the longest.

Then there is the undiscovered technology page, where the designer wants to use a new technology and the client has no idea what is happening. Oh well.

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