A better website
for your
life's work.
You're an expert at science. We're experts at websites. Decades of fieldwork deserve more than a page your postdoc built in 2014. We build lab websites like they matter — because they do: the right site lands you visibility, grants, media, speaking invites, and the students you actually want.
Your website is
your first impression.
Think about the last time a program officer, an editor, or your dream PhD applicant googled you. They found that site. They formed an opinion in ten seconds. You never even knew it happened — and you don't get that first impression back.
The Search
Someone with money, a byline, or an application googles your name. It happens more often than you think.
The Site
What they find in ten seconds decides whether they keep reading — or close the tab on your decade of work.
The Signal
A sharp, current site earns you the reply, the invite, the application from the student you actually want.
The Grant
It compounds — into funding, students, and the reputation your work already earned.
Your site works every day. It should look like it.
Built by a Microsoft veteran. Designing and shipping web experiences at global scale — now building for the community that raised us: working scientists.
Science is
photogenic.
Your hard drive is full of images most brands would kill for — micrographs, field shots, specimens, ten years of figures. Right now they're in a folder called final_v3 where no one will ever see them. Your site should put them front and center. Yours will.
Nobody gets a PhD
in web design.
And you shouldn't need one. But you've watched it happen: the colleague with thinner results and a sharper website gets the keynote, the feature, the renewal. You can defend your methods to Reviewer 2; building a site, wrangling SEO, writing a homepage about yourself is a different expertise. It's ours. Trade us the job you've been avoiding for the one we love.
- TR.01 You wrote the paper We build the page it deserves.
- TR.02 You ran the ten-year study We make it findable in ten seconds.
- TR.03 You update the science We update the site. Every month.
- TR.04 You hate self-promotion Good. That's our job, not yours.
We build it.
We keep it alive.
The Site
The core of what we do: lab websites, built right.
- Design & build, start to finish
- Publications, people & news pages
- SEO & analytics from day one
The Upkeep
A site is only as good as its last update.
- New papers & roster changes
- Edits, fixes & hosting handled
- Monthly, so it never goes stale
The Extra Mile
When you're ready for more than a site.
- Social media consulting
- Press & media outreach
- Grant narrative support
Built for the bench.
- SP.01 Principal Investigators Your name is a brand. Treat it like one.
- SP.02 Research Labs From lab page to landmark.
- SP.03 Departments & Institutes Recruit students, donors, attention.
- SP.04 Museums & Field Stations Collections deserve crowds.
Hormiga
means ant.
An ant carries fifty times its own weight. A colony moves mountains one grain at a time. Nobody notices — until the whole forest floor is theirs. That's how we work for your science.
Our storyThe FAQ.
The things every PI asks on the first call, answered up front — because your time is better spent on the science.
How much does a lab website cost?
$1,499, flat. One-time fee for design and build — publications, people, and news pages, SEO, analytics, and your first month of care included. No surprise line items; additional work beyond scope is $99/hr and only ever with your approval.
How long does it take?
4–6 weeks from kickoff to launch. Most of your involvement is a kickoff call, one round of review, and sending us your papers and headshots. We know your calendar is the scarcest resource in the lab.
Can you rebuild our existing site instead of starting fresh?
Yes — most of our projects are rebuilds. We migrate everything worth keeping (publications, people, project pages), fix what's broken, and redesign around it. Nothing gets lost, including your search rankings.
Do we own the website?
Completely. Your domain, your code, your content, your analytics. If you leave, everything goes with you and keeps working. No proprietary platform, no hostage situation.
Who writes the content? We're scientists, not copywriters.
We do the heavy lifting. We draft your pages from your papers, CV, and a conversation — in plain language that's accurate enough for you and clear enough for a program officer. You review; we never publish anything you haven't approved. The science is never dumbed down, only opened up.
How do payments work with grants and university procurement?
However your institution needs: invoices, purchase orders, W-9 on request. Many labs pay from startup funds, discretionary accounts, or outreach budgets. The annual prepay option (10% off) fits neatly into a single budget line for grant reporting.
What happens if we cancel the care plan?
Your site keeps running — you own it. The care plan is month to month; pause it during a field season, restart when the papers come out. We'll be here.
Do you actually understand academia?
Our founder grew up in a working research lab — the child of a university scientist. We know what a preprint is, why the publications page must be perfect, what Reviewer 2 does to a person, and why your last site hasn't been updated since the postdoc who built it graduated.
Raised in a lab.
Building for labs.
That's me and my dad — a career arachnologist. I grew up watching brilliant scientists do work the world rarely got to see. Hormiga Labs is how I fix that: better websites for the people advancing science.
Our story