WISHBONE

How Much Does it Cost? And Why?

It's no different than building a house. There are many cost impacting specifications that contribute to the price of a house. There's location and size of the property, the square footage and layout of the house, the exterior building materials, the interior building materials, the appliances, the interior fixtures, and the landscaping. Prospective clients have to clearly define the scope of what they want before they can hope that a web design firm can give them a quote.

Unfortunately, we see it more times than we would like-- the clients need something simple, just a little brochure site, not a big deal, here's my "inspiration site," and "give me the price for a basic site." Depending on whether or not the information seems logical, we bid. In the next instance, we are on a 3 month logo design safari with a rapidly creeping scope in form of widgets and web apps. In the meantime, we watch while our project budget flies out the window and we are praying just to break even.

Most of the time, clients just don't understand. And why should they? When I take my car to the mechanic, I don't want to learn how to replace my transmission, I just need to know that he did it. However, with Web development it becomes a bit different, with much higher financial stakes.

Clearly, Google and myspace and facebook were not apps built in a day or even two months. Hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars, have gone into the conceptualization, programming, and maintenance of these "simple" sites. For that reason, it is illogical to think that a small Web firm can build an exact replica of a major social networking site for the cost of a new transmission.

Custom website projects are often misunderstood because 1) there is the belief that it relies on an open source solution to supply the framework that it is not custom. Not true. Relying on a framework that is open source allows you, the customer, to enjoy the benefits of using open source technology, which prescribes many of the standards by which "joomla" developers or "drupal" developers operate. Using these open-source standards often make the site easier to maintain if you go from one developer/firm to another in the future.
2) There are many basic holes in the proverbial ozone in which the buyer/client and the developer/firm fail to communicate. Often, neither the client nor the firm understand precisely what web solution is needed for the project.

Decision makers and client-side contacts need to be on the same page. If you want to ensure the failure of a web project, then plan poorly. Poor planning is the primary reason projects have problems. Planning becomes more critical to the success of a website as the size and complexity of the project increases. Firms are faced with two huge challenges; 1) Convincing clients of the importance of investing time in the planning process, and 2) Having the willpower to refuse a client's project until an adequate plan is established, understood, and approved by all stakeholders.

Communication Breakdown

In the practical world, communication gaps are present during every project. The size of the gap (and the importance of the portion of the scope that is in the gap), will determine whether or not the project was "a smashing success" or a "nightmare/failure". If the gap is large, problems will be obvious. The firm honestly believes they did their job, and the client thinks the job was not complete, and wants to continue to make additions and changes with no more charges. In these cases, all parties think they are losing. And they are all right. A well-developed plan and constant communication can solve this.

A web design firm would never intentionally create communication gaps on projects they sell and execute. Gaps and the potential for them increase when 1) the person communicating the needs of the client is a 3rd party with no experience in the web development cycle, 2) the project is large with multiple widgets or functions that the client has envisioned working in a way that is not technically feasible, or 3) the client does not have a well-formed business idea and the idea morphs and changes as the end of the project draws near and the client wants to keep the door open for changing scope to accommodate business plan changes.

We have seen bad technology projects get saved and we have seen them die. We always try to resolve the issues with clients, however, sometimes it is in the best interest of everyone if we part ways. To save a project, one has to clearly define the communication gap. Defining the gap may involve spec sheets, punch lists, mockups, etc. Developers need from clients absolute clarity. Once the gap is defined, we always try to work out a compromise.

Some truths:
1) Because business models and priorities change, the web development and planning process is ongoing and should be revisited at least once per year. For new websites, the result of this process will dictate the scope of the website. For existing websites, the result of this process will dictate the scope of the redesign and increase in functionality.
2) For companies or organizations that have many stakeholders and decisions makers, we much prefer one person take the lead on getting the process done. It typically works best if the lead person puts together a planning document and then provides it for review and revisions to the other stakeholders prior to any web production.

Things for clients to consider.

Consideration 1. Define your target audiences

Define all of your target audiences for the website (i.e. potential customers, existing customers, existing reseller, potential reseller, existing investors, potential investors, existing employees, potential employees, press, existing vendors, potential vendors, etc).

Consideration 2. Rank the target audiences

Rank / prioritize the target with number 1 being the most important audience you need to address with your website.

Consideration 3. List your goals for each target audience.

Starting with your number 1 target audience - list the goals you have related to the website (i.e. "Buyers will be able to shop for products and purchase them"). The goals should be centered around what actions you want your target audiences to take on the website or as a result of the website.

Consideration 4. Review the goals in two ways.

First by Importance - use an A, B, or C.

* A = Must get done
* B = Should get done
* C = Get done if it's easy / doesn’t impact other more important items

Next by Urgency

* 2 = Needs to be done within 2 months
* 6 = Needs to be done within 6 months
* 12 = Needs to be done within 12 months
* NI = Not important

When you are done with the above steps, you should be able to look at the overall results and say... "if we don’t get anything else right, we have to do these X things".

How much? The most important question and the 300 lb gorilla in the room.

There are three categories of pricing and they are as follows:

1) Design - You can address this portion of your scope by answering the question "What is your website going to look like?" The website design includes the overall graphical look and feel of your website. For most websites, this includes the home page layout/design, the interior page template layout / design (typically there is only one, but if there are more.. this needs to be addressed), and the navigation structure and design.

2) Development for functionality - You can address this portion of your scope by answering the question "What is your website going to do?". The functionality on your website should all be geared towards helping you accomplish your goals with your target audiences. Functionality can be split into many general categories including content management, ecommerce shopping carts / product catalogs, directories, navigation management, marketing tools, third party software integration tools, etc. For business websites, this will likely represent the lion's share of your price. It also is the highest area of risk for communication gaps.

3) Content - You can address this portion of your scope by answering the question "What is your website going to say?" Content includes marketing copy (i.e. for your home page, about us page, etc), press releases, product data and images, pictures, presentation, documents / files, etc. Answer the following with the stakeholders:
o Who is responsible for the initial preparation / creation of the content?
o How will content updates (add, edits, removes) be made, and who will make them?

Notwithstanding a contract for copywriting, the client is responsible for the initial preparation of the content. Copywriting takes a great deal of time, especially if the technical developer is not an expert in the business field of the website being built.

So to answer the question, "how much?" we recommend you contact us with your specifications to get a commitment-free quote today.