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QUESTION:i have been given two quotations, each of which are in the $15-20k range for
web site development, however do not fully understand the implications of
choosing either. the first utilises java and the second utilises cold
fusion, and although both appear to be relatively thourough in their
proposals, and i cannot determine which might best suit our company for now
and the future.
ANSWER: This is interesting, but I would have to say the the benefits of proficiency
in coldfusion certainly out-weigh any loss in veratility that migt be
suffered
buy not learning something like visual basic.
Every artist has his favorite medium, and why should that not be the case for
programmers? "Bamboozaled" is harsh language as a response to someone who
simply expressed a certain level of uncertainty about pricing out the
proposals.
This is my pricing guide for Non-Web-Professionals:
1. KNOW YOUR DOCUVERSE!!
EXPECT that the number of screens in your site will also approximately equal
the number of employees in your organization. If you're say, an independent
computer consulant, your core screen is going to be something like a resume.
If you have 500 employees, at a company manufacturing heavy equipment, then
you'd expect about 7 screens for each deparment, a years worth of press
releases, and a screen for each individual product. And individual screens
generally average an hour of dev. time, so if your have 500 employees and
your
developement provider is charging $65/hr, a ballpark figure, and I do mean
Wrigely, is $32,000. However, if you produce screws, and your site is going
to
contain 250 screens of product specs, you'd pay half that number. If you
manufacture 250 different varieties of complex mechanical systems, it could
easily cost twice that to create illutrations and product descriptions for
each one, so you would create a better value by focusing on basic corporate
information, having the spec sheets from your catalog as downloadable PDFs,
and making sure people could communicate with you via email to request
printed info.
2. SET A LIFE-SPAN
This can be an arbitrary number, since the best we can do on this is our best
geuss. But 8 years is a pretty average lifespan for a corporate website. I
would say 10 years. If you developed a website today, and kept it for 10
years, you may not be using the lastest whiz-bang technology of the day in
2010, but you can be pretty sure that your site will be accessible, readable,
and be a value to your company. You can change your home-screen every 3
months
if you like, and of course you're going to want to keep the graphics fresh
and
consistent with the styles of the day, but you're building a database of
consistently formatted documents, and those legacy systems can be imported
into a new design in 2010.
3. COST FOR THE ENTIRE LIFE SPAN.
If you choose a development method that increases your hosting costs, how
much
are you really paying? If your company is very active about putting out
information, say, an industry-specific trade newletter putting up 100 new
screens of information a month, then you'd lean towards the direction of
using
database technology that's more expensive to host, but is more efficiently
updated. If you're a company involved with products of services that have a
longer development span and are only marketed to professionals in your
industry, then you might want to stick to pure HTML and only perform update
your site on a yearly basis.
4. COST FOR MANAGEMENT
If you're a trade newsletter, you might want a WebMaster? If you might want a
WebMaster you could acquire one by adding/training a writer to/on your
editorial staff who has experience with marketing and will be able to market
your site and get it noticed. If you're in heavy equipment, then you only
come
up with something new once every 6 months, and maybe your IT staff would be
better at maintaining your site? How much is it going to cost to have pages
added and deleted in a year by a full or part-time staff person compared to
having your web-provider perform this service? Will the work load fluctuate
seasonally? Maybe you just need to designate a website coordinator to act as
an adminstrative contact point to your web services provider, and possibly
perform only light maintenance?
5. ADD YOUR COSTS
You don't need a Porsche if you're looking for basic transportation. You
don't
want an 87 Yugo if you can afford something more reliable. Set goals. What is
your site supposed to do: Market your company? Provide products? Offer
on-line
sales? Recruit new employees? What information do you need to accomplish
these
goals? If your sell small-cost items to wide variety of people (hand-made
toys
to 3,000 stores), then you want more information. If you sell large cost
items
($100,000 city busses to 20 metropolitan areas) then you want less
information
(Perhaps core screens with case studies on "The City of Denver was paying
$1.million to maintain their busses, and with our new CityBus fleet their
only
paying half That )and you want to acquire more sales leads that your can
follow up on. How often is that information to be updated?
6. FOCUS ON THE MEDIUM
Depending on your company, you could do VERY well with 10 Case Studies
carefully targeted to specific industry segments, collect leads from those
case studies, and follow up with printer literature. Ask your phone reps what
people as them. Ask your sales staff what they say at trade shows. Web users
want to know how your organization will serve their immediate needs. Try to
anticipate those needs, and focus your web-dev efforts only on content
capable
of specifically serving those needs. Buying a website is like buying a car,
don't buy more than you want.
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