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Web Site Total Cost of Ownership
Rank: Member Joined: 10/6/2009 Posts: 164
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Hello,
What would be the Total Cost of Ownership for a Web site such as SK In terms of design,development and maintenance? Just interested in Knowing TCO for such models.
Marriages are made in heaven. But so are thunder and lightning.
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Rank: Veteran Joined: 6/8/2007 Posts: 675
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There are many factors influencing cost of ownership: - Web Development costs (depends on what you want to come up with, level of functionality, the price of the company/ person you contract) - Web Hosting costs (depends on traffic on the website. The more the traffic, the bigger your budget) - Other overheads (are you subscribing to any data feeds, content sourcing etc) - Maintenance (if you're not a web developer, then you need someone to tweak the site for you every once in a while!) Form is temporary, class is permanent
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Rank: Member Joined: 10/6/2009 Posts: 164
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@ anasazi
Can you put up some numbers, ballpark figures. I am well aware that functionality, web hosting, traffic etc contribute to the cost. But if I was to ask what are the cost for a low to high end site what numbers would I be looking at?
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Rank: Veteran Joined: 6/8/2007 Posts: 675
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Figures are tricky, reason being it depends on who you contract. You can get a website for 20,000 KShs or 2,000,000 KShs! Of course the cheaper the guy is, the more likely it is that you'll get a shoddy job. For an acceptable level website, you should budget about 100K for development (if you scout hard enough for a good independent contractor. for a company, at least 2.5 times more). If you want a load of features, double that at least. Web hosting can vary from 500 KShs a month to 5,000 a month or more depending on the package (offshore hosting). Local hosting is much more expensive. Most websites can survive on a budget of 1,000 KShs per month. Form is temporary, class is permanent
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Rank: Member Joined: 10/6/2009 Posts: 164
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I think 2M is way over the top. So say I want a website that has an online catalog, shopping cart etc are the following estimates reasonable?
Design, development and implementation - 250 K (one time cost)
Web hosting (domain name and web hosting renewable charges) - 5K
Maintenance and other cost - ?
Anyone else out there with knowledge/skill/experience in this area share your thoughts
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Rank: Veteran Joined: 6/8/2007 Posts: 675
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As I mentioned, depends on who you use... For some people, 2M is a standard fee. However your budget looks good. You should get something good for that, or even half of that. When you get the site done, make sure it has a content management system that will ensure you need maintenance only for minor issues. Form is temporary, class is permanent
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Rank: Elder Joined: 7/20/2007 Posts: 4,432
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Please note: I am extremely biased on this topic. Take what I say with a pinch of salt.2 million? Facebook was started with a $50 script. 2million? You are talking about a $30,000 website.Kweli what is being started here? CNN? Or your website also deliver icecream straight from the computer screen. Websites can be free if you wish. The problem is not the website. The problem is the therein after. So you build a website, then what?Building a site is the easy part....You should be more concerned with whether it is making any difference in your business. How many Kenyans have opened up travel websites. Guess who gets all the free traffic? Some guys in UK in their bedroom who know about marketing their web property. My advice is stop thinking about a ONE time payment then you have a website. Think a long term commitment in an investment that will change your life if you do it the right way. Heck, I can build you a free website if you find me on a good day....But will it make you any money? Costs1. Web Developer - consider them the architect of the site. Comes up with the structure...from $500 up 2. Web Designer - between $500 to $2000 - please note that this is not the same as a web developer. A web designer is like your interior designer or painter. 3. Programmer - If you need fancy stuff on your site( not flash)...between $500 to unlimited Most important4. SEO Expert - Monthly costs ranging from $1 to unlimited 5. Internet Marketer - Pay per lead or monthly fee.. depends a lot on your niche competition and the amount of work needed for your site Of Course you can do it the easy wayBuild a website - cost ksh.20k Then don't wonder why you never get buying visitors and you never ever make a sale on your site. Then you run around Nairobi telling people that there is no money in the internet. Do it the right way and consider web marketing as a running investment that pays 10 times more than buying shares in any market. Jose: If I make it through this thug life, I'll see you one day. The Lord is the only way to stop the hurt.
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Rank: Veteran Joined: 6/8/2007 Posts: 675
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I know of websites (done by Kenyan companies) that cost 7M. oh yes. Of course, whether it was value for money is neither here nor there. I'm sure it could have been done in India for 1000 USD through online outsourcing sites. However, realise that if you're into detail, cheap may be expensive. However alma you have a good breakdown of expected costs and things to consider. Yes, you can get a website for 20K. But I wonder if good developers/ designers are willing to accept that amount... Form is temporary, class is permanent
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Rank: Elder Joined: 7/20/2007 Posts: 4,432
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Anasazi Can you explain to me how you build a site for 7m and make no sale and this site grizzly makes $10,000 a month. second site used exactly $0 to build. Trust me..I know I hate saying it but there is a bunch of kenyan web designers who go around selling sites for 1 million that do absolutely nothing for the buyer. When you are saying 7 million, you are talking about a website that costs $100,000. You just have got to be kidding me.  Tell me one Kenyan site that is worth $2000 to build..By the way, I am extremely serious.Show me one and I will show you a conman who built it..Only Mashada...and probably this one wazua. I know of one company in particular that is notorius for building the worst websites the world has ever seen. They then get a newspaper guy to say how wonderful it is. Their minimum charge is 400k. Very shameful I might say.  But Hey, I am biased....Please take my advice with a pinch of salt.We have been building travel websites in Kenya for the first 5 yrs. Google kenya safari. 70% of the sites not owned by Kenyans. 90% of seo work done by indian web companies I work with... by the way, do the google on google.com us servers not google.co.ke. Your clients are coming from the us and uk anyway. There is hope but not with overcharging small businessmen who wish to start making the internet part of their marketing strategy. Jose: If I make it through this thug life, I'll see you one day. The Lord is the only way to stop the hurt.
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Rank: Veteran Joined: 6/8/2007 Posts: 675
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Well, I agree with your point that whether a website will make you money has much more to it than just spending the dough on it. However, for the web developers, if you can charge 7M for your product.... well... i hope you can back it up with your work, but if the client accepts... why not? The likes of eBay spend millions of dollars on technical work, ie web development. So again nailing a figure is difficult. The key thing is, what is the strategy? Form is temporary, class is permanent
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Rank: Elder Joined: 6/27/2008 Posts: 4,114
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I maintain a simple rule: the more you invest in starting a new business, the more likely it is to fail...before it's first birthday! Why would I pay 7 mill for a web site while there are places I can get for free? Also why pay 500 per MONTH hosting while there are places I can host for 2,500 per YEAR? Nothing is real unless it can be named; nothing has value unless it can be sold; money is worthless unless you spend it.
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Rank: Veteran Joined: 6/8/2007 Posts: 675
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Actually there are hosts for even $1 per month. The main factor here is features & capacity. Some of these hosts claim to allow unlimited traffic.. However, if your site becomes too successful... they shut you down! So you may need dedicated hosting etc etc Form is temporary, class is permanent
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Rank: Veteran Joined: 11/17/2009 Posts: 2,038 Location: GA
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according to alexa here are the top 20 local websites in kenya among the top 100 visited in kenya most of this websites have never advertised like patauza.co.ke it does not buy ad space in the dailies to market itself yet its up there with the big boys a good website has to have a target market which embraces it once its online word of mouth normally does the advertsing e.g home.co.ke serves the expatriate community hence its high rankings note where mashada is soon it will drop ensure your website serves a need other wise you are wasting your time like zayari.com its advertised daily on radio yet its not on the rankings today i have seen in the classifieds section of the daily nation a website targeting privateschools www.privateschools.co.kelooks to have some potential 1.nation.co.ke (10) 2.home.co.ke (12) 3.Standardmedia.co.ke (22) 4.capitalfm.co.ke (24) 5.patauza.co.ke(25) 6.sasahiva.com(30) 7.Webarazacareers.com (33) 8.kenyanjobs.blogspot.com (37) 10.safaricom.co.ke(50) 11.haiya.co.ke (53) 12.kenic.or.ke (62) 13.kra.go.ke(70) 14.AccessKenya.com (72) 15.uonbi.ac.ke (79) 16.jumuika.co.ke (80) 17.mashada.com (84) 18.bestjobskenya.com (100) 10.Businessdailyafrica.com (44) 11.Brightermonday.com (48)
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Rank: Member Joined: 10/6/2009 Posts: 164
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I think *web sites that cost > 7M probably have more functionality than your regurlar web sites per say, these Probably have an information system of some kind in the background and are not necessarily web sites but complete systems of some sort. I agree with the sentiments, just having a web site and expecting to make returns without a clear thought out plan is a recipe for failure. Rather a web site should be seen as a small component of a bigger business plan to meet a need or take advantage of an opportunity. However I disagree with the vitu vya bure mentality. Mukiha wrote Quote:Why would I pay 7 mill for a web site while there are places I can get for free I think if you are going to run a business especially one that you expect to grow substantially, it would be a bad idea to have its web site running on those free web hosting sites, those sites can be completely unreliable. What happens when you wake up one day and the web site is not there? who do you blame? Thanks (anasazi,alma,mukiha and madollar) for your input in the discussion.
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Rank: Veteran Joined: 11/2/2006 Posts: 1,206 Location: Nairobi
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I'm from an IT background and I think some of the posts here are funny.If I were a web designer,why would i accept a decent client to pay me 15k for a site?Unless I could make it within a day.... The KCB site costs around 3M.I know a local auction site that has spent around 4M so far...and yes....I have tasted 200k of that!I have a feeling that SK/Wazua was done by an IT company with one good guru.....or they simply forked out a crazy amount to have it done. Formally employed people often live their employers' dream & forget about their own.
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Rank: Member Joined: 10/6/2009 Posts: 164
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There should not be a huge discrepancy in cost for standard web sites, I would think web design cost should be coming down instead of going up. Unlike a decade ago. there is more competition by web designers, there is better technology encouraging "do it yourself" designs, more companies are demanding cost effective web sites.
I would also think you are more likely to be charged more by a web design company than a freelance web developer. The company obviously has a bigger overhead cost.
Note we are not talking about premium web sites. Anyway I am yet to see one designed for a kenyan market. When I say premium I am thinking flash and the works.
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Rank: Elder Joined: 7/20/2007 Posts: 4,432
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I am going to be VERY VERY BLUNT I said anyone paying any kenyan web design company more than 1 million bob is being conned. KCB if they paid 3million should demand their money back. It is built with Joomla a freeeeeee platform. I CAN HACK KCB NOW. After they spent the 3 million I can right now be able to login as their administrator and get any data they think they can hide. For those who need proof that kenyan web design companies are a bunch of conmen here is the link to the kcb website administrator side KCB ADMINISTRATOR LOGINIt would take me 5 minutes to hack it. Please guys, you are being conned here....Lakini if you think that you have met good web developers in Kenya who are worth 400k, then to each their own ..... By the way, I'm not saying that there are no sites that you pay for 100k dollars for. I'm just saying, they aren't as silly as the ones I've been shown so far. By the way Phaoro, if you have someone building sites for you in flash, you are in more trouble than you think.....Go read google best practise on flash. Jose: If I make it through this thug life, I'll see you one day. The Lord is the only way to stop the hurt.
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Rank: Elder Joined: 7/20/2007 Posts: 4,432
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As usual on sk we digress. The original post was about the total cost of ownership. This is my breakdown if you wish to have a successful web business. As you can see it is a serious investment. -Brochure Websites $500 -$1000 -Ecommerce Websites $1000 - $2000 -Bespoke complex website $5000 - $10,000 -Content Creation And Promotion - Text Content $200 / Audio $300 / Video $500 -SEO And Social Networking Services – Small $300 P/M / Medium $500 P/M / $700 P/M High Volume -List Building Small - $200 P/M, Medium - $400 P/M, High $1000 P/M -PPC – Small $400 P/M, Medium $800 + 10% Ad Spend, High $2000 + 10% Ad Spend Please note that creating the website is the easy part. It is its management that is more important. Good luck Phaoro Jose: If I make it through this thug life, I'll see you one day. The Lord is the only way to stop the hurt.
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Rank: Member Joined: 10/6/2009 Posts: 164
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@ alma,
I think your numbers for an ecommerce web site are not far off from what I was thinking. I am not necessarily interested in flash but wanted to pass a point across.
Thanks for the input.
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