Posted on July 17th, 2010Evaluating and justifying the projected cost for a Web Development project is really important. If you want to have an online presence for your business and only need a simple static site then it would be very easy to estimate the costs. The biggest cost component is usually related to creating layout design for your site and converting it into an HTML code. This cost varies depending upon the web developer, but it should cost you somewhere between $75 and $ 200. It may also be a good idea to buy ready made templates for about $50 each. The cost for static pages on your site like ‘Contact Us’ or ‘About Us’ page is usually between $5 and $25. This way, you will have a good estimation on how much your site should cost if you want to establish a simple online identity.
The task may get tougher when you use web programming to develop your website. This effectively means that you use a code to pull data from a backend database. The programming complexity will usually depend upon the database size and relations between different groups of data.
On bigger websites there are a number of components that contribute to costs. The first thing to do is to separate the static HTML pages with no related database. Those pages usually use fixed text or static images. Their costs can be calculated based on number of the pages you want on a website. You should also add the costs for custom design of template or home page.
The next step is to determine the costs of data driven or dynamic capability of your Web site.
- You should take into account the size and complexity of database involved. It may seem a little technical but if you can apply some analytical skills, it is possible to have a more accurate estimation.
- After estimating the database costs, you should figure out the web application cost by splitting it into modules, for example User Management module can be treated as a single entity. Again the complexity and the size of a module will determine its actual cost; some web developers may also consider the effort of integrating modules and the database into an application, as a separate cost component.
- You should also determine the cost of search feature. A simple search feature will cost about $25 or even free; and a complex one, which includes many options may be about $200. The search feature can be more expensive, if you have a big database with complex relation structure.
- Next you should estimate the cost of the reporting feature. A simple one may cost you about $50 and a more elaborate reporting feature is usually about $100. It should include printing option or support for multiple browsers.
- Last, calculate the installation and implementation costs of your site and web application in general. It may include configuration, onsite testing, and optimization.
For a less complicated application, web developers may charge between $150 and $300. For larger applications (which has complicated databases with multiple reports and searches) the costs may go up somewhere between $500 and $1000.
After gathering the above information, you should be able to get a fair idea about the estimated web application costs.
Increasing websites and web usage in the modern world indicate the benefits of software engineering towards web development. Keep up the good work. All the best.