Even though the Internet has been a commercial communications medium for over a decade and hundreds of thousands of websites have been developed over that time, most businesses have expectations about the development of their sites that are unrealistic or based on assumptions that are not necessarily based in fact.
Websites take time to plan. If you are planning on creating a website for your company, consider how long it took you to create your business plan. Good plans don't write themselves. It takes time and thought to plan out what you want your visitors to do and how your site fits in with the rest of your business. What is the purpose of your website? Will you be selling products? If this is the case, then your plan will be very different then if your goal is to recruit resellers for example. In either case, if you have not yet developed a web plan, then give yourself about three to four weeks to build a proper plan. If you want to outsource the development of your plan, expect a professional consultant to cost anywhere between a thousand and five thousand dollars for a fully developed web implementation plan. Many consulting firms will insist that you have a web implementation plan developed before any actual web development or design is started.
Websites take time to develop. Depending on your plan, you may need time to include time to design as well as develop your website. If you work with a graphic designer, you can expect your design process to take anywhere between three and six weeks depending on your level of involvement and the number of revisions you make to your design. The more involved you are, generally the faster the turnaround on designs. The more revisions you require, the longer the turnaround. There is one very important caveat before you engage a designer; if you have no idea what you want, then don't start the design process. Of course, this is not an issue if there is a web plan in place. However, there is still the chance that your perception of the design will not mesh with the designer's perceptions. It is important to be patient and explain your desires clearly in both the web plan and to the designer during the design process. Remember that this is your business and you know your business better than anyone. Unlike the design phase which is generally fixed, the development process cannot be easily predicted. If you are developing a simple content website, then it may take only a few weeks to put together, but if you are integrating a Content Management System or an E-commerce system, then you may need a more time to put all the pieces together. Realistically, a basic content managed website cantake about four to six weeks to develop, an e-commerce site can take between six and twelve weeks.
Expect to pay for content. The Internet audience requires a specific kind of content in order to attract and hold a reader's attention. Are you planning on writing the content yourself or can you pay someone to write the content for you? One of the biggest factors to affect the launch of a website is the creation of web content and, for commerce sites, product data entry. In some cases, websites have been designed and integrated with a content management system or e-commerce system only to sit idle for as long as twelve months waiting for content to be prepared for the site. When developing your website plan, make sure you take into account the time to create content, who is going to write the content for you and how much it will cost. After all, what is the point in spending thousands of dollars to create a website if you have no budget left to fill the site with content.
The bottom line is that there is no such thing as a cheap and fast professional website. Don't kid yourself about the time and costs of developing a high quality professional website. When you compile your plan, you'll find that on average you can expect to invest ten thousand dollars or more, although this amount may be higher depending on the complexity of your site. In addition, the site development, from plan to launch will most likely take in excess of three months. So, if you plan on having a high quality site with the functionality you need to run your business online, then be realistic in your expectations and expect to invest a substantial amount of time, energy, and money in the endeavour. If you do manage to find a way to complete your website for less, then you'll be beating your expectations.
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