Currently we make a list of pages and functions. Then we guess how many hours are needed for design/development for each step OR pull up our time tracking of a similar job to calculate hours. We add a bunch of hours for UX and then just multiply that by an hourly rate and hope we can meet the budget. Is this what everyone else does too?
How would you quote a 100 page website - existing, low conversion, poor design. Currently on Drupal - moving to Wordpress.
This all makes sense.
The only additional things you will want to consider, if you haven't already, are:
- An SLA - to agree on the level of communication provided throughout the project to the customer
This is because emails, calls, meeting can vary dramatically for each customer and/or project
- Tool costs
Factoring in the costs of any additional tools you might need for this project, in case you don't have them already
- # of amends - I'm sure you get this already but just having something written upfront which factors in the cost based on X number of amends or iterations
- Hosting costs
- Security costs
- Imagery and Iconography
I see this missed from website build projects a lot. It can be a big cost and worth factoring in if it hasn't been done already
- Integrations
So not just the page functionality but also any backend integrations the customer requires.
- Ongoing maintenance
Just making sure you have something in place with the customer that gives them idea about future maintenance costs and what they should be expecting to pay out for
In short, everything you've said looks along the right lines, but what I see missed most often are the above costs. This can impact your profitability on a project but also can be frustrating costs for the customer if they're not made aware of them early on.
Good luck with the project!
If you're interested in a different viewpoint all together, I would be able to tell you about how we sell Scrum without Waterfall. We don't ever have to fixed-bid anything. I generally find that fixed-bid is a solid way to lose your shirt.
This is completely valid question. Web Development projects are normally estimated on basis of past experience, client's expectations and future potential of the project.
When you want to build a Wordpress project, most prolific way to evaluate is to identify unique pages and on basis of that, you calculate efforts. And later multiply it with your per hour rates.
In a case when you're migrating existing site from one platform to another platform, try to understand client's expectations in terms of SEO, Content Migration and on-page optimisation.
In estimation, you should also consider efforts to be spent on - Design, Front end development, Wordpress theme development, content migration, QA, Project Management, client communication and 10% of buffer time to help you if you come across minor change requests.
Also, it would be ideal to set the right expectations upfront with a client about number iterations you would provide in design.
Hope this helps.
Thanks,
AMiT Thakrar
