Cost is the all important factor, especially for relatively smaller companies with constrained budgets.

The Custom-Built Option

The costs of building a custom intranet/extranet are prohibitive for most smaller organizations According to a study, custom built intranets/extranets can cost a company anywhere between $50,000 and $150,000 as initial capital investment. This is in addition to equally hefty ongoing costs of security, maintenance, training, upgrades etc. Thus it makes sense to direct attention to the other inexpensive, if not lucrative option - SAAS.

The SAAS Option

Near Zero Initial Costs - SAAS software are “ready-to-use” solutions, i.e., they save organizations the effort, time & costs associated with purchasing & installing software, system design and configuration, hiring specialized staff etc. Companies have a functional solution up and running almost from day one. Moreover, these solutions allow a great deal of customizability which for all practical purposes makes up for not having a custom built solution.

User/Space based Monthly Fees - The fee structure is a monthly fee based on number of users and storage space. This greatly enhances the predictability of the costs.

Per month costs range from $30 per month to $150 per month. Companies offer a motley of packages with different numbers of users and space allowed. Extra users and space are allowed on a per user or per MB basis.

Plans need to be well analyzed to avoid the phenomena of “spike pricing”, i.e., a surge in solution cost as you try to scale up with a solution.

Features vs. Price

Rather than a myopic “solely costs” consideration, a cost benefit analysis makes sense. The costs need to be seen in light of the range of features and functionalities the product provides.

A comprehensive list (though not exhaustive) of pertinent features is as follows:-

• Page Publisher
• Customizability
• Document Management
• Project Management
• Calendaring
• Contact Management
• Email
• Polls
• Forums
• Chat

Other pertinent factors are:

• User Friendliness
• How well integrated are the different features within the solution?
• Does it work with different operating systems, devices and browsers?
• Security
• Customer Support
• Integration with other applications

Costs need to be considered in tandem with the above. As costs go down, one will have to make some compromises on the features, but good research can reveal products which offer a very good cost to feature ratio.

Needs vs. Price

“Juicy” as some features may be, they need to be seen in light of needs.

To retain objectivity one can clearly define ones needs, and accordingly classify features as “needed features” and “features not needed”. It is possible that all features may not fit nicely into this schema as they hover between “essential” and “could be handy”. Another possible scheme of classifying features could be “must have”, “nice to have”, and “future requirements” (relating to features that do not serve an immediate need fit into our future plans).