So, you've been informed that 'we have this much to spend' on a new Intranet. At first it might sound like a lot, or maybe it sounds like nothing will happen for that budget. Alternatively, no one knows what is the appropriate amount to spend to get what we want. So, what does an Intranet cost?
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Book a demoIt’s a bit like asking ‘how much will an all-expenses paid vacation cost?’ So, where are you going on vacation? Can you drive there, or do you have to fly there? How long are you staying? Are you sleeping in a tent on a beach, or in a pampered resort in the mountains? The cost of an Intranet can feel like an unplanned vacation.
There’s no universal Intranet pricing standard that vendors follow. Each product has its own unique functions and vendors will price their solutions accordingly. Perhaps the only pricing dimension you’ll be able to find in common is the ‘per seat’ or ‘per author’ cost.
Most software is licensed on how many people will use it. For example, if you can communicate to a vendor that you have ‘200 users’, then you’ll quickly get a firm price for what it costs to license the Intranet for your organization.
Some Intranet products are offered as an out-of-the-box Intranets, thus minimizing the necessity for procuring services to establish the Intranet. Other Intranet products are just platforms that require a lot of heavy lifting in the form of services to get the platform to do anything meaningful. There are also platforms that offer a hybrid model where the out-of-the-box offering can be extended or customized to meet your bespoke business requirements.
The services cost of the typical Intranet can result in the most expensive part of the proposal. Most organizations will select a provider who will propose an off-the-shelf solution. There will be licensing costs and services costs. Some providers will take a margin of the licensing cost as an incentive for them to offer the off-the-shelf solution. Their services costs will cover deliverables like software implementation, template configuration, content population, security configuration and training. This is not a comprehensive list of services, but will give you an insight into some of the aspects that come with deploying an Intranet.
The most expensive part of an Intranet project can be the content itself. An Intranet is an empty vessel. It requires your content to become valuable. Who will create the content for the new Intranet? Will you be migrating large volumes of content from an existing Intranet into the new Intranet? Who will define the content map, sourcing of all the content, organizing all of it into a single location and then passing the content through a cleansing process? Only you will know your own content, so you’ll need to determine how much time will be required to perform this task and what time that will cost your organization.
There’s no universal Intranet pricing standard that vendors follow. Each product has its own unique functions and vendors will price their solutions accordingly. Perhaps the only pricing dimension you’ll be able to find in common is the ‘per seat’ or ‘per author’ cost.
Intranet solutions are delivered in two distinct ways. One is Software as a Service (SaaS), or as a traditional on premise installation. The SaaS delivery, or Cloud based approach, will mean you will rent the Intranet software from the vendor through a monthly or annual subscription.
The more traditional on premise model will require your organization to provide server infrastructure for the vendor to install their Intranet software onto a server within your environment. In most cases, you’ll purchase the solution on an annual basis under this arrangement.
Both models are common, but one choice over the other can change your cost of acquisition. Generally, a SaaS based Intranet provides the most cost efficient approach, but comes with some flexibility drawbacks. An on-premise deployment provides the most flexibility, but isn’t as efficient as a SaaS offering due to the maintenance costs of managing your own internal server.
Your personal choice will be based on a combination of price, flexibility and features. There is no wrong solution if budget drives your decision.
The cost of support will be relative to the size of your organization, and how many end users may require support in their use of the new Intranet.
Most vendors will offer a baseline support arrangement. If something major happens, they’ll work with you to resolve it as quickly as possible. From that point there is usually a sliding scale in how close a vendor will make themselves available. Naturally the lighter the support fee, the greater the time a vendor will take to respond to your requests for help and solve issues.
It goes without saying that the larger the organization, the more important support becomes and that a healthy investment in a dedicated support plan will define the continuity of service for the enterprise.
The following is aimed to provide you with a high-level guide in understanding Intranet software pricing dimensions, based on the size of your organization. This is far from a comprehensive pricing matrix, but will assist you in considering the different pricing levels when engaging with Intranet vendors.
In this example, the size of a micro to small organization is typically less than one hundred people. Typically, an Intranet project budget will range between $8,000 and $20,000 with an ongoing per annum fee being a percentage of the project cost.
A small to medium organization supports between one hundred and one thousand people, and project budgets will range anywhere from between $15,000 to $50,000 depending on the licensing fees, personalized services, dedicated support and variations in how the solution will be hosted and maintained.
The medium to enterprise organization operates with between one thousand and five thousand people and budgets quickly range from $50,000 to $250,000 with the licensing fees being a primary component of the pricing structure. Many vendors offer a ‘per seat’ licensing model. As an example, if you have two thousand people in your company, and the Intranet licensing is $5 per user, per month, then the licensing fee will be 2,000 x 5 x 12 = $120,000 per annum.
With more than five thousand people, most Intranet projects require investigation and scoping and result in custom pricing proposals. The primary difference between fifty people and five thousand people is the security and delivery of data and content. Projects at this scale require more comprehensive planning and implementation and typically result in implementation timeframes of months through to even years.
When budgeting for your intranet, it's essential to factor in the cost of employee apps. These apps are essential for improving mobile access and raising employee collaboration and engagement. Here are a few key points to note:
Licensing: Some Intranets, such as CentricMinds, already include an employee app in their licensing packages. This means that the app's cost is already included as part of the intranet solution. Confirm whether the employee app is included or if it must be purchased separately.
User-Based Pricing: Employee app pricing may be based on the number of users who will access it. Consider how your pricing scales as your user base grows and how it aligns with your organization's projected growth.
Include the costs associated with employee apps in your intranet budget. By doing so, you give your teams full intranet access, including a dedicated employee management app. This app allows your people to collaborate, communicate, stay up to date, and manage tasks from anywhere.
CentricMinds Intranet Software is the best choice for business of all sizes.
Here are just some of the reasons why CentricMinds Intranet software comes out on top:
Easy Setup: The CentricMinds Intranet platform is easy to set up and start using, with features that teams can use straight away — it offers business communication, engagement tools and analytics, and even file cloud storage. With these features, you can use one solution to help employees work together and improve daily productivity.
Create Connection: Employees can connect using the CentricMinds Intranet in several ways, including news feeds, chat features, a people directory, and an employee engagement mobile app. But the ease of updating and maintaining content is what stands out. It has a large selection of communication templates for sharing important updates. This means you don't have to spend time creating them yourself! CentricMinds provides features to emphasize important messages that team members need to see; use popups; send push notifications; have employees confirm they've read the updates; and measure activity! With its versatility and simplicity, CentricMinds is the market leader in employee experience work tools.
It's Flexible: Users can choose which features on the CentricMinds Intranet they want to activate or use a dedicated Employee App. You can begin with a simple intranet and quickly shape it to fit the changing needs of users and their work using the code-free platform. Turn on features such as task management for managing projects across teams or create secure customer portals for handling work requests and reports.
Pricing
CentricMinds Intranet provides a variety of plans to meet the requirements of all types of businesses. Their tiered plans are based on the number of users, allowing you to scale up as your company grows; the higher the plan, the more useful features you can access. Its powerful but user-friendly features make it simple to tailor your intranet to your company culture and provide employees with the resources they need to be productive.
The most popular Silver plan begins at $17.90 per user per month. This plan includes all of the features needed by growing businesses as they hire more employees, such as business process management, project management, and a mobile app.
SharePoint is Microsoft's collaboration platform. It’s mainly used for file storage and sharing and lets users launch sites like an Intranet. It has earned itself a reputation for being complicated and time-consuming to implement. If it’s not configured properly, it can become unmanageable and even a nightmare to use.
Out of the Box: Although SharePoint has some out-of-the-box functionality, you'll need to customize it and work with a SharePoint developer to meet your needs. As a result, businesses end up paying more than they bargained for and often have to wait longer to see any benefit from using the product.
Employee Satisfaction: SharePoint is a powerful tool, but it's not easy to use. The user interface is notoriously hard to use, which makes employee adoption more difficult. When an intranet isn't user-friendly, it takes too long to post updates, or employees can't find what they're looking for, trust in the intranet wanes. Employee satisfaction is often overlooked, but if an intranet is difficult to use, it affects employees' productivity.
Although SharePoint is powerful, its complexity is its downfall.
Manage: SharePoint can be a huge challenge, and if not managed correctly, it will quickly spiral out of control.
When SharePoint is properly curated and managed, it can be a good enough solution. But it can become a nightmare if you don't have someone in your company who’s experienced in managing SharePoint or working with consultants. Sharepoint is a big system. And it can be very overwhelming, so employees stop using it and start saving files in teams instead. This leads to information silos and documents that aren't managed.
Pricing
You can get SharePoint for free.
It's true! You don't have to pay anything at all to use Sharepoint.
But there is a catch: it's not "free" when considering the hidden costs.
If you're looking to set up a SharePoint intranet site, you'll need to budget for the initial setup, ongoing maintenance, and development costs. SharePoint is included in the Microsoft Office 365 E3 plan for businesses that use Microsoft Office 365 technologies. The price comes in at a hefty $23 USD per user/month for a yearly subscription. The initial setup and recurring SharePoint system administration costs can soon add up. Adding new features or integrations to your SharePoint site involves hiring SharePoint developers. When things break (which they will), it can be an ongoing cost to fix and maintain it.
SharePoint is 'free,' but with setup, maintenance, and customizations, "free" turns into “expensive” very quickly.
Jostle provides a central communication hub for users and brings teams together. It offers a range of features you would expect from a communications intranet, including announcements, news and discussions, and an org chart. It also provides a library for storing and accessing files.
It offers integrations with platforms such as Google Workspace, Microsoft, and an API.
Simplicity: Jostle’s strength is its simplicity, but if you want a lot of flexibility or customization in your intranet, you may need to look at other platforms.
Pricing
Jostle's tiered pricing plans for a prepaid annual subscription are a good way to get started with the platform. It offers add-ons such as tasks, org charts, listings for buy and sell, and events. There are no installation costs. Jostle provides support for all of its packages. The Gold plan for 50 users costs $11.00 USD per user/month.
While Jostle bills itself as an employee success platform, it falls short for businesses that want to customize their intranet or need more advanced features like cloud file sharing or work management tools. However, if you're looking for something lightweight and less expensive, this could be a good option for small teams.
What your company values most will affect how much an intranet solution will cost. The actual costs are determined by various factors, including
Remember that price isn't the only consideration when it comes to software. Features, security, usability, adaptivity, and performance are all critical components of any intranet project. With any project, you want to get the most bang for your buck as soon as possible rather than wait for months.
All three intranet solutions we considered are well-known in the collaboration space, and for a good reason. They all have communication tools and integrations that allow teams to collaborate. But CentricMinds outperforms them for two very good reasons:
1) It is adaptable and can meet the changing needs of business and its users;
2) CentricMinds' ease of use allows teams to share and find what they need easily.
As a result, your workforce is more empowered and productive.
CentricMinds is the way to go!
Check out the Glossary to help you understand industry jargon and ideas
Learn more about how CentricMinds Intranet can help you unify all your work with everyone in one single place.
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