I get asked a few times to week to estimate the cost of building online instruction. This is fairly easy to do on projects that are very similar to projects already completed (where scope, process, and costs are known) but really, really hard to estimate on new projects where there are so many unknowns. On new projects, without a LOT of additional information (which typically is gathered at the front end of a project), this is like trying to estimate the cost of building a house. How big of a house? Basement or slab? How many floors? What style? Finishes? Building site? Schedule?

I know it sounds like I’m either an idiot (NOT!) or playing games (double NOT!) to say I don’t know when I am asked this question but it really doesn’t do anyone any good, including the person who is asking the question, to pretend I know enough to provide a good answer. And even when we gather information before the project begins in order to estimate costs, here’s a guarantee I can make because it’s been true in every project I have worked on: We will learn things when we are working together and prototyping (one of the typical first steps) that will likely change what is wanted/needed and what it’ll cost.

Here are some of the typical issues that impact cost (and time):

• Prototyping (prototypes take more time and cost more up front but save a lot of time and cost from there on out)
• Instructional design and development expertise (advanced expertise lowers time and therefore cost)
• Availability of existing usable content (existing content typically requires more effort to make usable than expected and this adds to time and cost)
• SME and client stakeholder availability (better availability lowers time and cost)
• Graphics and media development (more and higher quality/fidelity means more time and higher cost)
• Interactivity (the more interactivity, the more time and the higher the cost… but not always)
• Amount of iteration (the more changes, the more time and the higher the cost… most clients underestimate how many changes they’ll want to make )
• Schedule (tighter deadlines increase cost because more people need to be involved)
• Process (the simpler and more streamlined the process, the lower the cost)
• Signoffs (more signoffs usually mean more changes, more time, and more costs)

So my general answer to the “How much will it cost?” is to say that I’ll have a much better idea after prototyping. When folks have a fixed budget (which is the norm), it’s better to answer the questions, “What do you need?” and “How much can you spend?” rather than guess at the answer to the question, “How much will it cost?” Here’s why. There is no one right way to build good online (or classroom or hybrid) instruction. With a known budget, figuring out how to get the biggest bang for your buck becomes easier. In other words, spend the money on this and not that, do these things this way instead of that way, use free ______ for these purposes, etc.

A LOT can be done less expensively. I’m working on a project now that needs to be high impact and low cost. We’re going to build templates for commonly used elements, use easy-to-use development tools with creative outputs, do media development on the cheap, and use impactful images with audio in place of some of the videos we wanted to shoot . We’re combining a wide range of client and vendor resources to save money. And we’re building it so the client can maintain it. The point? You can do a lot with less.

My colleague, Jenise Cook, wrote a blog posting on this topic and I recommend you read it for additional information and resources.

Questions or comments?