9. Analysis of website construction cost for small and medium-sized enterprises: How much can AnQiCMS save?

title: Cost Analysis of Small and Medium Enterprise Website Construction: How much can AnQiCMS save? description: I calculated the cost with real data: For a website with 50,000 PV per day, how much difference is there in the annual server cost between WordPress and AnQiCMS? The answer may exceed your expectations. keywords: Small and Medium Enterprise Website Construction, CMS Selection, Cost Analysis tag: Small and Medium Enterprise Website Construction, AnQiCMS, Cost Analysis, Server

category_id: 35

Small and medium-sized enterprise website construction, the budget is generally 5000 to 30,000. What is the main part of it?

Many people think it is development cost, but it is not necessarily so. If an open-source CMS is used, the development cost can be greatly reduced.But the server and maintenance costs are long-term expenses, and after three years, they may be higher than the development costs.

I calculated an account with real data.

Scenario setting

Assume that a small and medium-sized enterprise needs to build a website, with daily PV reaching 50,000 and average daily IP about 15,000.

Website content: 50 categories, 2000 articles, 200 product pages, 500 images.

Page type: Home, Category list page, Article detail page, Product detail page, About us, Contact information.

Cost of WordPress solution

Server

A WordPress website with 50,000 daily page views can't handle a 2-core 4G server.When concurrency is high, there will be delays. Adding cache can improve it, but problems will still occur when the cache expires.

A stable configuration is 4 cores 8G, plus Redis cache.

4-core 8GB server: approximately 400 yuan/month, 4800 yuan/year. Redis: If it is a cloud database Redis, it is about 200 yuan per month, 2400 yuan for a year. SSL certificate: Free Let’s Encrypt, 0 yuan.

The first-year server fee is: 4800 + 2400 = 7200 yuan.

Plugin fee

WordPress needs to install plugins:

• SEO plugin (Yoast SEO or Rank Math): The free version is enough, 0 yuan.
• Cache plugin (WP Super Cache): The free version is enough, 0 yuan.
• Security plugin (Wordfence): The free version is enough, 0 yuan.
• Multilingual plugin (WPML): If you need multilingual, 49 USD/year, about 350 yuan.

First-year plugin fee: about 350 yuan (if you need multilingual).

Domain and email

Domain: .com domain about 70 yuan/year. Corporate email: Tencent corporate email or Ali corporate email, the free version is enough.

First-year domain fee: about 70 yuan.

Maintenance cost

This is a cost that is easily overlooked.

WordPress needs regular updates: WordPress core, plugins, themes, PHP version, MySQL version. Each update may cause website problems, and someone needs to keep an eye on it.

Server maintenance: monitoring, backup, security enhancement, log analysis. If the company has operation and maintenance personnel, it's okay. If not, it needs to be outsourced. The outsourcing maintenance fee is generally 500-1000 yuan/month, 6000-12000 yuan/year.

First-year maintenance cost: according to outsourcing, about 8000 yuan.

Total cost of the WordPress plan for the first year

7200 + 350 + 70 + 8000 = 15620 yuan.

Note that this cost does not include development fees. If you buy a theme from the template market, it can be done for a few thousand. If you use a ready-made template without any changes, it can also be done for a few thousand.

But the server and maintenance costs are something that needs to be spent every year. In three years, the server and maintenance costs will be 35620 + 8000 x 2 = 51620 yuan.

The cost of the AnQiCMS plan

Server

AnQiCMS is written in Go language, without PHP interpretation overhead, without additional caching needs. Under the same traffic, 4 cores 8G is enough.

4-core 8G server: about 400 yuan/month, 4800 yuan for a year. SSL certificate: Free Let's Encrypt, 0 yuan. Redis: Not needed, 0 yuan.

First-year server fee: 4800 yuan.

Plugin fee

AnQiCMS's multilingual, SEO, and custom field features are all built-in, no additional plugins are needed.

Plugin fee: 0 yuan.

Domain and email

Domain: .com domain is about 70 yuan per year. Corporate email: Same as WordPress plan.

First-year domain fee: about 70 yuan.

Maintenance cost

AnQiCMS maintenance is simpler:

• Only need to update the AnQiCMS program itself, no need to update a bunch of plugins and themes.
• Updating Go binary files is convenient, just download the new version and replace it.
• Logs are clear, and troubleshooting is quick.

Outsourced maintenance fees are generally 300-500 yuan per month, 3600-6000 yuan per year.

First-year maintenance cost: According to outsourcing, about 4500 yuan.

Total cost of AnQiCMS plan in the first year

4800 + 0 + 70 + 4500 = 9370 yuan.

In three years: 9370 + 4500 x 2 = 18370 yuan.

cost comparison

Save 6250 yuan in the first year, over 12870 yuan in three years.

If the daily PV is higher, the gap will be larger. If the daily PV is 200,000, WordPress may need 8-core 16G + Redis cluster, the server cost will double, and the gap will be pulled to over 10,000 yuan.

Hidden costs

In addition to the money on the books, there are also some hidden costs:

Time cost

When WordPress has a problem, it takes time to investigate. PHP error messages are sometimes not intuitive, and you need to check the logs, look up documents, and search forums. AnQiCMS logs are clear, error messages are direct, and troubleshooting is fast.

Security risk

WordPress is a favorite target for hackers due to its large user base. The risk of being hacked or attacked is higher than that of niche CMS. The cost of recovery is very high once a security incident occurs.

Labor cost

There are many people who know WordPress, but relatively fewer who know PHP. When looking for outsourcing development or custom features, the labor cost of PHP development is slightly lower than that of Go, but the gap is not large. The key is that the WordPress ecosystem is large, with many choices and full competition, which makes the price low instead.

In what situations is WordPress more cost-effective

If your website:

• Daily PV is below 5000
• Does not need multilingual
• Does not need to modify the existing template
• There are technical personnel who understand WordPress

The total cost of WordPress may be lower, as there are many free themes and plugins, and the development labor cost is low.

In what situations is AnQiCMS more cost-effective

If your website:

• Daily PV is over 10,000
• Multi-language is needed
• Performance is required
• There are no full-time operations personnel

The total cost of AnQiCMS is lower, and the savings on servers and maintenance are obvious.

Summary

For small and medium-sized enterprise website construction, don't just look at the development cost. Servers and maintenance are long-term expenses, and after three years, they may be higher than the development cost.

Using the AnQiCMS solution, you can save more than 6,000 yuan in the first year and more than 12,000 yuan in three years. For small and medium-sized enterprises with limited budgets, this amount is not small.

Of course, there is still a gap in the ecosystem of AnQiCMS compared to WordPress. If your needs are more complex and require a large number of third-party integrations, WordPress has more options. If it is just for a corporate website, AnQiCMS is more than enough and also more cost-effective.