To: NGACO Education Foundation Board Members

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To: NGACO Education Foundation Board Members

From: WRTG 3035 Technical Communication Class at the University of Colorado

Date: 3/17/2010

Subject: Website Budget

After researching several website hosting sites, we have chosenwhat seem to bethe two best options. CertifiedHosting.com and Ipower.com both offer excellent website hosting and should be considered for the NGACO Education Foundation website. The costs associated with the website include the yearly hosting fee, domain privacy, domain registration, and site backups. Software licensing costs also factor in.

The Hosting Plans:

Both Ipower and Certified Hosting offer great plans. Ipower tends to have more advanced hosting features, and has better compatibility with the free programming software, Wordpress. However, Certified Hosting has better compatibility with the more robust Dolphin software. When used together, Certified Hosting and Dolphin outperform Ipower’s hosting features.

Dolphin is an open-source website programming software that provides many tools and features for creating a website community. Dolphin is database driven, and compared to Wordpress, it allows for more dynamic statistics, better integration with social networks, and has better plug-ins. The catch is that Dolphin costs $299 for a license, while Wordpress is free.

If the Foundation decides to go with Certified Hosting, we highly recommendpurchasing a $299 license for Dolphin (for more info see

If the foundation decides to go with Ipower, site-backup capabilities would need to be purchased for $12.95 annually (they are included in Dolphin and thus would not be needed for Certified Hosting).

Regardless of which hosting plan the Foundation chooses, we recommend adding yearly domain registration and domain privacy to the plan. Domain Registration is required for all websites. Domain privacy protects The Education Foundation contact and private information from being accessible through the site. Both sites come with the ability to create POP3 email accounts through the domain name, at no extra cost. This means we can create email accounts through the website, creating a uniformity and professional look for the Education Foundation.

Summary:

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AnnualCosts / Certified Hosting / Ipower
Hosting / $95.40 / $71.40
Domain Registration / $14.99 / $9.99
Domain Privacy / $9.99 / $8.99
Site Backups / (Included in Dolphin) / $12.95
Total Annual Cost / $120.38 per year / $103.33 per year
One-Time Costs (Dolphin License) / $299.00 / $0

Recommendation:

The Design Team for the NGACO Education Foundation’s website recommends the Foundation purchased Certified Hosting’s ‘Geek Plan’ for $7.95 per month. The annual costs associated with this plan total $120.38 when Domain Registration and Privacy are included. This plan also carries the purchase of a Dolphin license for the one-time cost of $299.

The additional costs for the Certified Hosting Plan will be justified through the creation of a better website for the Education Foundation. If we use Certified Hosting over Ipower, we can program the site to automatically mail out notifications to people (if deadline is approaching and their application is unfinished). We can also program the site so you can be notified when someone submits an application. Additionally, the site will be facebook compatible and more community based than if we were to use Wordpress for the programming. Overall, the use of Certified Hosting will result in a more successful website for the Education Foundation.

[for more information visit

Please let us know of any additional questions you may have.