--- title: "Build or buy an Intranet: is it worth building one?" description: Build or buy an intranet? Compare in-house builds, enterprise platforms, and self-service intranets on cost, IT effort, and who owns it after launch. image: https://blog.jostle.me/hubfs/What_is_performance_management_-min-1.png --- [![Jostle](https://blog.jostle.me/hubfs/Jostle_Jan2016_Images/jostleLogo.svg)](https://jostle.me/) [Blog](https://blog.jostle.me/) - [Product](https://jostle.me/product/) - [Pricing](https://jostle.me/pricing/) - [Case studies](https://jostle.me/why/case-studies/) [**Get Demo**](https://jostle.me/get-demo/) ![](https://jostle.me/assets/build/images/menu-back.svg)  [Back to all posts](https://blog.jostle.me/) # **Build or buy an Intranet: is it worth building one?** - [Intranet](https://blog.jostle.me/blog/topic/intranet) [![Gabe Scorgie](https://blog.jostle.me/hs-fs/hubfs/GabeS.jpeg?width=40&height=40&name=GabeS.jpeg)](https://blog.jostle.me/blog/author/gabe-scorgie) By [**Gabe Scorgie**](https://blog.jostle.me/blog/author/gabe-scorgie) 21 min read ![Build or buy an Intranet: is it worth building one?](https://blog.jostle.me/hubfs/What_is_performance_management_-min-1.png) **Quick Summary** - For most mid-market organizations, building an intranet in-house isn't worth the years of upkeep that follow launch. - Building makes sense when a dedicated team will own the intranet for years and no platform meets your requirements. - An enterprise intranet platform fits large organizations that need extensive configuration to manage publishing and access across business units. - A self-service intranet fits teams that want HR and comms to run it without a development or implementation project. - Compare the paths on who owns the intranet after launch, because that's where they differ most. Whether you work in IT, HR, internal comms, or on the leadership team, someone will likely ask early on why your company can't just build its own intranet. For most mid-market organizations, the honest answer is that building is possible, but it usually isn't worth the ongoing work. Building an intranet is a project with an end date. Owning one isn't, because someone has to keep the code working, the permissions right, and the content current for as long as people use it. Building does pay off for some organizations, usually those with a dedicated team that will run the intranet for years. Large enterprises have that team more often than mid-market companies do. Buying isn't automatically simpler, either. An enterprise intranet platform can still need configuration, outside consultants, and IT time before anyone logs in. A self-service platform is built for your own team to set up and run, with much less of that work. ## **Three approaches to build or buy an intranet** Most organizations end up on one of three paths. They differ in who builds the intranet, who sets it up, and who keeps it running after launch. ### **Path 1: Build in-house** Your own team designs the intranet, builds it, and runs it. In-house builds usually start from one of these: - **SharePoint:** It's one of the most common starting points, since many companies already have it through Microsoft 365. But[SharePoint is a document platform first](https://blog.jostle.me/blog/sharepoint-intranet), so your company still needs to plan the intranet's structure and configure its features. Custom development may be needed if the [built-in tools don't cover your requirements](https://blog.jostle.me/blog/is-sharepoint-the-best-choice-for-intranet). - **Custom development:** Your developers build the intranet as its own web application, or on a content management system such as WordPress or Drupal. They write or assemble the publishing, search, permissions, and navigation that a packaged platform would provide. - **A wiki:** It's quick to start, since anyone can create and edit pages. Its structure depends on the people who keep editing it, and pages go stale when nobody owns them. Whichever you choose, confirm with IT who'll maintain the intranet's configuration and any custom code after launch. ### **Path 2: Buy an enterprise intranet platform** You license a packaged intranet platform from a vendor that sells to large, complex organizations. These platforms are built for deep configuration and governance at that scale. That can include: - Multiple business units - Regional content and publishing teams - Different access rules by department or role - Integrations with HR systems and workplace applications - Highly customized information architecture The software is ready before you sign, but it can still need configuration, content migration, outside consultants, and IT involvement before launch. ### **Path 3: Buy a self-service intranet** You license a platform with the core structure already built, including news, documents, and an employee directory. Your own team configures it and runs it, with less development and implementation work. Setup comes down to decisions about your structure, your content, and who can publish. You customize within the platform's built-in structure, so HR and comms can keep it running without developer help. ## **The real cost of building an intranet** If you're preparing the business case for an intranet, count your own team's time as part of the cost. Include work during the build and after launch, even if you won't need any new hires. Here's what to account for: - **Initial development and migration costs:** Getting basic pages up is rarely the expensive part. Most of the cost goes into designing the site structure and permissions, building custom features, connecting your other systems, and moving old content over. Your team does that work or pays a contractor to do it. - **Development timeline:** A build moves at the pace of the people who review it. Department heads approve the design, a pilot group tests it, and content owners decide what moves over, all on top of their usual work. Every integration or custom workflow you add extends the schedule. - **Internal engineering or IT resources required:** Ask IT to estimate the time needed for setup and ongoing technical support, including any custom development. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reports a median annual wage of [$135,980 for software developers in May 2025](https://www.bls.gov/ooh/computer-and-information-technology/software-developers.htm). For example, if one developer spent 25% of their working time on the intranet over a year, that would represent about $34,000 in wages before benefits and other employment costs. Use your own staffing estimates and any contractor quotes to calculate the actual cost. - **Ongoing maintenance:** Changes to the software behind your intranet can create work for your technical team. For example, Microsoft retired [SharePoint Add-Ins](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/dev/sp-add-ins/retirement-announcement-for-add-ins)and [SharePoint 2013 workflows](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/sharepoint/dev/transform/modernize-workflows) in SharePoint Online on April 2, 2026. Teams that depended on those features had to migrate to supported alternatives. - **Security and compliance responsibility:** When your team writes the code, keeping it secure is your team's job. Cloud providers secure their own infrastructure, but under[Microsoft's shared responsibility model](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/security/fundamentals/shared-responsibility), for example, you're still responsible for your data, your access controls, and the security of any code you add. You also have to track every component the intranet uses and keep each one updated. - **Key-person dependency:** A custom intranet can end up depending on the one or two people who built it. When the developer who wrote your custom directory search leaves, the next platform change can break it, and nobody left knows the code. Documentation and shared ownership lower that risk, but they take time from the same small team. - **User adoption risk:** On a build, everything that gets people to use the intranet is yours to design and fund, including navigation, search, and the content owners who keep pages current. If a department's pages go stale, people go back to asking HR by email. - **Total cost of ownership beyond launch:** Compare the build and ongoing upkeep with the full cost of buying over the same period. On the buying side, include any implementation or integration charges alongside the subscription, and account for your own team's setup time and content maintenance under both options. Together, these make an in-house intranet a piece of internal software you'll staff and fund for as long as people use it. ### **When building an intranet actually makes sense** Before recommending an in-house build, review these points with IT: - **A team will own it for good:** You have platform or engineering staff who'll run and improve the intranet for years after launch. - **Your requirements go beyond any platform:** You need something configuration can't do, like connecting internal systems that have no ready-made integration. A different look doesn't count. - **You treat internal tools like products:** Your company already plans releases, tracks dependencies, and patches the software it builds for itself. - **The full cost still favors building:** You've priced the build plus years of upkeep, and custom development still comes out ahead. If the first point is uncertain, people who already have full-time jobs usually end up doing the upkeep above. ## **Buying an enterprise intranet can still mean a major implementation** Buying removes the need to develop an intranet from scratch. But it doesn't always remove the implementation work, and on an enterprise platform that work can be a project of its own. ### **Configuration before launch** An enterprise platform gives you a lot to set up before anyone uses it. HR and comms decide the site structure, the navigation, the branding, and who can publish where. They also define the audience groups the platform uses to target content, usually built from your org chart. Each of those decisions needs agreement from the departments it affects, and getting that agreement takes time. That depth gives a large organization fine control over who sees what. Some vendors also offer a templated setup that moves faster, with fewer choices to make. ### **Implementation partners and professional services** Many enterprise platforms deliver implementation through the vendor's own services team, a certified partner, or both. Partners typically handle deployment and change management, and on a larger project, you can also bring in a systems integrator for the integrations. That can mean a second contract and a second project manager alongside the license. Someone on your side still coordinates both and supplies the internal people each one needs. ### **Migration and integration work** Before you move content, you have to decide what's worth moving, whether it lives on an old intranet or in shared drives. That means retiring outdated material and mapping the rest to the new structure. Much of that review is manual work for your content owners. Some vendors automate migration from specific older platforms, so the effort depends on what you're leaving. You'll also choose which workplace systems to connect, such as your HR system or Microsoft 365, and what data each one shares with the platform. Each connection needs its own setup and testing before launch. ### **IT involvement during deployment** IT handles the technical setup during deployment. It connects single sign-on and user provisioning from your directory, and it maps the employee fields your audience groups are built from. Each of those steps needs someone with the right admin rights, and on a small IT team, that can be one person who's also running everything else. Connecting the platform to Microsoft 365 also needs an administrator to approve its access across the organization. Microsoft calls that approval [a sensitive operation](https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/entra/identity/enterprise-apps/grant-admin-consent), so IT usually reviews the vendor's security before granting it. ### **Ongoing IT or vendor dependency** You can keep depending on IT or the vendor after launch. A reorganization may require changes to the rules that determine who sees which content. Whether IT needs to help depends on how those rules are managed. Vendors also update their platforms on their own schedules. If an older feature is retired, your team may need to review migrated content or update custom layouts. Changes your admins can't make, such as a custom integration, may involve paid services. Ask which work your subscription covers and which is billed separately. That help can be worth paying for when your team doesn't have the expertise to handle the work itself. ### **Costs beyond the license fee** The subscription is often one line of several. Implementation services, consulting, content migration, integration add-ons, and higher support tiers can each be priced separately, and some are quoted only after scoping. Some vendors include support in the subscription, so the gap between vendors can be wide. Ask each vendor for the first-year and second-year totals before you compare platforms. Then add the implementation hours your own IT, HR, and comms teams will spend, since that time differs by path and never appears on an invoice. ## **How Jostle delivers a self-service intranet** A self-service platform moves setup and upkeep to the people who already own your content. Jostle, an employee success platform, is built that way. Your team configures it without a development project or an outside implementation partner, and a Jostle Customer Success Manager guides the launch. The decisions are still yours, and forming your communication strategy usually takes the most setup time. ### **News, Library, and People without a development project** A custom-built intranet starts empty. Your team has to design and build the news page, the document library, and the employee directory before anyone can use them. Jostle comes with the tools your team needs to publish updates and help employees find information: - **News:** Publish company announcements and target them to the relevant employees. - **Library:** Organize policies and manuals by topic, with a named owner responsible for each area. - **People:** Give employees a searchable directory, with profile data that can sync from your HR system or IT directory. - **Search:** Help employees find documents and colleagues, with results limited to information they're allowed to see. Setup takes no code. Your launch team matches the platform to your structure and branding, then adds content and people. ### **Role- and team-based access** When an employee changes departments on a typical intranet, their access to pages and files goes out of date until someone fixes it by hand, often in IT. In Jostle, access follows the groups people belong to, such as a location, department, team, or employee type. Those groups update from your HR system or directory, so when someone moves, what they can see changes with them. IT connects that sync once, at setup. Administrators can also[set access by role, location, and other details](https://jostle.me/security/), and[Library sets permissions per topic](https://jostle.me/product/how/library/) instead of file by file. ### **Item-level content targeting instead of departmental sites** Traditional intranets give each department, location, and project its own site, and[each one becomes its own information silo](https://jostle.me/why/replacing-intranets/). Every site also needs someone to build it and keep it current. Jostle targets each News item instead. A post goes to its own audience, such as a department, a location, an employee type, or named people. For example, a cafeteria menu can go only to the people who work at that location, and nobody has to build a department site to reach them. ### **Mobile and JostleTV access for frontline teams** If you're responsible for frontline communications in a company with a large number of deskless employees, you need a reliable way to reach them. At [KF Aerospace](https://jostle.me/why/case-studies/kf-aerospace/), for example, more than 80% of employees work in the hangars and rarely use a computer. Receptionists at each location used to print the articles leadership flagged and leave them in the lunchroom every week. The company then started using [JostleTV](https://jostle.me/product/jostle-tv/) to stream News to the TVs already in its lunchrooms and hangars. JostleTV, available as an add-on, automatically selects content for each screen's location, so nobody needs to maintain a slideshow. Employees can also catch up through [Jostle's mobile app](https://jostle.me/product/mobile/), which lets them read News and open company documents on their phones. ### **Microsoft 365 and Google Workspace integrations** If your company uses Microsoft 365 or Google Workspace, Jostle can store Library files in that environment. Once the integration is configured, the permissions you set in Jostle are enforced in the connected storage. - [**Microsoft 365**](https://jostle.me/microsoft-365): Library files are stored in OneDrive. Employees can sign in with Entra ID and co-edit Microsoft 365 documents from Jostle. - [**Google Workspace**](https://jostle.me/google-workspace): Library files are stored in Drive. Employees can use Google sign-in and co-edit Google Workspace documents. Linked Google Groups also update when you change the corresponding org unit in Jostle. In both cases, IT connects the integration once at setup, and nobody maintains a second set of file permissions after that. ### **Fewer development tickets for day-to-day changes** On many intranets, small changes wait in IT's queue, like giving a new person publishing rights or replacing a page owner who left. In Jostle, the people who own the content make those changes. News Editors use[Reporter Groups](https://jostle.me/product/governance/) to let subject matter experts, such as HR or a project manager, publish in their own News categories. When a Library topic owner leaves, you assign the topic to their replacement. Project managers add people to a team by dragging them onto it. At[Mike Albert Fleet Solutions](https://jostle.me/why/case-studies/mike-albert-fleet-solutions/), content on the old intranet needed the IT team for every edit. Its president, Jeff Hart, says Jostle "doesn't require the help of our IT team to add or manage content." ## **Build vs buy an intranet: A decision framework** Use this table to compare what your team would need to manage before and after launch: | **Criteria** | **Build In-House** | **Enterprise Intranet Platform** | **Self-Service Intranet** | | --- | --- | --- | --- | | Time to deployment | Often the longest, set by development and reviews | Varies with configuration, migration, and partner work | Usually the shortest, since setup needs no development | | Development required | Yes, for design, custom features, and integrations | Minimal coding, heavy configuration | None | | IT involvement at launch | High, leads technical setup | Moderate to high, handles identity and integrations | Low, connects sign-in and employee data | | Ongoing IT dependency | High, for fixes, updates, and platform changes | Varies, supports integrations and technical changes | Low, mostly for new integrations | | Implementation partner | Optional specialist help | Often, through vendor services or a certified partner | Not required; the vendor guides setup | | Upfront cost | Developer and consultant time, plus migration | Implementation services, migration, and integrations on top of the license | Low, mostly your team's setup time | | Ongoing costs | Platform costs and technical upkeep | Subscription, plus support tiers, retainers, or services | Subscription, plus your team's content upkeep | | Customization | Full control, limited by your team's time | Deep, through configuration and services | Configurable within the platform's structure | | Internal ownership required | Technical upkeep and content governance | Platform administration and content governance | Content and governance | | Best fit | Organizations with a team to own it long-term and requirements no platform meets | Large organizations with complex governance and the budget for an implementation project | Mid-market organizations that want HR and comms to run it without a development or implementation project | ## **How to choose the right intranet approach** Match the path to the team you'll have after launch, then check it against the table. - **Choose custom development if** a dedicated team will own the intranet for years and no platform meets your requirements. If you can staff the development, platform changes, and security work in the table's ongoing rows every year, building gives you full control. - **Choose an enterprise intranet platform if** you need extensive configuration to manage publishing and access across business units. Also confirm that you have the IT time for implementation, and include any partner fees in your budget. - **Choose a self-service intranet platform if** you want HR and comms to run the intranet without a development or implementation project. It fits when IT can connect sign-in and employee data once, and when the platform's structure covers what you need. Whichever path you bring to leadership, name who will own the intranet a year after launch and confirm that they have time set aside for the ongoing work. That answer settles most of the other rows. ## **Jostle: The best fit for teams that want a self-service intranet without a major implementation** If the self-service path fits your organization, Jostle is built for it. We designed it to help your HR and comms teams launch an intranet in days, with no setup fees. Your team prepares the content and keeps it current, while IT helps connect sign-in and employee data. To see what getting started would involve for your team, [get a demo](https://jostle.me/get-demo/) and bring the requirements you think need custom development. Ask us to walk through what Jostle can cover and how you'd manage it after launch. ![placeholder](https://blog.jostle.me/hubfs/Blog%20CTAs/doodad_blue01.svg) ![Blog\_CTA-EmployeeSuccess-help-tiny](https://blog.jostle.me/hs-fs/hubfs/Blog_CTA-EmployeeSuccess-help-tiny.png?width=450&height=255&name=Blog_CTA-EmployeeSuccess-help-tiny.png) ### Work has shifted dramatically. Help all employees be successful. [![Learn how](https://no-cache.hubspot.com/cta/default/1842135/d51e4989-60e6-4d99-a6f4-6ac5d328c45c.png)](https://cta-redirect.hubspot.com/cta/redirect/1842135/d51e4989-60e6-4d99-a6f4-6ac5d328c45c) ![placeholder](https://blog.jostle.me/hubfs/Blog%20CTAs/doodad_blue02.svg) [![Gabe Scorgie](https://blog.jostle.me/hs-fs/hubfs/GabeS.jpeg?width=40&height=40&name=GabeS.jpeg)](https://blog.jostle.me/blog/author/gabe-scorgie) Read more by [**Gabe Scorgie**](https://blog.jostle.me/blog/author/gabe-scorgie) - Share this: - - - ## **Add your comments** --- ## **Read more** [⟨Previous post](https://blog.jostle.me/blog/intranet-effectiveness) [![How to Measure Intranet Effectiveness: The Metrics That Show What's Actually Working](https://blog.jostle.me/hubfs/Leadership_vs._management-1.png)](https://blog.jostle.me/blog/intranet-effectiveness) ### [**How to Measure Intranet Effectiveness: The Metrics That Show What's Actually Working**](https://blog.jostle.me/blog/intranet-effectiveness) ### Table of Contents [![Jostle](https://www.jostle.me/assets/build/images/jostleLogo.svg)](https://jostle.me/) Jostle’s employee success platform is where everyone connects, communicates, and celebrates at work. 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