How Much Should a Virtual Data Room Cost?
Documents are starting to get more accessible in the virtual world. Due to a variety of factors, physical data rooms aren’t enough for current client needs. Thankfully the cost of running a virtual data room is lower than sustaining a physical one.
In order to pick a cost-effective solution for your organization, it’s important to understand a couple of factors that play a part in establishing the price of a virtual data room.
How is the price of a virtual data room calculated?
When we look at the pricing, four factors establish the cost of a virtual data room:
Page-based pricing
This kind of pricing is dependent on the amount of data you would like to store in the virtual data room. As the name suggests, the cost is linked to the number of pages sent to the VDR. This could be ideal for non-document heavy deals. Larger projects wouldn’t be cost-effective for this pricing method.
User-based pricing
The more people you want to enable access to your virtual data room, the more you would need to pay. This solution could be well executed in smaller projects, but when it comes to big M&A deals, it wouldn’t be cost-effective. There are many people involved in such a transaction, and it is impossible to predict how many of them should be permitted to access such a repository.
Storage size
Storage size is an important factor that impacts cost. Regular documents aren’t usually big files, but when it comes to scans, some presentations, or PDFs, the size starts to add up. This is why some VDRs have put limits on storage and file transfer.
Flat fee
A more convenient pricing scheme resolution is a flat fee. A company can choose a plan from the VDR provider’s site, and then pay a flat fee each month. Every feature is listed in the plan and the customer knows exactly what he is paying for. This price is usually a combination of the pricing tactics listed above. This is the most price solution, but provides the teams with enough features to justify the cost.
Those are just a few of the pricing methods used by virtual data room providers. But what about the aforementioned features? What exactly are we paying for?
Features of VDRs based on pricing in 2021
VDRs provide their users with a variety of personalized features that cloud storage providers do not provide. This is why the cost of a virtual data room is more expensive. Here are a few of the features VDRs offer their customers:
- Security. This is probably the first feature that comes to mind when someone is considering a VDR. Sophisticated security protocols, 24/7 customer support, and permission sets are all worth the investment. The data for M&A deals is sensitive and only the best defense systems should be put in place to protect documents placed in the VDR.
- Management. The visual organization of a VDR is game changing. Seeing the documents put into folders, organized and connected to each other can save a lot of time. This enables a much smoother file sharing experience. It provides the users with tools to improve their workflow. An array of statistics are waiting for you to explore, and the analysis of who made what changes is easily accessible.
- Functionality. Virtual data rooms aim to make working with your documents as easy as possible. With efficient customer support and an interface design that encourages interaction, everything is created to serve the client.
- App integration. Some virtual data rooms enable their users to integrate apps like Google Calendar or Salesforce into the data room. This helps in managing the workflow and in a lot of cases saves time.
Conclusions
As you can see, a number of factors go into the pricing of virtual data rooms. The final price tag depends on your personal needs. Whether you are a small business owner that needs to use the VDR for only a couple of projects, or a CEO of a big corporation that relies on VDR for M&A deals and other tasks on a weekly basis, you will find a solution that suits your demands from 40 cents per page to $20000 per year charged as a flat fee.