How to Hire a Web Developer
Have you reached the point that you need a professional working on staff to build and maintain your web presence? Here's your guide to the best practices for hiring a web developer.
With online sales accounting for a growing slice of retail revenue – Forrester Research estimates they could hit $177 billion in 2010 – and online marketing the key to many start-ups' success, it's crucial to work with a skilled web developer from the start.
But is adding a full-time developer to your team necessary? If your business is primarily online, or will incorporate a lot of mobile technology: certainly. If not, and you and your current staff are equipped to handle site maintenance and upkeep, you might consider retaining an independent contractor.
For Jamie Resker, who advises companies on workforce issues, hiring a contractor was an easy solution: "For my consulting business, I hired someone to do a site for me, and now I write my own content," she says. "I've encountered a lot of small-business owners can do it themselves."
Whether you're seeking a contractor for initial design and ongoing support or a full-time developer, it's important to identify exactly what skills and qualifications your developer will need to possess. The simplest way is to lay them out in a job description.
Dig Deeper: Find a Web Developer, Not a Belly Itcher
Hiring a Web Developer: The Job Description
The first item under the job title should be a summary overview the position. A list of job duties and responsibilities should follow. Though the nuts and bolts of the job responsibilities can vary, overall front-end site management is generally included, as are the abilities to optimize graphics and webpages, and do cross-browser optimization.
Hand-coding HTML should be among any developer's skill set, as should using CSS. Depending on your company's needs, other skills could include managing SEO, JavaScript, XML, CGI scripting and familiarity with server-side includes. Even if they're not necessary for the job at hand, it could benefit you to look for people who are familiar with more recent advancements in web technologies, such as CSS3 and HTML5.
Resker advises to examine what's new in job listings, such as the ability to do search-engine optimization, which has become a mainstream job requirement over the past couple years.
"If they're hiring someone to do the web work, they're not only hiring someone to get the content up, but hiring someone so that they're find-able when someone Googles them – someone who's going to know how to use keyword search," she says. "They need to be marketing-savvy and know what terms someone might use to look. Knowing what a long-tail keyword is, too."
Despite the host of technical skills they'll need to possess, a developer should no longer be thought of as a solitary worker. They'll need top-notch communication skills, and the ability to work well as a team with programmers, designers and marketing specialists. If you're hiring a senior developer, you'll also want to make sure your new hire possesses leadership skills and that you could foresee them leading a growing team of developers.
When drafting the description, it's key not to forget a catch-phrase line to include additional "duties as assigned," just in case the job morphs over time or something is omitted. "Basically, it's so a hire doesn't come back and say 'that wasn't in my job description," says Roberta Chinsky Matuson, the founder and principal of Human Resource Solutions.
Dig Deeper: View a Sample Job Description Template
Hiring a Web Developer: How to Determine Compensation
Before deciding a salary, it is important to weigh the skill level of the position you need filled with the amount you are prepared to spend and find a balance. A junior developer with less than one year of experience could a cost-effective hire – but without strong coding knowledge or familiarity with SEO or CSS might not possess the skill set necessary to oversee a site. Seek a mid-level or senior developer for all-encompassing responsibility loads.
To find a salary that's fair to offer, search other local listings online, and check out what web developers earn in your area on PayScale.com – where you can search for position plus experience, and take location into account. Searching Salary.com reveals that the median base salary for a web developer in a large city is between $48,000 and $64,000. But expect to pay more for a senior developer being hired into a do-it-all position.
When in doubt, it's also perfectly couth to ask applicants about their salary expectations. Consider benefits, also, as part of that expectation, because there is no gold standard for salary-setting.
That said, it's perfectly couth to ask applicants about their salary expectations in terms of base plus benefits. It's also worth asking what sort of salary scale the candidate expects for the rest of his or her staff.
And don't ignore the power of benefits to affect a web developer's decision to join your company. In small companies, benefits send important signals about culture and stability. "If you're like Google and have incredible benefits, then you might not need to pay that much. But if you don't offer health insurance, you might need to pay more," Matuson says.
Dig Deeper: Inc.com's Guide to Employee Compensation
Hiring a Web Developer: Attracting the Right Applicants
