Tips for Picking the Right WordPress Website Builder.
Designer, Developer or Website Builder?
Know what you need for best website results & how to ask the right questions before hiring a WordPress professional.
Here’s a great article by Joe Fylan that covers the differences between types of WordPress specialists, what they do, and what to ask before you hire one of them for your WordPress project.
WordPress Designer
I’ve listed designers first because if you’re building a custom WordPress website, the first step is usually to figure out exactly what it’s going to look like. Designers are typically masters when it comes to working with: Photoshop, Fireworks, Illustrator, WordPress.
It also not uncommon for designers to have a little or even extensive knowledge of HTML and CSS. So what does all this mean? It means that a designer can help you create the overall look and feel of your website. Site architecture, layout, colors, fonts, design elements and more.
Once they’ve finished designing your website, the Photoshop files are typically handed off to a developer for coding. If you’re working with a premade theme, a designer can help you change some of the specific design elements in order to customize your site.
WordPress Developer
Good WordPress developers are in high demand. Finding one who has time available to handle your project is not always an easy task but that depends largely on the size and complexity of your project. An individual who considers themselves to be a developer will usually have skills that include: in-depth knowledge of WordPress core, themes, possibly plugins, PHP, HTML, CSS, JAVA, JQUERY, MYSQL
Once a developer receives the Photoshop files from the designer, they can get started coding the website. The Coles Notes version of a developers job is essentially to take a visual representation of your site and turn it into a functional and fully-interactive website…
Developer-Designer Hybrid
This is actually more common that you might imagine – especially on smaller projects that are typical of a small to medium size business. If you’re a business owner who is looking for a custom website or if you want to have a template customized, chances are you’ll end up working with someone who has a mix of both design and development skills. It’s also pretty common for a designer-developer hybrid to bring in some outside help for areas of a project that might be beyond their skill level although there are certainly times when this isn’t required.
WordPress Site Builder
The premium WordPress theme market has created yet another category of WordPress professional. Some people call them website builders or architects. Most of the time these individuals will work with themes from a particular theme company. For example, Elegant Themes.
Although not technically a developer or designer, that doesn’t mean this WordPress professional isn’t a force to be reckoned with. Someone working in this category will probably have some rudimentary knowledge of design principles, HTML, CSS and maybe even a little PHP although they are probably classified as more of a hack than anything else.
As a business owner, this can actually end up being one of the best types of WordPress professionals to work with, and for good reason. Similar to hiring a general contractor to build a home, site builders often have extensive knowledge of which specific skills are required to complete a particular task. They understand when you’ll need help from a developer or when a particular design element will require help from a full-time designer. You might also find that they’re well versed in things like conversion optimization, email marketing, and social media.
Recommended WordPress Website Builders:
Important Qualities to Look For
There are seven things that are worth looking for in your quest for successful project completion. These are all things that you could assess as a layperson, knowing little or nothing about code, design or WordPress in general…
- Are They Communicative
- Personality Fit
- Flexibility
- A Portfolio of Appropriate Projects
- Quality References
- Skill-Set and Scope
- What Do They Ask For?
Wrap-Up
Finding the right developer or designer for your project doesn’t need to be a complicated process. Once you understand what kind of help you need, it’s just a case of making sure you’re hiring someone who has the qualifications that are required to see each stage of your project through to completion.
Just because you don’t understand WordPress best practices, how to design for the web or what the heck PHP is, this doesn’t mean you can’t hire the right people to get the job done…
For the full article, please follow this link to ElegantThemes, written by Joe Fylan
