So, you need to hire someone to help with your site – who do you hire? How much do they charge? What qualities should you look for? Where can you find someone?
This process can seem confusing to those not familiar with hiring technical help to build or maintain a website, it’s not so bad! Before starting, it’s important that you determine your needs and have a basic idea of budget.
When it looks like you’ll need to hire someone, you need to be detailed and specific. I can’t emphasize this enough. Defining the scope of the project is the biggest thing that will save you from encountering major problems later on. As I mentioned, you need to be as specific as possible. If you need modules changed or new functionality created, be sure to state this. Do you require a new theme, too? Will you require installation and modification? What’s your timeline? Think about the user perspective – what can an anonymous user do? What happens when they click there? Should that be hidden in search results? What should it look like?
While these seem somewhat obvious, remember that the developer or designer cannot read your mind. Vagueness never helps your bottom line.
Now that you have an idea of the project scope, you need to figure out a budget. When talking with programmers in regards to price you need to be clear - know exactly what you can afford. Don’t worry at this point, once you quote a price, the programmer will let you know what can and can’t be done within your budget. Sure, you may need to cut back on what you can get done at this time, however, this also allows you to break up the project into smaller tasks - which sometimes are easier on cost as well as stress levels. Be wary of flat rate quotes when you haven’t provided much detail yet.
With a budget in place, the next step is to match the desired skill level to the specific task. You wouldn’t want a plumber to rewire your house. The same idea applies to your website. You need the right person for the right job. For example, if you require a new theme, you need someone with CSS knowledge and Drupal experience to create what you desire. Take into consideration that experienced people can do most jobs in a shorter time, and implemented with higher quality, which will ultimately save you money.
Pricing is a very difficult realm to estimate. It’s like asking how much a house costs. Pricing will vary depending on the features you require, your timeline, and goals. You can find outsourced programmers for $10/hr, or you may pay $150/hr for a senior Drupal developer. You shouldn’t expect to pay less than $30/hr for a Drupal developer or themer with solid experience, and more likely in the $40-70/hr range. Exceptions exist, but they are often red flags, and you should proceed with caution if a candidate seems too good to be true. I would discourage you from working with a flat rate for your entire project, unless it a simple and very well defined task, such as installing Drupal on your server, adding a small feature to a module (these are often posted as “bounties” — as in “I will pay $X for feature Y”), or creating a simple Drupal theme from a set of detailed mockups.
Currently there are fewer good Drupal developers than the organizations who want them. Drupal has had a slower adoption in the corporate and mainstream world, but that is starting to change. If you are implementing a unique and complex set of features, it is best to go for a very experienced developer who knows Drupal’s best practices and will save you headaches down the road.
Mydrupal.com has a directory of Drupal service providers where some individuals and firms have listed their hourly rate.
Don’t forget the old story about the employer who complained that the repairman charged him $1000 for fixing a problem, even though he only tapped one spot with his hammer. So, the repair man itemized his bill: 1 tap = $5, knowing where to tap = $995.
Drupal is very much about “knowing where to tap,” and that takes months, if not years of building Drupal sites to be proficient at.
Now comes the time to actually hire on these people needed to get your website going. There are plenty of good resources out there on the technicalities of hiring a contractor, but here is a brief overview. You’ll want documentation, like a functional specs document, stating clearly what you require as detailed as possible, which includes agreed upon milestone dates. Wireframes are also a key document for planning and defining scope.
You will also need a contract. An excellent website to check out for contractor agreements and other legal forms is http://www.nolo.com. This site caters to the legal aspects of a business you’ll most commonly encounter.
Always expect that things will cost more and take longer than you think. The best thing you can do to keep your project on schedule and budget is get all materials to your workers as soon as possible, in particular preparing your site’s content when they request it. Building a site without having real content to enter is always a huge headache.
Drupal is open source software, and there is a strong community around contributing and sharing code with each other. You should talk to your developer about whether there will be modifications made or custom modules that you could contribute back to the community by posting it on Drupal.org. This is the main reason that Drupal is as fantastic as it is today. If you are a business or organization building your site on Drupal, the code you sponsor can be marked with your name and link when posted to the site, which ultimately helps your site!
The great thing about Drupal is that you can do a lot yourself without needing to be a programmer or sysadmin – but here is a rundown of some common titles that you may encounter.
A Drupal developer is a person who writes PHP code that specifically interacts with Drupal. They often live and breathe Drupal, and make up the core part of the Drupal community. Drupal programmers can also often suggest other helpers you may require for other parts of your project. Your developer should have specific knowledge of Drupal’s APIs, as well as have a good working knowledge of MySQL and PHP. Speaking from experience, I’ve never had a job go well where the developer was a PHP coder who figured Drupal would be easy to pick up along the way. Go for someone who already knows Drupal.
A sysadmin is short form for a system administrator. Sysadmins are hired most often in order to maintain or operate a computer system/network. While their main duty is to keep your web server running and secure, they may also be put in charge of other smaller responsibilities like installation, maintenance, and support of the site. Sysadmins are also the ones who generally handle backups and site performance issues (together with your developer). Sometimes, sysadmins may even do programming or scripting for your site - each case varies depending on project and person. You should make sure you are clear about who on your technical staff is doing what – will your developer be setting up your website on your server, or do you need someone to do this for you?
A site builder or webmaster is usually responsible for configuration of the website, along with maintaining it. They also may set up modules and themes for you, as well as being responsible for setting up access for the different user accounts needed. Your webmaster may help with content entry and configuration of various displays of content (such as Views and Blocks, in Drupal terms). Webmasters often know CSS/HTML and perhaps even PHP. They should know the ins and outs of Drupal and how to keep the pieces running smoothly once your site is set up. If you have a site that won’t require any programming, you may just need a webmaster or Drupal site builder to set up your installation and modules, and then be ready to go!
If your goal is a successful and popular website, one of the most important aspects is how easy it is to find in search engines. This is where a SEO Specialist comes in. SEO stands for Search Engine Optimization and these people help rank your site higher in search engines. SEO Specialists have several responsibilities - while it may seem easy to just use keywords in order to be found, there are countless unwritten rules and complex algorithms at play in your search engine rankings. SEO involves optimizing your code, content, presentation, and fixing problems that may prevent your website from ranking highly. SEO can be a shady business where a sly ‘professional’ looking to make a quick buck can actually ruin your long-term prospects for SEO, so it’s best to pick someone based on a good recommendation, not just a random forum post or Google ad. There are individuals and companies who specialize in SEO within Drupal, and many modules dedicated to improving search engine placement.
A graphic or web designer can be hired to create the visual look and feel of your website. You will likely need a company logo, business cards, and marketing materials, as well as your web site design. Some designers only do print or web design, and some do both. Make sure you are clear about this – a “web designer” may know nothing about preparing design materials for print, and there are too many horror stories about print designers thinking they can create web site designs.
You may also work with someone doing information architecture (IA) at this stage. This is someone who focuses on the layout, functionality, and content on each page, without working with the graphic design yet. They usually create “wireframes”, which are outlines of what your pages should look like.
Your designer likely works in Adobe Photoshop, and may only create “mockups” or “comps” (which are static pictures of what your website will look like), or he/she may also create the cut up web-ready graphics and CSS for you. In some cases, your graphic designer may also be proficient at creating a whole Drupal theme, but this is not a common combination of skills. If you have either just mockups, or static HTML/CSS, you will still need a themer to turn this into a live Drupal theme.
A themer is someone who specifically creates the Drupal theme (aka “skin” or “template”) for your website. This is a position that bridges the gap between designers and developers, and your themer may be on more of the creative or technical end of the scale. Your themer must know CSS, be very familiar with Drupal’s configurations, and should also have some graphics editing and PHP skills. If you have a developer and/or designer as well, the themer will need to work closely with them.
Depending on your project, you may also need a moderator, editor, or community manager. If you are going to have a large amount of user-generated content, such as a video site or large forum, you may also need someone to assist with moderating and managing this content. Editors and writers can also provide content for your site.
So, you’ve got your budget in order and a solid idea of who you need now. Now, where do you find these people? There are so many places online to look for contractors that we could write a book on it. However, we will go over some of the bigger and better places to find skilled Drupal workers.
Since your website is a Drupal site, one of the best places to find these helpers is the "playground" of Drupal users and coders. Drupal.org offers several different areas on their website alone in order to find a person. You can try the forum at http://drupal.org/forum/51 - this will take you right to the Paid Drupal Service forum. Here you can post exactly what you desire, how much you’re able to spend and get quotes for time as well as cost for entire or part of the project. Make sure you provide contact information in your post, or go into your account and enable your contact form so people can reach you.
You can also try http://drupal.org/profile/drupal-services. This will take you to a list of names and contact information of people who provide Drupal services. You can check out their profiles at this site, as well as be linked to their personal websites and even what country they’re located in.
There is also the #drupal-consultants channel on IRC (chat).
Another handy site to check out is drupalancers.com. This site is a one-stop shop for anything and everything Drupal freelancers. You have to register and pay to post a job, but there is a rating list to see who the top programmers are. Make sure you ask about specific Drupal experience.
You may not really think of Craigslist as a place to find programmers. However, it is an excellent way to find a programmer in your area or long distance. Listings are free and you can mask your e-mail address. Again, you should be very specific in what you’re looking for and always remember to be careful on these types of sites. Make sure the person is legit before offering any form of payment. The last thing you want is a person saying work is done and then not giving you anything more than an empty wallet.
Elance, Guru and odesk are exactly what you’d think - on-line marketplaces to find freelance workers. These three are a lot alike. They all provide escrow services to ensure that you get your finished product before turning payment over to the contractor, and even help you with things like issuing tax forms or file storage for your work-in-progress.
However, watch out for very low cost providers who may not offer the kind of quality you need. We’ve had varying luck with contractors on these sites – some stellar quality work for rock-bottom prices, but some miserable experiences with providers who vanish or misrepresent their skills. You’ll have to sign up to post projects on each of these sites, but, there is no cost for posting jobs (they make their money on a percentage of what you pay contractors) unless you want to feature your ad.