When choosing a webmaster or web developer for your business there are many factors that you’ll need to decide on. Taking your time, asking questions, and doing research can be the difference between a site that brings you more business or one that drives your prospects away. It’s never an easy task but by understanding who to look for and what to expect, the process and decisions can be a lot easier.

You need to first decide who you are looking for. You can select someone that is an individual or you could select a company. You can select someone that does custom design work or someone that uses templates. You could select someone local that you can meet in person or you could work with someone over the phone or from email. All the choices have their positives and negatives and can come down to personal preference, but it’s important to ask and get an idea of how your potential webmaster works.

Your webmaster could be an individual or a team. Web development usually consist of multiple players and there is usually a division of labor in current web design which happens between graphic design and programming/implementation. It’s hard and very rare to find someone that can design graphics and can also do the backend scripting and programming. For that reason the modern day webmaster usually consists of a team or an individual skilled at subcontracting. Another important trait to look for is their marketing experience. Your website not only needs a way to get visitors to it, but it also needs to keep visitors there and needs to motivate potential customers to buy or what marketers call conversions. They don’t need to be a full blown expert is traffic, SEO, and conversion – that in itself is a whole other service, but they should understand its importance and know why a site needs to be optimized and be willing or experienced to work with an SEO/marketing firm if or when needed.

After you have narrowed down some choices, some of the most important and overlooked qualities to look for are dependability, availability, and professionalism. Your webmaster is going to be vital to your business and so you’ll need to be assured he or she will be there when you need him or her. Sometimes you’ll need things changed quickly or have sever issue and your webmaster should be there for you as their client. A definition of client is one that depends on the protection of another. That is how you want your webmaster to see your relationship and behave accordingly by being dependable, available, and professional to you and your business. So be sure to ask them questions, read their reviews, and even ask them if you can talk to a previous or current client. Be sure you like this person and that they are the type of person you are going to want to do business with in the long haul.

If you are about to start an ecommerce site selling products or services, you are going to need to pick an ecommerce platform. You’ll want to find a webmaster that has experience in this field and who has current and past ecommerce sites and clients. There are webmasters who specialize in ecommerce site design and maintenance, and they should be able explain the benefits and drawbacks between various platforms and solutions and help you pick the correct one for your business model. We have a great list of designers and developers we trust and have relationships with. Be sure to visit our partners page here or https://www.emerchant.com/partners/ to see our design partners/webmasters whether you are starting a new website or are looking to redesign your current website.