6 Tips for Choosing the Right Web Development Firm

Website is a powerful instrument to bring credibility to an enterprise. A business that aims to keep and expand the audience needs reliable functionality and captivating design for their web page.

The task is challenging given the evolving technologies and around 200 million active websites globally. That’s when a professional web development company comes to solve the problem.

But how to choose the one that suits your needs best? This article walks you through the essential aspects you should consider when selecting a technical partner for your idea or business.

Choosing a web development agency: what you should know

A web development company is an agency that builds digital solutions to help brands evolve online. With the technologies that entered our daily lives, the online presence allows you to enter new markets and reach out to more users in a shorter time.

An experienced development team will surely build a high-quality website for you, however, only you know exactly what your business idea is and what your website should be like.

Therefore, before searching for the right web development company, you should define the basic aspects of your future solution.

Points to consider before talking to a development team

Below are questions that you should answer before discussing your project with a web development agency:

• What kind of a website do you want to build?

A solid development partner considers the project in the context of a client’s business objectives.

• Who are your competitors?

This helps understand how your product idea stands out among similar solutions.

• Who is your target audience?

When you have your end buyer defined, you’ll quickly transfer the vision to your future web developers. Thus, they will understand who’s the final purchaser and deliver the best possible solution.

• What problems should your website solve?

Understanding your users’ needs allows you to improve the product and stand out on the market.

• What functionality would you like to include?

You don’t need to know how it works, just a rough view of what you’d like to include in your website.

• What is your budget?

This is an aspect that may vary depending on the purpose of your solution and the functionality included in it.

• Do you want to scale your website?

If your business grows or if the market changes, you might want to add features to your website. This aspect is crucial when a development team plans how to build your solution.

Out-of-the-box vs custom solution

One more decision you need to make is whether you need a custom website, or an out-of-the-box solution would be enough.

Depending on your needs and project complexity, a web development company can suggest one of the mentioned solution options. Let’s see their pros and cons.

• Who are your competitors?

A template is a ready-made web page that includes the basic features and design of a website. They are pre-built and can be used for small projects and start-ups that do not contain much functionality. Template-based solutions are quick in development and require less cost.

A popular way is to get a pre-built website with WordPress. The webpage is then combined with a theme from Template Monster, ThemeForest, or Elegant Themes.

Template-based websites have some drawbacks. Such ready-made solutions depend on the template source. If it breaks, so will your website. Also, you’re limited on configurations to the template website. The functionality and design are typical, which means many web pages are similar to yours.

• Custom websites

Developing a custom website solution is a serious deal, so you need to entrust it to a team with expertise in developing complex products. Custom solution code is unique, so you own it, and other websites cannot copy and use your source code.

For example, Spotify that is centered around a seemingly simple idea of streaming songs does it in a perfect way. Users can smoothly wander between devices not missing a second of music. Also, the website holds an excellent AI and machine learning system that leads to versatile suggestions of songs for users. All this is possible thanks to reliable and efficient code.

Choosing between templates or custom websites, Codica prefers the latter. Every project for us is unique. So, we select methods and techniques that will best suit the project’s objectives.

Now that you’ve answered the main questions about your future solution, let’s clear things up on how to choose a web development company that will help you build it. Here are some vital aspects to consider.

Tips for choosing a web development firm

1. Check their portfolio

Previous works prove the web development company’s proficiency. It’s a kind of success story on how a company resolved other clients’ issues.

The company’s case studies

Check how long the web development provider has been on the market and study the volume of delivered projects. In this case, numbers matter as it shows a level of trust between web developers and customers.

At the same time, you shouldn’t only focus on figures. If the portfolio reports the diversity and complexity of the projects delivered, the team might have versatile skills.

Check the website of a web development agency you’d like to cooperate with. A solid company will present the created solutions reflecting their skills.

Also, consider that a company you choose needs to be experienced in developing websites similar to yours.

Related reading: Job Matching Portal Development by Codica

Codica has vast experience in building websites and web applications. Our proficiency is proved by the projects we deliver. We take the best from technologies and project concepts to create functional and engaging solutions. For example, this is how we’ve delivered the RecruitEverywhere platform for hiring and searching for jobs globally.

2. Look at social proof

Reviews on open platforms and social media

Checking platforms like Glassdoor, Owler, and Clutch would be good when choosing a web development company. Such platforms gather feedback from the clients of IT companies globally. They show the rates based on customers’ feedback, minimum project size, number of workers, etc.

Here’s one of the reviews our client has left about Codica on Clutch.

If these are not enough, try and search on other web platforms. Get beyond the customers and study employees' opinions and reviews.

Client references

Clients’ reviews bring credibility to a website development firm and show how it handles development tasks.

Below is a video review from Codica’s client. It presents the activity booking marketplace that we've developed to help parents plan their children’s leisure.

You can also contact the company's existing clients and examine the solutions they have delivered. The best web development companies highlight the unique style of each brand and ensure smooth user flow.

Reach out to companies’ customers and request their opinions on cooperation with web developers. Discuss with the client if the provider is responsive and meets deadlines. Happy clients would eagerly share their impressions.

Awards and certifications

Companies’ awards and certifications recognize their achievements. Review the rate of such awards and certificates to assess if the company’s accomplishments are valuable.

For example, Clutch named Codica among the top web development companies in Ukraine for the third year in a row.

3. Discuss your involvement in the project

Before starting collaboration with your future web development team, you should establish the right level of trust, as it solves a lot.

When you share your vision and ideas on your future digital product, you expect the same openness in return. This is a reasonable desire to know the progress of your website development.

Transparency of the development process

Discuss with the company the level of your inclusion in the developing process. A professional web development company will provide you with relevant documents. They will keep you involved in all steps of development. Additionally, their operational chat for your product may also be available.

Their wish to uncover all these aspects will reflect the degree of transparency. There’s no big deal for a web development firm with clear behavior. But if they are not so ready to share this information with you, consider giving up with them.

At this point, finding a balance is critical. Most likely, the web development team won’t be comfortable with total control from your side. At the same time, trusting relationships with some involvement have to occur.

Communication

How to choose a web development company that provides smooth communication? There are aspects that will help you discover their approach to keep you informed:

• How do they deal with changes in the requirements for the project?
• Do they respond immediately?
• What communication channels do they use?

Choose a company that is helpful and a dedicated person who handles communication between you and the web development agency.

One more aspect to consider is how often they provide status reports. Here it’s important for you to decide - either you want daily, or let’s say weekly status reports from the development team.

4. Check their technical expertise

Technologies are essential for your website. With the right technologies used, your solution will be responsive, fast-loading, and secure in use. More relevant here are technologies with proven track records, which have shown themselves best in your project area.

Depending on the technologies used, there are two types of development teams that web dev companies cover:

• Frontend development department. They create interfaces for the solutions, ensuring responsiveness and stunning design.

• Backend development department. They ensure the functional part: handling database queries, calculations, and performance.

Choose a web design and development company that has proven expertise in several technologies embracing both frontend and backend.

Cybersecurity is another vital aspect for any custom enterprise software solution as technologies grow and evolve. The full-stack and backend development companies ensure that your solution data is protected against attacks.

How to choose a website developer that has an experienced team? There are questions you can ask the website services provider:

• What technologies do they use to keep your website efficient and competitive?
• How do they adapt to emerging technologies and trends?
• How long has the company worked with the technologies chosen for your project?
• Are their solutions in line with search engine requirements and the latest technical standards?
• How do they guarantee security for their solutions?

If you opt to build your website from scratch with the mentioned technologies, you’ll need a team of experts that usually includes:

• Front-end developers;
• Back-end developers;
• UX/UI designers;
• QA engineers;
• DevOps engineers;
• Project managers.

You can ask how long the team has been working together and if experienced specialists will be involved in the project. It ensures that professionals with proven qualifications will deliver your product. Whatever web development firm you choose, their skills are essential.

At Codica, we have a team of highly qualified professionals who cover necessary aspects at all stages of a company’s website development. Also, our project managers ensure excellent communication with customers to deliver high-quality and secure products.

5. Make sure they provide the services required for website development

Website development companies vary in the services rendered. Still, several of them show that a company follows best practices and standards when creating a solution. Let’s discover the services that an expert web development company provides to deliver a high-quality software product.

Discovery stage

From our experience, product discovery sessions positively influence the product output. A web development firm acts, in this case, as a partner and advisor. The agency may not have wide experience in your particular business, but their knowledge of market trends is what counts in this case.

Also, if you collaborate with a team that has particular expertise in the domain you’re interested in - that’s the perfect match. They will apply all their accumulated expertise to advise on the best way to create your product.

What are Discovery sessions? Thanks to this stage, a provider can outline the viability of the client’s idea, tech stack, budget, and time required for building a project. A professional web development team goes beyond client’s prerequisites. They analyze how your project would stand in the long run.

A good web development company will discuss the project in detail. They are eager to share their experience gained through many projects.

Building an MVP

MVP, a minimum viable product, is a version of a product that includes minimum functionality to test if it appeals to the customers. Web development businesses consider creating an MVP a good practice. It allows you flexibility in case you need changes in your product.

In Codica, we believe testing your product with MVP web development services helps you optimize expenses for developing and deploying a product. We delivered several solutions in the form of MVP. It helps our clients to focus on the primary value of their product, saving time and cost for launch.

UX and UI design

A website should have a mobile-friendly design with intuitive UX and appealing UI in line with the corporate company style. For example, the design of the Airbnb company highlights the brand motto of belonging anywhere.

The approach to web design used in a company should be suitable for building a responsive website with a fast load. Users enjoy such pages, which means they will stay longer on your website, boosting your conversion rates and trust in your brand.

The right web development company will consult you on including the needed features or choosing the design. They will discuss changes at each step of creating your solution.

QA and optimization

At this point, a web dev company checks with manual and automation tests if the website runs properly. The features should work as they’re intended.

Also, it is vital to prove that the code is efficient and performant. For example, optimized website code consumes less memory and executes faster.

The web development companies that provide such services are the right choice for you.

Support and maintenance

It is advisable to choose a website development company that will provide further support for your product.

As your business grows over time, you will need to make changes to your website. So, choose a web dev company that provides maintenance and scaling of your website.

This is how Codica delivered a complex solution for an online news portal. The website allows adding massive amounts of content and a high loading speed.

6. Discover their development approach

There are two primary methods to approach product development: Agile and Waterfall. Your ability to make changes during the development and the price depends on these methodologies.

In the Waterfall methodology, a team moves to the next development stage after the previous one is completed.

Agile methodology implies moving in small steps testing a product at each stage of development. So, changes to a project can be made as soon as possible. It shortens the time and reduces costs for development. Most web development firms adopt an agile approach as it proved to be efficient.

When you have discovered the best fit for your project, ask your future web dev company which one they use.

The project management approach impacts your future digital product and determines how it adapts to the market. So when choosing which way to go, vote for one that will boost your business best.

The software delivery method determines a lot. It is advised to startups to opt for the development teams that follow the Agile approach. In such a way it’s easier to make changes on the way and adjust your product to the emerging market needs.

What influences website development cost?

Web development is a costly deal. When you apply for project development, a company typically provides an approximate estimate of its cost.

The price for hourly website development is around $100-175 in the US and $55-75 in other countries. Project-based pricing ranges between $10000 to $50000 globally.

The following aspects usually determine web development cost:

• Custom or ready-made;
• Team location and hourly rate;
• Number of pages;
• Functionality;
• Database integration;
• UX/UI design services;
• Security protocol;
• Domain name;
• Website hosting;
• Integration with third-party CRM, ERP, CMS, or similar solutions;
• Technical support.

Ask the website development firm what is included in the development cost. Stay with those who suggest necessary features that enhance your users’ experience.

Recommended reading: How Much Does it Cost to Build a Website in 2024?

Local vs remote development team

You can opt for a local or remote company. How do you choose between those types of web development companies? Let’s see their pros and cons.

A local web development company

Pros:

• Communication. The same cultural background makes mutual understanding easier.

• Legal aspects. It’s easier to solve legal issues when your business and the website development firm that you choose are in the same location.

• Culture. Cultural similarities will ease the project delivery. Ensure that the agency follows the ethical and development principles as yours. It will facilitate communication, hence, the development of your website.

Cons:

• Cost. Local companies may be more costly than outsourced, especially if taking the US as an example.

• Time. Many ventures search for experienced website development companies. Besides, you need time to find developers with the required skills.

A remote web development company

Pros:

• Talent pool. Outsourcing companies are open to involving professionals.

• Less costly. The company with outstaff usually charges less than local businesses.

Cons:

• Communication. It may be impeded due to different cultural backgrounds and time zones.

• Legal aspects. Differences in law can take more cost and time to develop a project.

• Time synchronization. You need to wait for feedback and adjust your schedule to the remote company.

Despite the cons, remote web development is quite popular. Companies from Eastern Europe, Africa, and Asia charge less than Western companies. Below you can see the development rates across different regions globally.

Codica’s expertise in custom web development

Our company specializes in developing websites and web applications. Clients come to us with their ideas and needs, and we are ready to help them.

We use an agile approach in product delivery. It brings flexibility in development and enables improvements as soon as possible.

We have vast experience building custom solutions that allow for scalability and support. Our expert team ensures optimized use of technologies and seamless integrations. This helps us rate among the best web development companies.

For example, our portfolio holds a global travel marketplace for polar expeditions. We delivered a platform with a convenient and simple CMS, guidebook, and booking system. Our solution exceeded the client’s estimates and brought twice more sales than expected.

Summing up: how to hire a web development company?

An experienced web development agency will develop a custom solution highlighting your brand. A positive impression for users leads to more prospects and sales, which is beneficial for your business growth.

Choose a website development company that will develop, support, and scale your website. The tech stack should cover the technologies that make your website responsive and fast-loading.

Here at Codica we know how to create engaging solutions that highlight and build trust in your brand.

Check our portfolio to see the successful products that we’ve delivered to our clients. We’re eager to discuss your project and help you create a great solution. Feel free to contact us.