The post What is Codeable, who is it for and how can it help you appeared first on a-idea studio.

What is Codeable?

Codeable is a web portal that collects the best WordPress Experts: developers, site builders, SEO Experts and designers – and connects them with clients. However, Codeable is more than just yet another freelancer site. To become a Codeable Expert, a developer has to go through a long entry process. At the end only the top 2% of the applicants are approved. This is how they assure the quality of their service.

This process involves checking the applicants’ technical skills as well as checking their communication skills, too. My opinion is that it’s a very good approach from Codeable. The code quality itself is essential in resolving web development issues. However, what makes clients really happy is often the fact how it is communicated, how they are treated.

And communication doesn’t only mean “talking nicely”. Not at all! It’s more like listening to your client’s real needs and assuring them that they are in the best possible hands. It’s also an attitude that you want to give them value: top quality solution in top quality packing.

Like Per Esbensen (Codeable CEO) told me once:

“Imagine that you in an official Mercedes-Benz service. It’s not like a no-name car service in a distant street. In the official Mercedes service everything is neat and tidy, everything is well designed, and the front end people are always kind with you. You get premium quality solution, and they give you warranty on the job they do. Of course, it has a price tag, but this is why it’s an official Mercedes service and not a no-name one.”

Codeable is aiming to be the “Mercedes service of WordPress development”. Where clients can come with their projects, tasks, problems and they can be sure that they will be served in premium quality and extra care. Something that is not always provided at cheaper outsourcing websites.

Who is Codeable for?

Well, while there is a statement that “Codeable is for everyone” on the service’s home page, I would argue with it (sorry, mates ). Codeable is generally for people and businesses who own a WordPress based website or want to have one.

If you are one of them, then Codeable can give the perfect solution for you. Their 300 WordPress developers, designers and site builders have a high level of knowledge in the industry. If you browse through their profiles, you rarely can find anyone who has less than 5 years experience in WordPress development. So you can be sure you’re not dealing here with amateurs.

What can Codeable experts do for you?

Generally everything that is related to WordPress, but let’s see some of the typical cases:

• You need a unique WordPress theme
• You have a bug on your site and want it fixed asap.
• You need some plugins installed and configured
• You need modifications to a plugin or a theme, but you can’t do it yourself
• You are the leader of a webdesign agency and is in lack of capacity, but don’t want to turn down that project
• You are fed up with your current hosting and want to migrate your site to another one
• You need a WooCommerce-based online store
• You need a well-configured online booking on your website
• You need ongoing maintenance for your WordPress website(s)
• Just need a consultation to figure out how difficult it would be to build up your website
• etc.

… and who it isn’t for?

Let’s have a look at the other side. There are definitely groups of people for whom Codeable is not the perfect match:

• Who need a website build on other system than WordPress. Codeable is the place of WordPress experts. We (Codeable experts) have traveled different professional journeys until we ended up on Codeable, and some of us know Drupal, Laravel, Joomla, etc., too. However, it is not a standard thing on Codeable. While you can still publish projects like these on the portal, it’s not 100% guaranteed that you’ll find a suitable expert.
• Who wants to get it done as cheap as possible. A complete web store for $200? Maybe possible, but not on Codeable. And most probably not in a good quality. On Codeable, the hourly rates start at $60/h (USD). But in change for the higher price tag, you are connected with the best experts out there. And hey, it’s still more affordable than lot of expensive agencies!
• Who likes to see developers underbidding each other for his/her project. On Codeable the final price is the average of the estimations of the experts who have applied for your project. So if Dev A would do it for $800 and Dev B would do it for $1,000, then your final price tag will be $900.

How does Codeable work

OK, let’s say you need a small improvement to your WordPress website. How can you get it done using Codeable’s services?

#1: Visit Codeable.io

First you’ll have to visit Codeable.io. Be aware that there is .io at the end of the domain, not .com!

#2: Have a look

If you are absolutely new to this website, I recommend you to look around first. Read what’s on the front page, browse the list of the developers and browse through the articles in the blog to become more familiar with the site. You can also have a look at the FAQ pages, so you can have a peek into how the app works once you are inside.

This is how the Codeable home page looks like when writing this article

#3: Your first project

OK, now we are ready to jump into it after scraping the surface for a while… Let’s create our first project at Codeable! To do so, you can use this link, or press the GET STARTED NOW button on Codeable.io

#4: Select Project Type

The next screen you can see is the Project Type selector. At the moment you can select between the following categories:

• Install & Configure
• Customize
• Fix
• Develeop & Design
• Migrate

and their sub-categories.

There is also a possibility to start a 1-hour consultation with a WordPress expert. Here you can discuss what you need inside the frames of your project and you can get important and useful advices for them. Anyway, if you don’t have any clues what to do here, just reach out to the support with the Intercom icon in the right bottom corner of the screen. They will help you within minutes.

For the sake of simplicity, let’s say that you need an improvement to your WP theme, so you select the “Customize / Theme” category and click on the START button.

The project type selector

#5: The project details form

Here you’ll have to fill in a simple form. By submitting it, your project will be online inside the Codeable app. Let’s see how you should fill it in to get the best possible service as fast as possible…

• Project title: should not be too long, but should be specific enough to give a rough idea about what it is about. Let’s say, you need the customization for an Avada child theme, and what you need is a new blog layout. Then the title should be something like “Avada child theme needs new blog layout”. Try not to be too generic (like “I need help with my website”) here – however, I’m sure you’ll get help even in these cases, too.
• Preferred experts: if you have someone on Codeable’s experts list who’d you like to work with then you can add his/her name to this field. You can add up to 5 experts in this field. Of course, if you leave this field empty, your project will be visible for all experts.
  • Tip: if you’d like to work with us, simply add my name, “Ervin Domonkos” to this field
• How soon do you need it? This setting here is not a deadline! It just gives the experts a hint about how urgent the project is for you. The deadline finally will be what you agree about later.
• Describe your project: this is the most important part. Some tips how a good description looks like:
  • It’s a good rule of thumb to start with describing what your website is about, what you’d like to achieve. Then you can describe the current situation, then describe how the desired situation would be different from it.
  • If the work has to be done on an existing website, always include the URL in the description. Anyway, this will be the first thing the experts ask for if you forget to add it.
  • If there are more things to be done during the project, use bullet points. It’s always easier to realize what needs to be done this way than trying to figure it out of a block of text.
  • If a new process needs to be implemented on your site, then try describing it as steps – like:
    • Step 1 – user clicks here
    • Step 2 – the popup jumps up with the form
    • Step 3 – user fills it out
    • Step 4 – Clicks on the Submit button
    • Step 5 – confirmation email sent
  • If you have any material (images, videos, documents) that can help understanding your project, then please include a link to them or upload them to the project.
• Upload files: here is where you can upload anything that can be useful for completing the project. If your project is a bigger one, then it’s strongly recommended to write a Brief Document in which you try to describe all the aspects of the project.
• Budget: estimates are based on the scope, complexity and urgency of a project. However, if you specify your budget size, the experts will know better how complex solution should they offer to you. E.g. in a bigger budget project there is always more space to pay attention to small but important nuances. A low budget one can usually only afford a “works ok, but nothing special” solution most of the times. It’s up to you which one makes you satisfied.

If everything is ready, please read through everything once again, and then you can Publish your project.

What to do if I want to modify something after the project was published?

Don’t worry, you can modify it later. It can even happen that some experts will ask you to add some more information to it. So it’s not a bad thing if your project description is not perfect at the beginning.

#6: After publishing

After publishing it, your project will appear in the Codeable app. Inside the app the Codeable experts will see your project, and someone will reply to it typically in a few hours.

Of course if you chose some Preferred experts in the previous step, then only those people will see your project.

What to do if no-one responds to my project?

There can be more reasons why it happened:

• Your brief wasn’t concrete enough
• Your budget was too low compared to what you’d like to achieve
• Simply everyone was a bit busy when you posted it.

If you feel like there has too much time elapsed since you posted your project, you can always reach out to the support (bottom right corner of Codeable’s screen) asking to help you find a suitable expert.

#7: Conversation about your project

On Codeable your project’s page is called a Workroom. As the experts start answering to your project intro, a conversation starts between you and them. The experts will ask you questions about your project in order to make it crystal clear what needs to be done. If it’s an improvement to an existing site, then they might ask for your wp-admin credentials as well – in order to have a look “under the hood”.

Important! When you share your admin password with them, please don’t add it directly to the Project’s conversation, as it is visible to all experts at this time. Use Codeable’s Credential Vault instead, which is a secure way of sharing passwords and sensitive data. And in the Vault you can choose whom you’d like to share it with.

#8: Estimating

Once everything is crystal clear, one or a few experts will add their estimations for your project. You’ll see the average value of their estimations in the right sidebar as the Estimated Price. And this will eventually be your project’s price.

By estimating, the expert also states that he/she possesses the knowledge and has availability to do your project.

#9: Hiring

If you are satisfied with the price, you can hire one of the experts who have made an estimation for your project by clicking on the HIRE XY button on the right hand side.

After clicking on the button you’ll be asked to pay for the project upfront. Your money will be kept on Codeable’s escrow account until the expert delivers the solution.

#10: Ongoing project

Your project room will become a private workroom after the payment. From now on only you and the hired expert can see its contents.

A Codeable workroom

As the next thing, the expert will start working on your project. Once done, they will ask you to review the work done.

When you are satisfied, you can press the COMPLETE button.

#11: Completed project

After you mark the project complete, the project’s status will change to Completed and the money you paid upfront is transferred to the expert’s account.

Although the project is completed, you can re-visit it any time to check your previous conversations and to download the project files in the future.

If you happen to need help in the future on the same website and you’d like to use the same expert’s services, you can write them in this same workroom. So you can make sure only you and he/she can see the new task (and you can add the new task as an additional task).

Thank you for reading this article. Hope we’ll meet on Codeable someday!

The post What is Codeable, who is it for and how can it help you appeared first on a-idea studio.

The post Site building Glossary for WordPress appeared first on a-idea studio.

This article can also be useful for site builders and developers. Just send this article’s link to your clients, so they can learn what you are talking about when you say: CPT, Ajax, ACF or similar things.

I’ll try to regularly update this article. However, if you miss a term from the list, just drop me a comment at the bottom – and I’ll add it with the next update.

Site building Glossary for WordPress

Accessibility	Web Accessibility is the collection of practices that are done in order to make the information of the website accessible by everyone (especially people with disabilities).
ACF	Advanced Custom Fields. A plugin for WordPress that allows you to add extra information to your posts and pages that shouldn't be directly added to your post content. A widely used plugin, you can learn more about it here.
AJAX	Asynchronous JavaScript And XML. This is the method that makes it possible to load new content without reloading the whole page. E.g. you must have seen on e-commerce sites that after you click on the "Add to Cart" button, the page doesn't reload, but a spinner icon appears, maybe with the text "Adding to cart...". In these and similar cases an "AJAX call" is running in the background. What really happens is that the JavaScript code on your website loads some information based on some settings from the server, and then it modifies the current page based on the received results.
Brief	A document that describes your project. The more detailed your brief is the easier it is for the developer or agency to make an estimation for it and to finally deliver you what you really needed. Here is an article about how to write great briefs for a WordPress development project.
Category	A built-in taxonomy in WordPress used by Posts by default. With categories you can create different groups of posts. Categories can be hierarchical.
CMS	Content Management System. In the world of websites a CMS is a software that lets you edit your website data using an admin dashboard and displays it in the front end using templates. WordPress itself is a CMS.
Conversion	An event on a website when the visitor does the desired action and thus is promoted to the next level of the sales process. Examples of conversions: A new visitor on your site subscribes to your mailing list. A member of your mailing list buys your product. A visitor clicks on an affiliate link A visitor registers.
Conversion Rate	The percentage of the users who have promoted from the previous level of the sales process to the current one (= number of conversions / size of the previous level group). E.g. if you had 100 unique visitors on your website in the previous month and 6 of them subscribed to your mailing list, then your Conversion Rate was 6%.
CPT	Custom Post Type. By default, when you log into wp-admin, you can see 2 post types: Posts and Pages (there are others, too, but it's easier to undersand this way...). However, if you need a new type of content (e.g. Products, Portfolio items, Cars, Appartments, etc. - based on what your business needs), you can add them as a new Custom Post Type (CPT). Custom Post Types work the best when they have a corresponding template in your WordPress Theme. E.g. if you have a look at WooCommerce, it adds Products as a CPT, and it has its own template for displaying products.
Cron	A server-side program on Unix-like systems that is responsible for running othe programs automatically. With cron you can set up to run a script e.g. daily, in the 37th minute of every hour or on the 4th day of each month, etc.
CSS	Cascading Style Sheets. A programming language that is used to describe how the HTML elements on your website should look. This is where you define the colors, the sizes, the backgrounds, borders, etc. Learn more about CSS here.
CTA	Call to Action. Usually a visual element, a button or a form on your website that helps the visitor do a desired action. A CTA often triggers a conversion event. E.g. a "Click here to register" button is a typical CTA element.
GDPR	General Data Protection Regulation. A new data protection law on its way to take effect on 25th May 2018. It raises strict rules for storing personal data (like name, address, IP-address, email, etc.) of EU citizens. It raises the need of almost all companies to review how they store user's data and make changes if needed - as fines for breaking these rules can be immense. Read more about GDPR here and here is an article that collects what we can do with our WordPress site to become GDPR-compliant.
Git	Git is a Version Control System (VCS). See Version Control.
Grid	Some web page layouts are built up using a so-called Grid System. A grid usually splits the web page into 4, 6, 8, 10, 12 or 16 columns, then while building up the page from different items you can specify how many columns the current item should use. E.g. in a 12-column grid system a 8-column + 4-column set up can be used to have a main content area of 2/3 width and a sidebar of 1/3 width. Another advantage of grid systems is that they help a lot in making your website responsive.
Gutenberg	Gutenberg is the project name of the new WordPress post and page editor that is expected to be released in WordPress 5.0. Until then it can be downloaded as a plugin.
HTML	Hypertext Markup Language. The basic language that defines the website's elements. If you click on "Inspect element" or "View source" in your browser, you can see the page's HTML source. You can learn more about it on W3Schools.
HTTP	Hypertext Transfer Protocol. Describes how the web pages are transmitted between a server and a client computer. Every time you load a file for a webpage (HTML, CSS, JS, image files, etc.), a new HTTP request is sent to the server, and it responds with the requested data or an error message.
HTTPS	HTTP Secure or HTTP over TLS/SSL. The secure version of the HTTP protocol, where the data is sent encrypted over the internet. Not too long ago Google made using HTTPS instead of HTTP is a ranking factor in Google Search. If you are about to switch from HTTP to HTTPS, this article can be a good starting point.
JavaScript	Front end programing language that can manipulate the web page after it's loaded. E.g. if you can see a calculator on a page or elements that move on different user actions are usually done with JavaScript. However, this programming language knows a lot more...
JS	See JavaScript
Mockup	Used in website planning for planning the layout of the pages. It is not really the design itself, just a simplified presentation of the look and feel.
Multisite	Formerly called WPMU. Multisite is a special WordPress installation that can host multiple sub-sites. It is useful when you need a network of sites that are very similar to each other, e.g. regional sites of the same company that should use the same theme.
MVP	Minimum Viable Product. When designing a web app, it's a good idea to think of what the minimal functionality is that the app can be launched with. It has 2 major advantages: A) You can come up with a working version earlier, so you can get feedback faster. B) You can develop the further versions based on the initial feedback - so don't have to put too much effort into something that is not important for your users.
Online Marketing	Online Marketing is a collection of methods with an aim to sell your services or products on the internet. It is a quite broad notion, contains all activities done on your website, in your email marketing, on other sites in order to attract more visitors to your site, etc.
PHP	A server-side programming language. WordPress is written mainly in this language. How it works in a nutshell: the web server runs the PHP code that creates an output, which is often the HTML code of the webpage. This way, with PHP you can create pages that can have different content based on the circumstances / settings (dynamic web pages).
Plugin	By default, WordPress is capable of building only simple websites: a few static pages + a blog. If you want to extend it's functionality (e.g. add contact forms, add eCommerce functionality, discussion forum, etc.), you have to install plugins (a.k.a extensions for WordPress). To install a plugin, just go to Plugins » Add new in wp-admin, and follow the instructions.
Post	In the WordPress ecosystem a "post" usually means a blog post.
Responsive	A website is responsive if it reacts to the screen size and navigation methods of the device it is viewed on. E.g. a responsive website can be optimized to be 1200 pixels wide on a laptop screen, while on a small cell phone screen it can rearrange its elements to be only e.g. 400 pixels wide (together with optimizing it for touch events). This way the site can keep an optimized user experience regardless of what it is viewed with.
Server (hardware)	A powerful computer that should be always on and that hosts (runs on demand) web pages (and/or other data).
Server (software)	A memory-resident program that listens to requests from the network. If a request comes in that it can serve, then it runs the necessary code / commands. E.g. a web server (like Apache or Nginx) listens to HTTP requests. And if one comes in, it returns the requested page to the user (or an error if the page was not found).
Sidebar	A sidebar is a template part that is usually displayed on the left or right hand side of the main content area. In WP development it's often a synonym for widget areas.
Slider	A visual element on a website that changes the displayed image (or other elements) with a visual effect. Usually the change is triggered when a specific time is elapsed (e.g. change the images every 10 seconds) or a user action is performed (e.g. click on navigation arrows). The most popular slider plugins in the WordPress ecosystem are Slider Revolution and LayerSlider.
Speed Optimization	The faster a website is the better it is. 2 main factors, why: User experience: your users will be more satisfied with your website if they are served quickly. Google ranking: site speed is a ranking factor in Google Search. The most popular tools for checking how quickly your website loads: Pingdom Tools, GTMetrix, Google PageSpeed Insights.
SEO	Search Engine Optimization. A collection of methods and activities that are done in order to achieve the best possible positions in search engines like Google Search, Bing, Yahoo, etc. Can be split into 2 parts: On-site SEO: done on the website itself. Includes making the content, the code and the structure of the site as search engine friendly as possible. A best practice tool for WordPress on-site SEO is the Yoast SEO plugin. Off-site SEO: done outside the website. Generally means creating / collecting good quality links pointing to your website. If you want to have the best results, you should work on both on-site and off-site parts of Search Engine Optimization.
Sub-site	A child site of a Multisite installation.
Super Admin	A special administartion level on WP Multisite installations. A Super admin can see the wp-admin of all subsites.
Tag	A built-in taxonomy in WordPress used by Posts by default. It is mainly used to mark the post with some useful keywords that can be used later e.g. in tag clouds.
Tag Cloud	A visual representation of tags connected to posts, where usually the more frequent tags are emphasized with bigger fonts or stronger colors. The default WordPress package has a Tag Cloud widget.
Taxonomy	In WP, a taxonomy is an entity that can be connected to different post types. It helps grouping the posts based on different aspects. E.g. on a news site you can easily group articles by adding categories to them like "politics", "economy", "sports", "arts", etc.
Template	In WordPress a template is a PHP file that displays a post or a page. To find out which template will display which page, have a look at the WordPress Template Hierarchy.
Theme	A collection of template (PHP) files, CSS stylesheets and optionally JavaScript and other files that describe how your posts and pages should be displayed in the front end. Changing the theme can display the same data with a completely different look. The best places for looking for WordPress themes are the WP Theme Directory and ThemeForest.
UI	User Interface. The visual part of an application that makes it possible for the user to interact with the app or with other users. It's a perpetual challenge of software planning to make the UI as easy to use and intuitive as possible.
URL	Uniform Resource Locator. Generally this is a web address. Everything that can be seen in the browser's address bar are URLs. It starts usually with http:// or https://.
User Flow	See User Journey.
User Journey	Planning your user journeys should be part of the planning phase of each of your projects. It's generally writing down what can happen to the visitors after landing on your site. The bigger your site is the more number of user journeys you'll probably have.
UX	User Experience. How your users will feel on your site and how easy it is for them to find/do the desired things. It is highly recommended that you plan your User Experience before you start to create the site.
Version Control	When a bigger project is being done in programming, it's recommended to track the changes of its source code with a Version Control System. This way it can be tracked who changed what and when in the code.
Widget	A small tool / visual element that can be placed in sidebars / widget areas. Some widgets are shipped with the WordPress Core, while others can be added by plugins.
Widget area	A special space in WordPress templates where you can drop widgets. You can add widgets to them in WP-Admin » Appearance » Widgets.
WooCommerce	The most popular eCommerce plugin for WordPress is WooComerce, used by more than 3 million people.
WordPress Core	A pure WordPress installation, without any plugins or extra themes. In WP development when developers mention it, they usually mean the files inside the /wp-includes, /wp-admin and the WP root directory. It is a "deadly sin" in the WP world to modify these files, as your modification will be overwritten by the next WordPress update (making the site maintenance a nightmare).
WP	WordPress
WP-Admin	The admin dashboard of WordPress where you can set up everything about your WordPress site. You can reach it if you put /wp-admin after your home page's URL. E.g. www.example.com » www.example.com/wp-admin
WP-Cron	WordPress' own implementation of Cron. It is a limited functionality cron, which means that it needs a page load process to trigger the automatic run event.
WPMU	See Multisite

If you feel like something is missing from the list, please drop me a message below in the comments section:

The post Site building Glossary for WordPress appeared first on a-idea studio.

The post Big dilemma of web agencies: in-house or outsource appeared first on a-idea studio.

• as a quasi-employee of an agency
• as a contractor of an agency
• as a freelancer working with several agencies

A constant dilemma I’ve met talking to leaders of the different agencies was whether it’s a better idea to employ a web developer as a full-time employee or outsource the projects to freelancers.

The question is not easy at all. Lot of advantages and disadvantages are listed on both sides – let’s have a closer look at them…

A web developer as an employee

Positive side

• Works for lower hourly rates. E.g. in Europe a web developer typically earns $10-$40 hourly, while a freelancer usually works for lot higher rates (cca. $25-$200 / hour)
• Available in his/her working hours exclusively for the employer. No need to worry about refusing your project, because of working on someone else’s project at the moment
• More flexibility about what they do during their working hours. E.g. if a project became more urgent than other projects, you can simply tell your employees to focus on this now instead of the other things they were working on
• More control over what’s happening: especially if you are working in the same office physically – you can always check on them what they are doing. It can be important to those who like to practice close control over what is happening

Negative side

• You have to pay the developers’ wages even if you don’t have enough projects to work on. This is a very big risk, because if you don’t have enough income, your finances can go into negative – that can put your whole business at risk
• The second one correlates with the previous point: you can’t fire them easily. There are laws in every country that protect employees and set minimal terms of notice, etc. So generally you can’t just tell your employee: you don’t have to come in tomorrow – but you won’t get any money for it, though.
• It can easily happen that your developer is a pro in one field, but isn’t super-good in an other territory. E.g. maybe she can plan good UX solutions, but isn’t that good with database planning. In this case you’ll need to hire someone else for that task.

Outsourcing web development to a freelancer

Positive side

• You can hire the expert for as many hours as you’d like to. As the developer is not your employee, if your project needs only 10 hours of work, you have to pay him/her only the 10 hours of work, not the whole month’s wage.
• You can select which expert you’d like to hire: if you need a database pro, you hire one. If you need a design pro, you hire one. So you can always hire the person who is the most suitable for the job.
• Smaller risk: if your freelancer is not as good as expected, you can hire someone else for your next project. With an employee who is just not good enough, it would be more difficult to do a switch…

Negative side

• Higher hourly rates. Freelancer experts have to calculate in their own risks, so they have to charge you higher hourly rates. However, you usually hire a freelancer expert when the size of the project doesn’t require a full-time employee – or when you need a very special knowledge that you may not find in-house. So in many cases a freelancer means lower risk for you even at higher rates.
• Risk that the expert disappears: while this is a very rare case, everyone has heard about stories when the freelancer developer has disappeared in the middle of the project and no-one knows where he’s gone since then. It often raises the need of some warranties that make sure:
  • the expert won’t disappear
  • if he/she disappears anyway, someone else can take over the job quickly
• Looser control: as you can’t see every movement of the expert, you have to trust them that your project will end with the desired results. This is why it’s extremely important that the expert can communicate with you clearly, and has the attitude of “asking something before doing it wrong”.
  • A method of addressing this risk is if the developer uploads the source code real-time or at least once daily. This way the client can see how the project progresses and can step in if something goes in a wrong direction.

Is there a way in between?

It often happens with agencies that they keep the strategic positions in-house, like project management, account management, lead development, UX design, etc. In the same time they reach out to freelancers for completing the specific projects. So their workflows look like:

1. the project manager communicates with the client and the freelancer(s)
2. the UX designer puts together the brief with the client and the project manager
3. they calculate the costs and the feasibility together with the freelancer

Which is the good way for me?

It really depends on your business. You’ll have to make lot of calculations. If you can gather enough projects that will fill in an employee’s full work time, then it may be a better idea to hire someone in-house. If you tend to have variable number and size of projects, maybe it’s a better idea to hire a freelancer on-demand.

Also, some tasks may need some special knowledge that you need a special expert for. While employing someone to do a task or send one of your employees to learn it would be an overkill, you can hire a freelancer expert for the specific project.

Another case when a freelancer may temporarily extend an agency's team is when you have a peak in workforce need, but you are not sure that the next periods will have the same amount of work.

Thanks for reading, if you’d like to add your thoughts, use the comment form below…

The post Big dilemma of web agencies: in-house or outsource appeared first on a-idea studio.

The post We are on Codeable! appeared first on a-idea studio.

Website Update

One big thing that we’ve completed in the past few weeks was a major update to our website. While in the front end the changes may look small, we’ve completely rebuilt its backend, creating a single site from our previous multisite installation…

However, we kept all the URLs the same where it was possible, so if you linked to our site before, it probably still works.

I became a Codeable Expert last month

My Codeable WordPress Expert Certificate

It’s a very huge step forward in the life of our studio, because from now on we’ll have the chance to work with some very good clients in the future.

What is Codeable?

Codeable is a network of individual WordPress Developers and clients (website owners, agencies, etc.) who need a WordPress job done in the best possible quality. You may say it’s just another outsourcing network, but I can tell you, it’s different.

While on other outsourcing networks developers are bidding for projects they don’t even understand correctly, leading to reckless price-wars, Codeable uses a completely different approach. Let’s see why it is different:

• Only 2-3% of the applicants are granted the Codeable Expert status. Yes, I had to go through their rigorous entry exams, and it wasn’t an easy ride. But I am now inside, you can find my profile on the Codeable.io site.
• Clients and Developers can discuss the project before it starts. For example, on Upwork the biggest disadvantage was that I wasn’t able to talk to the client before the project started, which is nonsense. How would I know how much I had to estimate when the brief is not crystal-clear? On Codeable we have plenty of possibilities to discuss the project before we apply for it. Furthermore, we are not allowed to apply for anything we are not 100% sure we can do.
• One of the best customer supports I’ve ever met.
• Codeable.io is exclusively for WordPress projects. Better focus and everybody is speaking the same language.
• Almost 99% of the projects are rated 5/5. Maybe this number is the result of the strict pre-selection of WordPress Experts.
• Communication, communication and communication: these are 3 fields every expert on Codeable is required to be professional in

Can I hire you there for your next project?

Of course, you can! I advise you to have a look around the Codeable.io site first and decide if it’s for you. You can post a project directly for me on Codeable if you’d like to – using this link: Hire Ervin on Codeable. I am happy to help you.

In case of any questions, please ask me in a comment below.

UPDATE!

Here is a new, more comprehensive article on what Codeable is, who it is for and how to use it.

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