A fully functional and engaging web product is important for startups. Whether it acts as a lead driver, or a platform that provides services to customers, you’ll need a good web development team to ensure the website achieves its purposes.
Statistics point to horrifying results of a badly built website. For example, 88% of users will never return to a website due to a bad experience. Besides concerns on bad UX design, the technicalities of the website are equally important. Google has pointed out that a webpage that takes more than 3 seconds to load will drive 32% of visitors away.
Understanding The Web Development Team Structure
While it’s possible to quickly put up a website with drag-and-drop tools, building a website that requires complex backend services requires a team of diverse expertise. So, hold off the thought of hiring a freelancer to build an e-commerce store or a membership website like Udemy.
Even if you hire a developer, the tasks involved are too overwhelming for a single individual. You run the risks of delaying the time-to-market, or introduce avoidable bugs when the website goes live.
Therefore, it’s essential to set up a team of IT experts with relevant skill sets. Alternatively, you’ll want to work with a web development agency with an established team structure. Either way, here are the roles that make up a web design team.
Project manager
Project manager serves as the anchor of the entire web development team. The project manager takes charge of planning, organizing, execution, and monitoring the entire web development service process. Their job scope comes with a heavy responsibility of mitigating project risks and ensuring timely delivery.
Primary Tasks
An effective project manager kickstarts a project by understanding the technical specifications. It is their responsibility to estimate the budget and resources needed to get the project done within the given timeline. They’ll draft a plan highlighting the tasks to be done, key milestones and present it to you.
When given the green light, the project manager gets to work by segregating the tasks to the respective team members. The project manager needs to stay on top of all the technical work and this means coordinating tasks on project management tools like Asana and Trello. They need to ensure that tasks are broken into short, iterative sprints and executed according to the agreed timeline.
When certain milestones are met, the project manager will present the progress to you. It could be a mock-up, proof-of-concept, prototype, or an MVP. What’s important is that the project manager will seek your feedback and get the team to make necessary improvisations.
Product manager
The product manager is also known as the CEO of the product. A product manager serves as an intermediary between the business side of the website and the technical aspects. Their role is crucial to ensure that your website is not only functional but also meets its economic goals.
Primary Tasks
The product manager needs to understand what motivates users to visit and interact with a website. To achieve that, they’ll have to study user behaviors and what motivates them into interacting with a website. This is important as interaction leads to conversions and ultimately revenue.
One of the product manager’s key responsibilities is to gather product requirements by interviewing the users. The product manager needs to identify what are the pain points that the users are facing and how your website can be designed as a solution.
To do that, a product manager not only has to be adept in technical knowledge but also understands the business side of the website. They need to prioritize the web features, determine, which needs to be included in the MVP, collect metrics, check if the unit economy works and make proper changes based on the collected data.
Solution Architect
The solution architect takes the lead in establishing the framework of the project. The framework serves as a technical blueprint or skeleton for designers and developers to work on. They play an active role in guiding developers to flesh out the web content and functionalities.
Primary Tasks
Solution architects need to be aware of the nature of different types of websites. Depending on the usage, each type of website may require different site architecture, content, design, and interface.
It is the solution architect’s responsibility to understand the website application in-depth and create a wireframe that connects the different aspects of the website. For example, a solution architect may use block diagrams to indicate the relationship between different pages. They need to ensure that users could maneuver between pages to view information or perform specific actions.
The visualized wireframe of the website serves as technical guidance for developers and also helps you to understand the overall architecture of the website.
Web Developer
Web developers are programmers who take project requirements and turn them into functional websites. A website consists of a front-end and back-end and each part requires a developer with the relevant skill sets.
Check out our guide on how to hire web developers.
Front-End Developer
Primary Tasks
Front-end describes the visual part of the website. In other words, the front end is the part where users see and interact on the website. A front-end developer brings the layout of the website into life, by writing scripts and working with dynamic libraries and frameworks.
Techstack
These are common tech stacks used by front-end developers.
- HTML5
- Javascript
- CSS
- React JS
Back-End Developer
Data processing on a website often happens on the server-side, which is called the back-end. Back-end developers work closely with database, data processing, and integration with 3rd-party services. They’re responsible for ensuring data is exchanged in a secure and efficient manner.
Techstack
Backend developers rely on these common programming languages and frameworks in their job.
- Java
- .Net
- PHP
- Python
- Node.js
Quality Assurance Engineer
The quality assurance engineer is a pivotal role in any web development team. They ensure that your website is free from bugs and is delivered according to the project requirements. Quality assurance engineers work closely with developers and designers.
Primary Tasks
The main responsibility of a quality assurance engineer involves that the website passes QA tests at different stages of development. To do that, they’ll require a good understanding of the project requirement and prepare QA test strategies accordingly.
QA testing doesn’t take place at the end of the development. Instead, the process can begin when the team has a UI layout ready. The QA assurance engineer will run automated or manual testing methods to ensure that the design complies with the requirements. Testing is done in various stages of development until the website goes live.
Regardless of the test stages, the QA assurance will compile the results of the testing and revert to the developers in charge. The developers will then address any irregularities before moving on to the next stage.
UX/UI Designer
A UX/UI designer specializes in comprehending user behavior and translating them into an intuitive layout for a seamless web experience. The role is important to ensure that your users remain engaged when using the website and can easily reach targeted interventions, like order or leave request for services. Based on the quality, understanding of the niche and trends smooth UI/UX could increase the conversion rate, and other metrics needed for the business. UX/UI designers work closely with front-end developers to create responsive and purposeful web pages.
Primary Tasks
As mentioned, UX/UI designers are responsible for building user-friendly web pages according to the project requirements. To do that, they’ll need to prioritize users as part of their design strategy. For example, UX/UI designers need to envision the interaction flow from the moment a user visits a landing page right to the check-out process.
UX/UI designers tend to be people with analytical minds and people skills. They’ll need to understand the mindset of users, often guided by user personas and research. Then, they’ll need to turn their findings into graphic elements on the web pages.
The job of a UX/UI designer doesn’t end with building great web interfaces. The discipline itself is an ever-changing one, with dynamic trends affecting user behaviors on websites. Therefore, they’ll need to be knowledgeable in interpreting analytics, such as bounce rate and what triggers them.
Useful Tips For Coordinating A Web Development Team
Building a website is a collective effort of a highly technical team. However, don’t forget that the experts working on the tasks are people like you. This means that success lies in proper communication with the team members.
To start with, you’ll want to balance freedom and responsibility. Developers and designers work best when their creativity is not stifled. When you bring team players to your startup, they will cherish the freedom and rise up to the occasion. It also helps when your web design team is aligned with your business goals.
The trick to getting your team running like a well-oiled machine is to establish a communication framework. This means deciding the tools for project management and communication. At Uptech, we use tools like Slack, Jira, Zoom, Figma, and Miro to ensure our development team collaborates seamlessly.
While technology makes communication easier, it doesn’t replace the role of a good communicator. This means that you’ll need to work closely with the product manager. The product manager needs to understand the business side of the project, and you’re in the best position to brief them about your business goals.
You’ll find that clear requirements translate into accurate technical specifications. This allows the developers to build a website that is strongly anchored to the users’ needs.
Why Build Your Web App With Uptech’s Web Development Team
Uptech understands the complexity of building web app. Throughout the years, we have built a team with the above-mentioned architecture and operate efficiently with Agile principles. We believe that understanding our client’s business is the key to delivering engaging websites for end users.
Nomad, a web app that we’ve built for a real-estate startup in UAE, shows what our web development team is capable of. This project involves building a web app that facilitates house buying and renting in Dubai. With a concept from our client, we took proactive steps to conduct user research in the local market.
By understanding user sentiments, we build a list of features that are necessary to solve house buyers’ and agents’ pain points. Our developers and UX/UI designers work closely with the solution architect to bring a concept into a functional web app. Throughout the process, our QA engineer tested Nomad rigorously to ensure that it meets our client’s requirements.
Today, Nomad enjoys great reviews by renters and buyers. It is featured in prominent publications like Business Insiders and Crunchbase News.
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Conclusion
Building a website is no mean feat and it takes the collective effort of a web development team. Each team member shares an equal and important role to ensure that the website is built according to the requirements and delivered on time. Our team has done a great job for Nomad and other startups, and we trust that we can do the same for you.
Launch your new website with Uptech team.