According to data from the Canada’s Job Bank, the median hourly wage for web developers in Canada is $30.50. That works out to an annual salary of around $63,000 based on a full-time work week. It’s important to consider other costs associated with hiring an employee: benefits, training, and employment insurance. These costs can add significantly to the overall cost of putting a full-time webmaster on staff.
It’s important to carefully consider the costs and benefits of hiring a webmaster on staff versus using a website management company, and to consult with a web design professional or marketing specialist to determine the best course of action for your business.
Things to consider when deciding whether to hire a webmaster on staff or use a website management company:
- Cost. Hiring a webmaster on staff can be more expensive in the long run. A website management company may charge a monthly or annual fee for their services.
- Expertise. A webmaster on staff may have more in-depth knowledge of your business and its website, but a website management company may have a team of experts with a wide range of skills and experience.
- Time commitment. Hiring a webmaster on staff may require a larger time commitment in terms of training and management, while a website management company can handle all website-related tasks.
- Scalability. If your business is growing quickly or experiencing sudden spikes in traffic, a website management company may be able to scale up their services more quickly than an in-house webmaster.
The best option for your business will depend on your specific needs and resources.
Is Having A Full-time Webmaster Too Much AND Not Enough?
With a webmaster on staff, you have a full-time staffer and all of the costs that come with them. A WordPress support agency can cost much less than a dedicated staffer. In a pinch, they can bring the whole force of their service to the clients in times of need. When something goes really wrong, there’s not way to scale a single webmaster, but WordPress support can commit multiple people to making a fix.
Traditionally, WordPress support services commonly include:
- Troubleshooting and bug fixing. Experiencing issues with your WordPress site? We can help diagnose and fix problems.
- Plugin and theme support. If you’re using a plugin or theme that’s causing issues on your site, a support company can help troubleshoot and resolve the problem.
- Security support. WordPress support companies can help secure your site by installing and configuring security plugins, performing regular security scans, and helping you recover from a hack or malware attack.
- Performance optimization. If your WordPress site is running slow or experiencing other performance issues, a support company can help optimize your site’s speed and performance.
- Design and customization. Some WordPress support companies offer design and customization services to help you customize the look and feel of your site. Web321 adds projects to the support work. We can create custom plugins or themes.
- Ongoing maintenance and updates. Many WordPress support companies offer ongoing maintenance and update services to ensure your site is always running smoothly and securely.
WordPress support services can help businesses and individuals who use WordPress to manage their websites by providing a range of technical and design support services. Beyond the basic services, Web321 offers more services to fulfill the role of a webmaster.
When Is It Time To Hire or Retain WordPress Support?
The best time to retain a WordPress support company is when the company is too big to ignore the Web (ie. if the company grosses more than $100k), yet small enough that they can’t bear the expense of a dedicated staff member. If a company is spending $500,000 on payroll, one full time webmaster would cost $60-80k or 11 to 16% of the overall payroll. Ideally, the webmaster role should account for 5 to 10% of the payroll. Their work should be key to digitization of the business and the marketing successes. Put another way: what’s the return-on-investment (ROI) of a full time webmaster on the payroll? If they cost $80k/yr, they need to do work that generates far more than $80k per year. Is that the case? if the role of the webmaster is only making a modest gain on the company bottom line, then a less expensive option is the better solution. A company like Web321 can come into play to help the company, but create a positive ROI. This is what we do: we take care of websites and offer WordPress support.