What Makes a Good PHP Developer? and How Can You Afford Them?

by Virtual Employee Digital Marketer

Websites are now not just your brand identity, they are also the main engine driving sales, thanks to SEO. Today, the majority of any business is AdWord driven. You are in a ceaseless pursuit to get your target audience to your website. And hence, PHP developers have become critical cogs in the wheel. If you hire PHP developers who are able to ensure a seamless website with the best UI attributes, that’s the battle half won. And when you hire a PHP developer, you must see to it that he/she meets the following 5 basic parameters.

1. The developer should have a firm understanding of procedural programming theory, including OOP (Object Oriented Programming)

2. He/she should be an expert in PHP.net's documentation.

3. Security- Must be capable of protecting the code, database and file systems for hazards like XSS attacks or first or second order database injection attacks.

4. Debugging- Must have the ability and nerves to quickly and calmly go from an error code to fixes, even in an unfamiliar framework. Must have intimate knowledge how to var_dump() and print_r() through any problem.

5. Keep code and html separate- Mix "view" with your "model" or "control" code and see how things turn haywire. Good PHP developers for hire will always ensure that the code and html are mostly unique. And it’s important since it impacts Wordpress, which despite not being a big favorite amongst developers, are preferred due to SEO.

Now when you hire PHP developers who happen to fulfill all your requirements in terms of talent, expertise and experience, you end up paying them way more than what you had initially budgeted for. There are no fixed remunerations in this profession, and depending on your willingness (read desperation), PHP developers for hire can charge a bomb. I have shown a comparative chart of average wages for PHP developers. All rates are calculated annually.

US	$86,353
Switzerland	$73,207
Denmark	$71,409
Norway	$66,694
UK	$48,444
Israel	$39,953
Germany	$47,421
Netherlands	$39,447
Finland	$41,977

As you can see, these are pretty high rates. Hiring someone at such a high remuneration locally could seriously strain your budget. Take the example of Simon McCaroll, owner of Printbots, UK, who underpins the difficulty in trying to hire locally for such a technical position on a limited budget. The seemingly endless employment regulations also frustrated him, an emotion which is also shared across the Atlantic by Bob Hess of Paragon Print Systems. This forced both these men to look overseas for options and today they both employ services of virtual employees based in India.

Simply put, when it comes to PHP developers, India is arguably the best place to go. And not without reason.

· Compared to developers and programmers in North America or Europe, an Indian virtual employee can save you anywhere between 50 percent to a staggering 70 percent!

· Indian employees have shown extremely high levels of loyalty, sincerity and dedication to the outsourced jobs. It has impressed clients globally who now depend on these virtual employees for multiple processes.

· Thanks to the abundance of the talent pool (size and population does matter!), it not only keeps costs silently friendly, it creates a huge pool of experienced professionals readily available to clients. The client has plenty of choices.

· The client does not have to worry about HR and other issues. It’s handled by the outsourcing partner. When you hire PHP developers in India, they work under Indian labor laws, due to their physical location and them technically being employees of your outsourcing partner. So no more worrying about which Federal law you might be breaking!

These are just some reasons that I managed to highlight. There are so many more! So in case you are struggling to hire a PHP developer locally, maybe, India needs to be your next port of call.