How much does it cost to hire an offshore Shopify developer?

Shopify is an eCommerce platform that allows businesses to quickly create and manage online stores without having any issues with servers and development.

Shopify uses Liquid–a template language created by Shopify and written in Ruby. This template language is used to load and easily create dynamic content for the shops.

The benefits of using Shopify as a platform for the online stores are:

• Easy maintenance and management. The platform provides software and hosting to launch and manage the website easily. The interface is very intuitive and user-friendly.
• Security. Shopify provides a high level of security in dealing with any kind of documentation, personal information, and transactions.
• App and features integration. Owners of eCommerce websites can integrate applications to their online shops, thus, adding new features.
• Marketing tools. Shopify provides SEO features and website analytics. It is also easy to create landing pages for the websites and customize tags for SEO.

Shopify is a platform that allows businesses to create, maintain, and manage eCommerce websites. It is also possible to create and sell goods in offline shops with the help of Shopify Point of Sale (POS) and application with all the shopping locations available. It is also a good option that allows you to customize the website easily.

There are several tools that are worth using to create an attractive eCommerce website.

• Exchange. This tool allows you to buy and sell online shops. It is easy to find a suitable shop based on different features, such as price, revenue, profit, business type, site age, and others.
• Burst. With this tool, you can find high-quality pictures for the online shop: banners, ads, and other marketing purposes.
• Hatchful. This tool allows you to create a unique logo for your eCommerce website. You can choose from a variety of fonts, colors, shapes, etc. (thus, if you have no budget for the logo, you can create it with free options).
• Kit. It is a marketing tool that provides such features as email personalization, ad creation, posting, and reminders not to forget to post on social media.

Shopify app developer is a full-stack developer whose main responsibilities are to create, maintain, and manage the interactive eCommerce website. Other responsibilities of the Shopify developer are to create new or modify existing themes in Shopify Templates for specific brand benchmarks.

If the back-end or front-end developer has a good experience with HTML, CSS, JavaScript and has created websites on their own, they can dive into creating eCommerce websites on Shopify.

There are three types of developers based on their experience level: junior, middle, and senior developers.

• Junior Shopify developers
  Junior Shopify developers (Entry-level) are the ones who begin their path in programming and have up to two years of experience. The web developers should have basic knowledge of Liquid, JavaScript, HTML, CSS, or PHP, a basic understanding of Shopify Ajax API and Admin APIs. As junior engineers don’t work on complicated projects, they are responsible for basic tasks. Senior developers and experienced teammates guide and help them in their learning of technologies.
• Middle Shopify developers
  Middle Shopify developers have from three to five years of experience that requires them to have advanced knowledge of more than two programming languages (JavaScript, PHP, Ruby, or MySQL). They also have advanced knowledge of Liquid template language, front-end development, and experience in implementing headless eCommerce projects on Shopify. Middle engineers are skilled enough to create their own projects and provide high-quality software solutions for the projects.
• Senior Shopify developers
  Senior software developers have more than five years of experience. Such a level of expertise requires them to have advanced knowledge of more than two programming languages, frameworks, an advanced understanding of front-end development, and extensive expertise in developing websites on the Shopify platform. They also have experience in integrating external APIs and the ability to install and customize the Shopify themes. Senior developers also have good collaboration skills, and they often play a role of a team lead and manage the development process.

Shopify developers have the following responsibilities:

• Create and maintain new Shopify themes;
• Write clear, readable code;
• Test the performance of the website and proceed with the debugging process;
• Together with UI and UX developers, create an efficient user experience;
• Optimize the website with marketing tools and platform APIs for higher conversions.

Shopify developers are required to have the following skills:

• Experience in full-stack development;
• Strong knowledge of Liquid and Shopify Themes;
• Expertise in PHP, JavaScript, Ruby on Rail, and JSON REST API;
• Knowledge of Google Analytics tools for Conversion Rate Optimization (CRO) and other marketing tools;
• Experience with such popular platforms as WordPress, Magento, etc.

When hiring Shopify developers, you have three types of engineers: freelancers, in-house, and outsourced developers.

• Freelance Shopify developers
  Freelance developers are a good option if you have a not complicated short-term task. You can hire them very quickly, and it is also cheaper compared to other options. This model also provides a wide pool of freelancers from other countries. Freelancers are a good option for developing small features and improving the existing eCommerce websites. But with this option, you may have a low-quality product as it is difficult to find skilled and experienced developers with all the required skills among freelancers.
• In-house Shopify developers
  If you have a project in the core development stage or you want to find a team of engineers for your company, you should hire in-house developers. These programmers are highly motivated and dedicated to the company as they are a part of your business. It is also a good option as in-house developers try their best to create high-quality projects and provide software solutions on how to improve existing ones. Although, this hiring model is quite expensive as you pay not only for the developers’ work but also spend on technologies your developers need and bonuses for them.
• Outsourced Shopify developers
  The last option is outsourcing which includes two types of hiring–traditional outsourcing and staff augmentation. With outsourcing, you can hire a dedicated development team of software engineers as well as QAs, designers, and PMs to work on your eCommerce project. You can hire quality offshore developers that live in countries with a lower cost of living which influences the average salary of developers and make it a cost-effective solution. Staff augmentation allows you to quickly hire one or several experienced developers with the required skills as a helping part of the in-house team. This model also provides a wide talent pool with cost-effective hiring (you only pay for developers’ working hours).

A good developer job description can help you to find the best matching candidates that will also be able to provide you with good development services. To get an attractive developer job description, point out the following:

• Write the job title and describe the developer’s role.
• List tech skills.
• Point out the responsibilities the developer will have.
• Point out the project’s development stage (core development or maintenance).
• Write about the expectations you have of the end product.
• Write about the field your company works in (the developers with related job experience can come up with appropriate solutions for your project).

There are many ways how to test the developer’s tech skills–online tests, live coding, and assessment questions. Hard skills assessment questions allow you to check the required knowledge and skills.

• Are there any Liquid IDEs available for Macs and PCs?
• Is it possible to set up custom product types to have two different kinds of product templates?
• Is product_img_url -> srcset possible?
• What would be the typical syntax for a Liquid object with a metafield?
• What is the best way to make a dynamic section available on the homepage?
• Can Shopify compile both Sass and Less?