The world of web design requires a fine balance. It is essential that you have enough band width to service existing clients and offer a high-quality service to new clients, but in this in a volatile era, it is not advisable to carry excess demand in terms of resources. Hiring independent contractors can help businesses to achieve this balance: the resources are available when they are needed, but the agency won’t have to pay for them in leaner times.
The Benefits of Hiring an Independent Contractor
No matter what size your web design agency is, hiring a contractor can offer significant benefits.
- Value For Money: While independent contractors often earn higher hourly or daily rates, they usually end up being more cost-effective for agencies over time because there’s no need to pay for employee benefits, social security, or taxes. Businesses can also set flexible work terms without the complications of employment law. By using contractor management software, agencies can simplify onboarding, track project deliverables, manage compliance, and ensure smooth collaboration with contractors. This makes the entire process more efficient and cost-effective.
- Niche Experience: you can hire contractors to service a particular need or client with niche skills and knowing the trends, from specific coding requirements to bespoke themes and plugins, enabling you to pitch for contracts that are at the higher end of your capacity and experience.
- Ready-Made Expertise: one of the big draws of using contractors instead of building in-house capacity as that contractors are adept at hitting the ground running. New hires usually require some development, even if it is just the basic onboarding and induction process. Contractors, on the other hand, are office chameleons, adapting to different environments seamlessly, which means that they require little in terms of initial input while providing instant value to a team or project.
Tips For Successful Partnerships
One of the great misconceptions of securing an independent contractor is that they may not be as invested in organizational culture and success. This is not always the case; if you choose the right contractor and you take the time to make sure that they fit with your organization and have the skills and experience and access to tools that will help you to bring your website development to the next level, your contractor can feel – and act – as though they are a core member of your team. This is especially important for client-facing work as it is essential that, as a web design agency, your clients feel valued and not palmed off on a “contractor”.
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Choose Wisely
The process of choosing a contractor may take some time. A great way to find global talent is via recruitment sites; just take a look at the contract jobs on Motion Recruitment. Before you start looking, carefully consider the skills that you are looking for. Consider what you need on a regular basis as a web agency, and what you may need for shorter periods of time or stand-alone projects with new or existing clients. The aim is to have a list of skills and aptitudes broken down into categories: evergreen, seasonal, and occasional. Ideally, you want the evergreen skills to be serviced in-house with boosts provided by contractors; the capabilities in your evergreen and seasonal lists are the ones that you need from your contract, with the occasional as nice-to-haves.
Once you have a clear idea of what you are looking for to support your web development agency, you are in a good position to start looking. It is a good idea to extend your search over a range of platforms. Advertise on contractor jobs pages, but ask around, too; check in with other web agencies to see if they have any recommendations and reach out to your teams across departments to see if they can recommend contractors. You can even launch a small outreach campaign for hiring right candidates, it should be easy with tools like Smart Reach. Once you have a shortlist based on capabilities, you can get into the cultural fit. Don’t look for someone that is “like” your organization – look for someone that will complement it, not just reflecting your values and skills, but amplifying them. An understanding of and rapport with your organization is critical; you need to make sure that you are working with someone who understands you and will fit in well, while helping to bring your web design offerings to the next level.
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Build Relationships
A contractor is not just “a contractor”. For the period of time that they are working with you, they need to be treated as an integral part of the team, both internally and from a client perspective. From adding them to your team page on the website, to involving them in team events and activities, and making sure that they are involved with client interactions, your the contractor is a member of the team. This relationship building is important both internally and externally. Internally, for optimal performance, you need to welcome a culture of trust and teamwork. Externally, your clients need to feel that they are valued and that you are going the extra mile to make sure that they have the best there is to offer for their web design project.
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Introduce a Retainer
As a web design agency, you don’t want to turn away valuable work. Knowing that you have a trusted contractor who knows your organization, your clients and your values is an invaluable resource that you can call upon when you need support. Finding a good contractor is a challenge and once you have contact with them, it is well worth trying to keep them so that you can utilize their services when you need to. Introducing a retainer will mean that you only need to make a relatively small regular investment in order to ensure that you have the extra capacity when you need it. As little as a few hours or a day a month can be enough for you to make sure that you have a contractor at your disposal, without having to go through a new procurement process every time.
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Practicalities to Consider
Skills, experience and capacity are the primary factors to consider, and they should have been covered in your process of choosing your contractor. However, there are a few logistical elements to consider, too. These include time zone and working hours, visa and work permit requirements, and the preferred currency and payment method.
Steps to Hire
Once you find a suitable contractor for your organization and its immediate needs, it is important that you define expectations and follow the right hiring process.
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Create Your Contracting Agreement
The agreement should outline the work that the contractor will undertake with KPIs (key point indicators) and timelines clearly defined. Specify the process for reporting, including how and when any variations in deliverables are reported, and to whom. Clearly outline key points of contact including other contractors or subcontractors and specify ownership of IP (intellectual property).
Finally, clearly outline the agreement in terms of payment including how much will be paid, when, and how.
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Confirm Local Compliance
While it may not be your duty to ensure that your contractor meets their local regulations in terms of tax and employment law, you may be found liable if they do not correctly report their self-employment with you. All US agencies must comply with the US Fair Labor Standards Act but different states differ in their requirements for reporting new hirs and independent contractors. Check out your contractor’s local requirements before signing contracts.
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Ascertain Tax Requirements
While working with independent contractors frees you from paying additional benefits, social security and tax, it is still useful for you to gather information so that you have it should you be required to provide it by their tax regulator. If your independent contractor is located in the United States, you may be required to complete a federal tax form to confirm non-employee compensation. This is likely to be from 1099-NEC or form 1099-MISC. You may also need to fill in form W 9. For contractors outside of the United States, you may need to complete form W-8 BEN.
If you are unsure what your obligations are as an agency hiring an independent contractor, consult the IRS website or official tax collection agency sites.
Conclusion
Whether to accommodate new clients within your web design agency, to cover senior staff absence, or to fill posts on an interim basis while you recruit permanently, independent contractors can be a valuable addition to your team. By ensuring that you take time and care in the process of recruiting contractors, you and your permanent and contracted team members will have the opportunities to flourish.
