I’ve talked to multiple agencies and store owners who are desperately trying to find good PHP developers, with in-depth knowledge of WordPress and WooCommerce.
The development requests I’m receiving vary from plugin-specific customization, whole new functionality, and even complete WooCommerce store builds.
Everywhere the question is the same. Where are the good developers? Therefore I’m writing this post as a guide for each type of development work, and an introduction to our process for custom PHP work!
Find developers for customizing WordPress plugins
You have a specific plugin that you need to change/customize to fit your project. My recommendation would be to contact the developer of the plugin directly, even if they don’t advertise such a service. Why? Plugins can be complex, therefore the person who wrote the code will know it best.
The original developers should provide the best high-quality code while keeping the customizations tightly integrated with the core plugin.
Tips on asking for customization:
- Prepare a detailed outline of what you need. Screenshots are extra helpful.
- Send the details via their dedicated support forms.
- Be prepared to pay, not everything is free – the price will depend on the level of complexity. If you are lucky the developers have already made some snippets to get started.
Find developers for customizing WooCommerce
There are plenty of people who advertise WooCommerce customizations, but be careful! There are many people who will copy and paste snippets they find on the internet without a deep understanding of how the code impacts your store.
I encourage you to put a high value on the developers who would choose to modify your mission-critical store. WooCommerce has complex moving parts, which means that one change to the code (via action hooks) can have unforeseen side effects. The developer needs to know what they are doing and the impact each change has on the store.
Our choices
I’ll of course recommend hiring Puri.io for custom development. We’ve built a deep understanding of WooCommerce by developing our plugins for years. You can submit your project scope for free, then we’ll be in touch.
We’ve partnered with Codeable for development – We recommend their vetted developers for work outside the scope of our plugins or when we aren’t available. You can get a free quote from Codeable here.
Another choice is posting a job on UpWork, however, the quality of the developers may vary as they are not vetted to the same standard as Codeable.
Find Maintenance & Support
Your website is an ongoing project, it requires updates and maintenance. Luckily, there’s been innovation within the WordPress/WooCommerce hosting space. Great hosting providers who will simply do the server maintenance and even provide help via support.
I’ve moved all our sites over to Kinsta since they provide automated backups, and update their server infrastructure. It’s a completely hands-off approach compared to self-hosting.
What about onsite management for WordPress? There’s a great service by WPBuffs. The team will manage your updates, edits, and even emergency support.