Interview with Jigar Shah, CEO & Founder - WPWeb Infotech Pvt. Ltd.

Jigar Shah  

CEO & Founder, WPWeb Infotech Pvt. Ltd.

Give us a quick overview on WPWeb Infotech. When and how did you begin this journey and what were your motives to be successful in web design and development?

I began my journey creating WPWeb Infotech about 5 years back on 15 August 2015. One of my clients and friends; Daniel Waser motivated me to start a business of selling WordPress plugins as I was then actually the developer myself and was associated with him for almost 3 years for all his plugin development ideas. I launched few plugin ideas like Social Auto Poster and Social Login where I got an extremely overwhelming response in the market. Later I started developing extensions for EDD (Easy Digital Downloads). Nowadays, we create WordPress and WooCommerce plugins and our focus is on to get clients who are looking for such services where they also intend to sell plugins or themes so that we can give them all services such as plugin or theme development, design, support and even digital marketing stuff under one roof.

What is your role in the management and development of WPWeb Infotech? 

I started my role as developer. However, now my chief role is to take care of the entire operations that include the development of in-house products as well as client base projects, its communication, support and marketing. We closely collaborate with all clients and understand their business ideas and requirements and develop an easy to use optimal solution.

Tell us about your biggest achievement in the industry 

We became Envato Elite Author in the year 2015 which was our first biggest achievement. We then became Trusted Consultants on Easy Digital Downloads in the year 2016. We are now a team of 40 enthusiasts who love to work on WordPress and have served more than 200 happy clients and 10,000 + happy customers that make use of our hand crafted Plugins.

How do you schedule the development phases of the web design and development projects to promise the timeline to your clients?

At WPWeb Infotech, we have a multidisciplinary team that works together. The team comprises of: web developers, web designers, digital marketers, and SEO experts. We do follow the below process to get clients on board and give them a successful execution:

Requirement gathering.

Creating scope of work.

Kick off call with client and internal team to make sure all are on same page.

Weekly updates if hourly project or milestone base delivery if project is in fixed cost.

Final delivery of the project with demo call to explain all the things to client properly.

Make project live on client server and free bug support

We also support clients after delivery by doing maintenance contract or via hourly slot model where he can take support as and when required.

Which framework, programming or scripting languages do you prefer for web development? How do you convince your clients for the same?

We prefer working with PHP frameworks like CI or laravel and for open source technology we strongly suggest WordPress only to all our clients. For our WordPress plugins, we keep updating our plugins to latest WordPress version and make sure it is 100% multi language support. In addition to this we also always make sure to follow all WordPress coding standards. We also suggest making use of actions / filters, so if any client wants to customize the same they can do that it very easily.

For the development and design services, most of the clients are clear with what they need and they don’t much care about which language or framework we are going to use as far as the solution provided is smooth and easy to use for them. However, if they seek our suggestions; we strongly suggest them WordPress. In cases where they want to go for custom code we suggest them to use laravel as it provides more security features.

What would you suggest for a successful and profitable business progression, when it comes to web design and development? How do you define the factors that influenced you make this choice?

One can keep a close eye on client’s satisfaction. With an extremely competitive market it becomes very important to be extremely responsive and take all measures to make sure the growth target is not missed. Delivering optimal and fully functional solutions adding value to the client’s business and their growth helps you grow your Business as well.

How do you scheme your pricing model? How do you fix your budget? 

We work with various pricing models on different products. For instance, we have a flat rate on the WordPress plugins, per site with lifetime updates and a 6 month free support. While for the service industry, we follow 3 different models as under:

FIXED PRICE MODEL

When the client's requirements are clear we suggest going ahead with this model where a scope of work for the project is defined and agreed mutually and milestones are defined.

TIME AND MATERIAL

In instances where it is difficult to specify the scope, specifications and implementation for the development of a project the time and material engagement model becomes an attractive option. In this business model, all the activities are supervised on an hourly basis. The client is then charged based upon a predefined hourly rate.

DEDICATED RESOURCE HIRING

The dedicated web developer model is the most flexible business model where we align a resource to dedicatedly work with the client & his team. The resource exclusively works on any of the client’s projects. This model is economically most competitive as well.

How helpful are the web design and development made by WPWeb Infotech for your clients in enhancing their business?

I think today we have more than 13,000 people - using our products to grow their businesses. We have worked for potential clients like Saint-Gobain, ERRIN, Max, San Diego University and many other respected firms. They are working with us more than 3 years now and they still are working with us as they are happy with the work we deliver. We just do not provide development services but also try to understand their business logics and help them grow their business with our expertise.

9. What according to you are the best practices to attain client satisfaction for web development?

 Keeping communication clear and preparing a detailed &Scope Clarity in detail and keep communication clear to avoid misunderstandings at a later stage. 

Sharing regular work updates via emails or Skype or any project management tools like Jira or asana.

Attending to the concerns of the client with an ongoing development process

Giving minor flexibility in accommodating on-the-fly task requests or amendments.

Maintenance & after deployment support should be handled with agility and perfection.

Take it as learning experience when you get negative feedback, make it right for the next time.

How do you update your business system to be in pace with the technological advancements?

We stay updated with all technological advancements and keep our infrastructure updated all the time. Our team of WordPress enthusiasts is great learners and remains updated with any developments happening in and around WordPress. Team work is of key significance to us and our work culture has been created in such a way that everyone in the team is more than colleagues and shares a very special bond amongst us.

What are your thoughts about material design, progressive web app and Internet of Things (IoT)?

Growing ease of connectivity, communication, and access to information has grown the knowledge base. Progressive web apps have a broad way to go for huge number of businesses since they have the ease to deliver content without any additional effort of surfing through the web. The IoT concept is also widely accepted and implemented through multiple domains and is also growing overnight.

What do you think will be the future of web design and development technology?

The future of any technology hugely depends upon its usability & scalability. With more and more people getting used to technological innovations we will have a larger user base for web design & development technology.

In the current scenario I see people are moving to WordPress from other open source software’s like joomla, magento, oscommerce, etc. because of the ease of using it and its flexibility. I strongly feel only shopify can beat WordPress in future.