Should we hire a web dev agency?
We're a $2M revenue startup with a Squarespace website. We need to build a content first website with a powerful content front end and back end. Should we: 1) Hire a Web dev agency 2) Hire freelancers 3) Hire a full stack developer None of the in house team members are technical
"content first website" With "powerful content frontend and backend" What the fuck does that even mean. Sure, hire a dev company that'll rob you blind and leave you with the tech debt Hire one technical guy internally to manage your interests and outsource the work. Otherwise none of you will have any idea if you're getting ripped off or not. Don't outsource to India
Racist much ? Don't generalize a country of over a billion because you were incompetent in outsourcing.
Honestly, you could probably look for a local shop that does website development if your site is largely marketing based. Look for a company that will do a discovery process first, so they know what they are quoting you. I'm all for agile practice but in the software as a service space, if whatever company you work with quotes you without a full understanding of the business needs, both now and at a high level in the future, run.
Depends what you need your website to do - if you're pulling in $2m in revenue with a squarespace website and no engineers, I'm assuming your website is not the product but rather something to help you sell your product. If that's the case, probably a full-time SWE won't have enough to work on, and you're probably better off with an agency. If on the other hand the website is directly a part of your value prop, rather than just an accessory to your offering, you probably should have someone in-house to work on it
Even after the website is up, there's the whole "prod support" thing... which most people just kind of ignore, and the means of hosting the website as well as where to make payments for keeping the site up will kind of become tribal knowledge I'd go for a freelancer over an agency, and I agree with the other poster about not outsourcing to India, which is what tends to happen with an agency like Accenture, Tata Consultancy, etc. Having an in-house web dev would be ideal (but the salary for a good one is probably cost prohibitive), or at least somebody to be "the technical guy" that inherits and supports whatever you get out of freelancers.
TC or GTFO