Internet's exponential growth and the benefits associated with it have made businesses start, expand, and shift their services online through websites. From buying, selling, and renting, to browsing TV content, watching videos, listening to music, and using social media, everything is possible only because of websites and web applications. With more organisations willing to attract a large set of customers globally, the need for an aesthetically pleasing, responsive, and user-friendly website is growing. As per LinkedIn's 2020 Emerging Jobs Report India (Source), JavaScript developer, back end developer, full-stack engineer, Python developer, and front-end engineer fall under the list of top 15 emerging jobs. The massive requirement of web developers highlights why you should think of making a career in the same. However, before you plan to do so, here is all that you must know about web development.

What is Web development?

Web development is the process of building and maintaining websites to host via the internet. The process involves tasks such as web designing, client-side and server-side scripting, web content development, and network security configuration to build a perfect website or web application. Web design and web development are two most confused and interchangeably used terms, however, they are not the same. While web design focuses on aesthetics, design, layout, and user experience of the website, web development involves the usage of web languages, software, and coding to make the website functional. Web development is about experimenting with new technologies, solving customers' problems, and building a responsive, easily accessible, and useful websites.

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Why is Web development needed?

Websites have become the first point of communication between customers and brands lately. It helps in creating awareness about a brand and its products and services, it generates leads, and it facilitates buying and selling of products. Websites give customers more liberty to choose, buy, and pay for a product as per their requirements, from anywhere, 24×7. Similarly, a well optimised, partially automated website, helps businesses hire employees only for the essential tasks rather than just assisting customers in selecting, buying, paying, or returning products like they do in physical stores. Had web development not been there, businesses could not have built their remarkable identity standing strong in today's cut-throat competition. Web development helps organisations expand their reach through a credible platform, reduce costs, provide 24×7 accessibility to the customers, and pave the way for affordable worldwide marketing.

When do organisations need web developers?

Organisations are established to detect customers' problems and solve them. After detection of the problem, companies find and build a solution that reaches the customers through a website. While anyone can create a website today with free-of-cost page builders and templates, only a skilled, technically sound, visually creative, and experienced web developer can make a customised website as per companies' requirements. Organisations need professional web developers to build the website or web application that allows customers to connect with the brand to find apt solutions such as purchasing goods, paying bills, booking tickets, learning, and seeking entertainment. Organisations either hire web developers on a full-time basis or on a contractual basis for specific projects.

Companies look up to skilled web developers when they wish to execute their idea of building a website from scratch. Web developers assist brands in finalising the website design as per the trends, user requirements, and relevance to the competitors and the market. They build and test the website, add content management systems and complicated e-commerce tools in it, and they use programming languages like HTML & CSS to code the website. Web developers collectively work with different teams to finalise the content that would go on the website, decide the website's layout, graphics, audio, and video with the help of other designers, and continuously monitor the website to manage its functionality, add new features, and keep the site secure.

Where is the need for Web development felt? – Career opportunities for web developers

Companies in almost every industry, be it technology, manufacturing, education, retail, food and beverage, entertainment, or telecommunications need professional web developers who can build, maintain, manage, and upgrade websites. People with knowledge of web development could work at —

• MNCs – Multinational corporations are branched out in different countries with a huge number of employees and provide promising growth opportunities and exposure to web developers. Although they expect applicants to have some prior internship or job experience, working in an MNC has multiple perks such as a diverse working environment, strong cultural values, opportunity to travel abroad, valuable and extensive networking opportunities, and unmatched experience for future. Skilled web developers can work with MNCs that specialise in computer systems, advertising, public relations, consulting, company management, information services, data, and design-related services.
• Start-ups or small businesses – Unlike MNCs, start-ups have a different set of perks and growth opportunities for budding web developers. Working as a web developer with growing companies helps one build a strong vision, learn to manage more tasks, handle responsibilities and challenges, bring innovative work to the table, and become frugal and independent. The freedom to creatively explore new possibilities in a start-up motivates web developers to give life to their imagination. One can start as an intern with a start-up and can gradually convert their internship into full-time roles like a web developer, computer programmer, software developer, database administrator, or technical writer.
• Self-employment or freelancing – Along with the flexibility in schedule, freedom to choose different web development projects, working from any location, and saving costs, freelancing helps in the development of ownership, self-confidence, interpersonal skills, networking and other essential skills. As per the U.S. Bureau of labour statistics (source), self-employment is the second most popular opportunity for web developers after full-time jobs in computer systems design and related services. As a freelancer, one can work with different industries on a contractual basis in roles such as back end, front end, full-stack, WordPress, PHP and My SQL, HTML, and ReactJS developer and can also work as a lecturer or online web development teacher.
• Web development agencies – A lot of organisations usually prefer outsourcing their website creation and management work to avoid getting stuck with an unattractive, outdated, and static website. Web development agencies work with different clients and help them by creating a professional web design, customised website, optimise it for higher conversion, and provide on-going support. Working with such dynamic agencies help individuals learn the importance of simple yet unique UI/UX, clean coding, SEO, and responsive design. Job portal, e-learning solutions, e-commerce and marketplace, social networking, news portal, business directory, tours and travel, and property listing website are some websites for different industries that a web developer could get to work on with a professional agency.

Who can do Web development?

Web development is an extensive task which demands technical and non-technical proficiency along with practical experience of building the website, finding and rectifying errors, updating content, and monitoring the website. Someone can perform web development once they choose an industry, niche, and category they would like to work in as the skills required for each differ. Web developers generally work in 3 major categories-

• Front-end web developer – These are responsible for ideating, planning, and designing that part of the website with which users interact. It includes the website colours, font, designs, navigation, actions, and how the website behaves when the users interact with it. They build the user experience through 3 major languages – HTML, CSS, and Javascript programming.
• Back-end web developer – The back end of the website has a database, a server, and an application. The data related to the users and their actions is stored in the back-end which is managed by back-end developers. They generally use server-side languages such as PHP, Python, and Java to build the application and several tools like Oracle and MySQL to manage the data.
• Full-stack web developer – These people work on both the client-side and server-side and perform the duties of both front-end and back-end developer. They generally work with all the tools, languages, and software that the above two work with.

After choosing any one of the above mentioned 3, one can start learning the essential skills required for web development. Knowledge of programming languages such as HTML, CSS, SQL, Java, Python, and XML, understanding of UI/UX, back end basics, testing and debugging skills, and responsive design skills are must to build a career as a web developer. Analytical skills, interpersonal skills, teamwork, time-management, constant improvement and learning, and staying up-to-date with the latest web development tools and industry trends are some of the essential soft skills they must have. Someone with all these skills and the enthusiasm to work on user experience, browser compatibility, API and databases, internet security, responsive design, and networks and servers every day can do web development.

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How to learn Web development?

Web development brings some of the most dynamic, creative, and interesting career opportunities if learnt from a credible online training platform or university. Online web development courses are extremely popular as they provide extensive practical exposure that physical training institutes sometimes fail to serve the students with due to lack of devices, internet access, technological availability, and higher teaching charges. Online trainings are affordable, accessible, and easily available even in the most remote parts of the country.

Enrolling in an online web development training will help you learn HTML & CSS to build the structure of web pages and to style them, Bootstrap to develop responsive mobile web pages, SQL queries to create, manage, and store information in the database, and PHP to perform operations on the database and to build functional logic. You will learn through engaging video tutorials in a 6 weeks long training which also includes multiple assignments, assessment tests, code challenges, quizzes and exercises. Along with expert support through the forum, a certificate with a unique verification number, and placement assistance, you will get to work on a real-life e-commerce website from scratch where you will deploy all the web development skills and tools learnt in the training.

Courtesy: Internshala Trainings (trainings.internshala.com) – an online training platform