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Web Industry Job Titles: Where Do You Fit In?

With the continuous evolution of the Web, web industry job titles are created at a very impressive rate, opening up a lot of possible career opportunities for more people each day.

Speaking of careers, what do you call yourself? Are you a web designer or a web developer? Or are you the kind of person who’s somehow stuck on both boats? Learning your real job title will be tantamount to learning where you’re good at. Stamping your identity through a job title could be considered as the first step.

There are a lot of job titles in the web industry and the confusion between such jobs is understandable because they do meet ways. So, how do we know which is which and where we fit in?

Let’s take a look!

Web designer

As the name suggests, a web designer’s main job is to design. Talking literally, this job focuses on the ‘look’ of the whole website. Web designers are the architects of the Web and should be masters of the visual arts.

What web designers do:

Web designers plan for the overall look of the website, including considering the costs of actually developing it.
Web designers should be able to create a look and feel that catches the viewer’s attention to keep them glued to the screen.

What skills should web designers have:

Web designers should be competent in colour scheming, graphic design and information flow.
There is an ongoing debate if web designers should learn how to code or not. This talk has been prevailing around web design and development forums for over a long time now. However, there is really no definite answer for that right now.

UI/UX designer

UI designers are responsible for creating unforgettable user experiences. Using their keen observation of trends and eye for creative and totally neat designs, they make your browsing experience a once-in-a lifetime opportunity.

What UI/UX designers do:

UI/UX designers collaborate with product managers and engineers to orient themselves in the themes of the design.
UI/UX designers execute the plans from conceptualisation to actual development. This, of course, will include wireframe creation, storyboarding, among other things, so to facilitate communication and interaction between the design and the user.

What skills should UI/UX designers have:

UI/UX designers should have broad experience in the design process. That includes manipulation of Photoshop, Illustrator and other products.
UI/UX designers need skills to code.

Art director

Art directors or design directors take designing into an administrative level. They are supervisors of the workflow and they are the head of a team of designers.

What art directors do:

Art directors are responsible for coordinating with the client and supervising the design process.
Art directors update the clients from time to time regarding the progress of the work.
Art directors check the quality and uniformity of the design.

What skills should art directors have:

Art directors need to have an excellent taste of design.
Art directors must have the ability to create designs in minimal supervision.
Art directors must have an excellent grasp of the technologies used in designing.
Art directors should have the skills needed to fully utilise the talents of the team and transform them into outstanding results.

Web developer

If web designers are the white collar architects of the web industry, we have the web developers as the ever hardworking blue collar builders. Web development can be considered the building industry of the web. Without web developers, the design will just remain in plans or in PSD mock ups. Web developers use a lot of tools in producing an optimised and interactive website.

What web developers do:

Web developers are responsible for the production, modification and maintenance of the website and its user interface.
Web developers work with web designers in making semantic mark-up languages like XHMTL/CSS and turning their static PSDs to working browser pages.
Web developers implement server-side codes to develop a complex and interactive website.

What skills should web developers have:

Web developers should be experienced in programming languages like PHP, ASP, Ruby, Phyton, HTML/CSS and more.

Web content strategist

Of course, the website won’t just purely be designs. It needs content and this is where web content strategists come into play.

What web content strategists do:

Web content strategists are responsible for planning, developing and managing information placed on the website.

What skills should web content strategists have:

Being in charge of the content of the website, web content strategists should have great command of the English language.
Web content strategists should have ample amount of knowledge in copywriting and audience experience.

Information technician

Just because information technicians deal with hardware, doesn’t mean that they can’t be considered having a web-related job. Truth is, without them the web won’t probably run as smoothly as it does right now.

What information technicians do:

Information technicians are responsible for hardware and software maintenance.
Training, consultation and recommendation about future planning and development of resources are also part of the job description of the information technician.
Information technicians are the point person when it comes to ensuring that technology is accessible and equipped with the up-to-date hardware and software.
Information technicians are also called in to perform troubleshooting in hardware, software and networks.

In short, information technicians tend to the basic needs of the computers and networks per se.

Product manager

We mentioned the role of the art director. Well, art directors have bosses too and they are called product managers.

What project managers do:

Product managers ensure that every facet of the project is well-tended.
Product managers deal with clients, art directors and lead developers and steer the whole project into the projected results.

What skills should project managers have:

Project managers should have great multitasking skills.
Product managers know how to take charge.
Product managers know how to communicate effectively with clients and the developers too.

Customer service representative

As every product or web service is not flawless, it is a must to have some people who are alerted if these flaws reach the customer.

What customer service representatives do:

Customer service representatives make sure that each client meets what they want.
Customer service representatives help the client or tell the developers to solve problems met by the customers.
The main job of customer service representatives is to talk to people and help them solve problems, from navigation to unruly website bugs.

What skills should customer service representatives have:

Customer service representatives need to have a clear grasp of the product or service being offered.
Customer service representatives can easily make the regular customer understand what they are trying to ask that customer to do.

SEO specialist

SEO specialists work with copywriters and sometimes, copywriters are also SEO specialists.

What SEO specialists do:

SEO specialists develop the website’s visibility on the internet by continually trying to improve the website’s ranks in the search engines.
SEO specialists are also responsible for maximising the traffic a website gets through the addition of keywords.

What skills should SEO specialists have:

Basically, when you speak of SEO specialists, they are the common people who make a living out of understanding what search engines want.

Conclusion

So there you have it. These are some of the many web industry job titles that we commonly encounter.

Now, knowing the different job titles, are you now aware of what you will be called? Well then, if you are, you may now start adding the title in your business card. Flaunt that name, but flaunt your work more.