New Company - Website Build Help

[mattvely]

I would really appreciate your advice. I am a non-technical person but will be looking to hire a web developer/programmer in the near future for a new company I am going to start. I am not wanting to become an expert, but want to at least understand the basic terminology, design structure, etc.

This is what I am trying to accomplish. I want to build a Website where "homeowners” can locate and hire a “plumber”. Our goal is to have thousands of plumbers who will build an online profile using our web based application. After they are approved, they will be listed as an option for homeowners on our Website.

A homeowner will be able to narrow the list of available plumbers using search fiels such as zip code radius, certain license requirements, experience, etc. They will then be presented with the top 10 options and can pick which plumber they would like to contact via an E-mail form on the plumbers profile. The plumber would then receive a notice there is an interested homeowner and they should log into their account to respond. If they decide it is a good fit, the homeowner would then enter their credit card information and we will then charge their card for the hours that the plumber submits to our Website after the job. We would then pay the plumber their payment less a small admin fee. The actual company idea has quite a few other bells and whistles, but this is the very high level concept.

So my questions are:

1) Is it correct to say I am looking for a developer to build an HTML Website that has connections to a database via PHP?
2) What kind of database should I use?
2) Since this would be my first time doing something like this, is it better to build the actual Website first and then the database part or vice versa?
3) Would a single developer be able to handle the entire project or is it recommended to hire someone to handle the customer facing Website and another developer to build the back end database part?

Thanks again and I am sure I will have other questions depending on the responses to these first few questions.

 

[ronaldroe]

1. That is the most likely option, but there are others.
2. Let the dev worry about that, but it'll likely be mySQL.
3. Vice versa
4. I would recommend a firm to do this. They'll have both sides of the coin staffed. You'll pay out a bit more, but likely get a better product sooner. One person could take care of it, but it'd likely take too long. 2 separate freelancers to do it may be asking for problems, we're a prideful bunch.

 

[mattvely]

Ronald - Thank you very much for the reply. Your responses make sense to me. At this stage, I pretty much have every single webpage in a powerpoint slide deck with comments on bottom detailing the purpose of that specific page. I am trying to think through everything before I actually look to hire someone (or a firm) but would you recommend another type of software (something a non-technical person such as myself) that I should use to layout the Website? Additionally, I am struggling to understand even a ballpark range of what something like this would cost? Assuming there are 50 or so individual pages (some of which will be connected to a database and I think the correct word is "dynamic"), and a datebase, do you have any typical ranges you would think a single freelance developer up to an established firm based in the USA might charge for something like this? I will of course get multiple bids, but want to make sure I am getting accurate bids. Additionally, do freelancers and firms typically treat something like this on a fixed bid or an hourly bid? Thanks again.