Quick Steps to Creating Your Online Portfolio
Your personal portfolio is a way for designers to showcase their work. If your a freelance designer, your portfolio will be an avenue to show your work to potential clients and to promote yourself within the design community. If your a student, your portfolio is what you should have to show your work to design firms looking to hire you. Portfolios are used by all different types of designers, rather your a graphic designer, web developer, interactive media designer, every type of designer in media should have a way to showcase their personal work.
Building your online presence is key to promoting yourself online within the community and to prospective clients. I have put together quick steps that will guide you through the process of creating your portfolio, with examples that will get you up and running in no time.
The Key Elements in Your Personal Portfolio
Your Logo
Your logo is the first thing a user will see on your website. The logo should represent you and your brand. Branding is one of the most important parts in building any type of presence online and its whats going to make your name recognizable. The logo should either be your name or the name of your business. If your promoting yourself as a freelance designer, then its obvious you will use your name. If your a freelance designer who is trying to market his company to potential clients, then its best you design a logo for your business.
The logo is often placed on the top left corner of your website. But a lot of creative designers also place their logo within the header of there design.
Portfolio
Your portfolio is very important. Obviously this is why your here, to showcase your work right? This requires a lot of attention because you want to display your work in a very cool, clean, and possibly creative fashion. Its so many different ways to display your work. But the main idea is to have your work separated into sections. So maybe you’ll have a web design area, which will show your websites, and maybe a graphic design or print area which will display that work. But its best to keep those sections separated.
The other important part of your portfolio is how you display it. You should first have thumbnails to your work, a lot of modern online portfolios use very big thumbnails which has the name of the client or project. When you click on a web design thumbnail, the project description should show, with the project name, technology used, and the URL.
Those are just some ways of showing your portfolio, here are some examples on how its done:
Services
Anyone who comes to your website trying to find out if your the guy for the job would want to see your services. Your services should be sort of a mini resume. It should show what exactly do you provide to clients. This could include: web design, logo, flyer, business cards, e-commerce, photography, twitter design, the list goes on. I think a cool way to show your services is the accompany it with thumbnails. But a lot of designers simply show a list of their services, and even sometimes show the cost.
About Me
This section allows the visitors of your site to get to know you a little better. Your about me section should include a brief bio, with a photo of some sort and maybe even a description on your history as a designer and who you have worked with in the past. General information could be a good idea, but most clients want to know how you relate to their business. Another cool addition that could benefit your about me section is your resume. Possibly providing a .PDF version of your resume could allow people to see your experience first hand.
Contact
The contact section should be straight forward. It could include a few different things though. You want to provide your name, number and email address for clients to contact you.
Also providing a small form for people to fill out in-case they have questions or want a quote request is a very good idea. A lot of clients would love to just fill out their needs and have your contact them back, but I have learned from first hand experience that showing your services and prices on the site tends to give a very good turn around in purchases.
Blog
Adding a blog to your portfolio is a new feature in online portfolios. Almost every designer has a blog nowadays, so its cool to either link to your blog or have your rss feed right in the news section. This will keep users up to date on whats going on with you at the same time show users that your active in the design community. Having a blog also tends to show potential clients that you know what your talking about.
Call To Action
Having a call to action is the deal maker. Showing a purchase now, order now, or event contact for quote area on your site will get potential clients to contact you immediately. Showing web packages with the option to purchase that package is a process ive always used in my websites and it has worked to my benefit.
Social Media
This is obviously another key part to your portfolio. Showing clients your active on social networks is just another element to get clients to contact you. Its another avenue for them to know you personally and contact you for services. Displaying your twitter, myspace and facebook accounts on your website with the option to add you not only builds your friends list, but it keeps a close connection with clients.
Conclusion
Those are just some quick steps to get your going in creative your own online portfolio. In every portfolio should have those options and links. On vectornpixel.com we will continue to publish articles relating to online portfolios that will further assist you and getting your online presence seen. Next we will provide a showcase of portfolios that will inspire you to be creative when designing your next home on the web !
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