Building your Professional Portfolio
An online portfolio is like a treasure trove for potential employers! Your resume, work samples, relevant work and extracurricular experience all in one place? Score! To pick the right web builder for your portfolio, you need to consider three main things:
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- What sort of content you want to display: graphic, written, video, etc.
- How much time you have to work on it
- How much customizability you desire (and customizability is a double-edged sword!)
Our resources will help you decide which web builder is right for you and give you the information you need to jump right in!
Design Elements
Building a website that a user can easily read, understand, and use is no easy task! While web builders will help you make the right choices, a basic understanding of the Elements of Design will help ensure you create something beautiful and usable! Tutor Amanda Harner distilled these elements (colors, fonts, and shapes) into a helpful website full of great examples and advice.
Wix or Weebly Web Resource
Check out the interactive guide that DigiComm tutor Madi English created to help students decide with web builder is right for them. She helps you think through the pros and cons and decide with platform is right for you given your time, content, and creative control.
Wix v. Weebly Quiz
Ah, the age old question, "which web builder is right for me?" The portfolio building process can be a tedious one, so it's important to think about which web builder best fits your needs. Take this short, ten question quiz to determine whether you should be Team Wix or Team Weebly!
Web builder comparison chart
Want to know the pros and cons of our two favorite free web builders? Take a look at our comparison chart for Wix and Weebly. We consider how much time you have, how user friendly you want the builder to be, and what sort of content you're planning on displaying.
Portfolio Guide
Are you the kind of person who wants to get the big picture before jumping into a big project like creating a professional portfolio? Well, we got you covered. Our handy-dandy guide includes an FAQ, overview of personal branding, web building basics, tips on how to tackle the difficult "About Me" page, and lastly how to protect your portfolio.
Portfolio Guide
Web builder: Weebly
Have you decided that Weebly is the site for you? Awesome, let's get started! Check out this handout for an overview of the basics of Weebly. Learn how to navigate, add subpages, link out to external websites or documents, and much more!
Web builder: Wix
Want to use Wix to build your portfolio? Great choice! This handout will provide you with what you need to know to help you get started. Learn how to navigate Wix, incorporate creative content, create a visually appealing site, and much more!
Usability Testing Handout
Finished with your portfolio? Conduct a usability test to be sure it's good to go live! This handout will help you determine the ease of use of your website. It will also help you check to make sure you have included key information on your portfolio.
Usability Handout (pdf)
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Last step! Once your portfolio is ready to be shared, you need to think about privacy. You have the option to keep your portfolio hidden from search engines and only let people access it by sending them your link. However, if you want people to be able to search and find your portfolio, you should set up the Search Engine Optimization (SEO) for your portfolio. This will make it easier for search engines like Google to find and display the right content.
The following icons used in our cover images are from the Noun Project
- Documents by Garrett Knoll (http://thenounproject.com/garrett.knoll/)
- Certificate by Made by Made
- Persona by Oliviu Stoian
- Digital storytelling by Gregor Cresnar
- Video by Alfa Design
Licensed via Creative Commons (CC by 3.0 US)
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