Creating a Personal Portfolio Website can be one of the best things to do for your career.
You get the opportunity to showcase what you can do online, your best work samples, your most significant accomplishments, and any noteworthy thing about you.
Although creating a personal portfolio is a big deal, this article will make the task easy for you.
I will be walking you through some step-by-step processes on how to create a converting personal portfolio.
This post will review what a personal portfolio website is, what a portfolio website should have, and how to create a portfolio website for free.
Let’s begin with what a personal portfolio website is.
What Is A Personal Portfolio Website?
A personal portfolio website is an extension of your personality.
As a media, digital or creative professional, or someone willing to establish themselves as a professional in any field, you need to put yourself out there.
A personal website is necessary for bringing attention to your work. It can help you land gigs doing more of what you love to do.
Having understood what it is, let’s see what’s included.
What Should A Portfolio Website Have?
In creating your portfolio, you must understand that your online portfolio can be your best tool to get your services to the next level.
It gives you a competitive edge over other sellers that do not have one.
Whether you decide to use your portfolio to kick start your freelance services or to showcase your work, a converting portfolio website should feature the following:
Professionalism
Remember that one of the reasons you create your portfolio website is to attract new customers. Hence, it has to be professional.
Everyone is drawn to excellence, and trust me; your potential clients would know if you invested any time into your portfolio to make it worth their while.
Your Home Page should be as clean and as minimal as possible, describing your Website with precision.
It forms their first impression of you and would make trusting their work with you easy.
It Should Show Off Your Strengths
Your portfolio should accurately define all your strengths and anything about you that can appeal to your customer’s visual, emotional, or business needs.
You can appeal to their visual senses by making the Website as eye-catching as possible.
A lot of people will relate better with a clean minimal web page than a crowded web page.
You should look forward to appealing to their emotional needs by mentioning other things that define you beyond just your professional skill. For example, if you are a dog or cat lover, you could include that in your bio as it could be a room for emotional bonding with visitors who relate with you on that personal level.
It should importantly detail what you do and how it would meet their business need, which is the primary reason they came searching in the first place.
Take advantage of the following parts to do so.
About Page
The ‘about page’ should be your hook page. Make it as professional yet with as much humor as you can afford without taking away from what your Website should be doing – converting visitors to paying customers.
The Basic Things That an About Page Should Have:
- Your Picture
Your visitors should match what they read to a face to form a whole picture.
It adds a touch of authenticity and transparency and can go a long way in building trust.
It also helps them remember you a lot quicker as they can mentally match your job with your face.
- Your full name
Alongside an alias or some other name they might be able to resonate with, a name is a must on a personal portfolio.
For example, as much as I would have my name ‘Chris Walker’ written out boldly on my portfolio site, it would be wise to include ‘SUPERSTAR SEO’ somewhere in my bio to showcase myself further.
In searching for a service provider in my niche, my Website visitors might have seen the name ‘SUPERSTAR SEO’ on search engines or Legiit. Helping them connect the dots would give them a higher chance of buying from me.
- A bit about yourself
You have to be creative about this, but it should of a necessity include what you would do for them. You could include your years of experience and the values that define your work. You could also add a personal touch like I earlier explained.
Here are examples of interesting ‘about’ pages.
This seller first introduced himself, starting with his name, and then went a bit personal with us by telling us about his family.
You might decide, unlike this seller, to tell a story about your work or why you chose to pursue that line of work or state what you do. See another Example:
Your Portfolio Website Should Show Some Samples Of Your Work
Your work samples show your future buyers the type of excellence and quality tenable to their jobs.
In a competitive market such as the digital space right now, it could take less than a second to lose a potential buyer.
For this reason, your portfolio should be as catchy as possible and straight to the point. If possible, in this section, use photos. It will capture the viewer’s attention first.
They will then proceed to read what you have written if they like what they see.
Take advantage of whatever you can use, from videos to slideshows to thumbnail galleries. It would be best if you had a beautiful presentation of your works to captivate your audience.
Show Positive Feedback From Satisfied Customers
Following the samples of your work, provide some positive feedback you have gotten from other customers. It would encourage future buyers to pick you.
If you don’t have any feedback, build on the part where you show samples of what you have done or can do while encouraging your customers to leave you positive feedback.
Two Ways You Can Get Your Portfolio Up
Hire a Freelance Designer on Legiit
If creating your portfolio website would be too much of a task for you, there are quicker ways to spare you the time. You can hire a Legiit Freelancer to Build a Spectacular Personal Portfolio Website for you.
Do It Yourself
You can still get yourself out there for free by taking advantage of platforms that allow you to showcase yourself more easily, and better yet, you can do it yourself.
Freelancing platforms are a great way to start.
How To Create A Portfolio Website For Free
Creating a portfolio or service page on freelancing platforms such as Legiit is the first step towards getting that job or gig, and it is free!
All you need is a portfolio that stands out. Here are the steps required:
Create Your Portfolio
Get potential customers to know what service you are offering.
You want to be as direct and avoid any ambiguous use of words here.
Remember that you have very few seconds to catch your potential customer’s attention. Start by stating what you do.
If they don’t understand what you are offering at first glance, they will scroll past you.
How To Create Your Portfolio On Legiit
- Login to the Legiit website
- Go to your profile. Under Portfolio, click on ‘Create New.’
Choose Your Page Design
Depending on your message or niche, your page should reflect it.
Whatever design you choose should be user-friendly.
To make your page beautiful and catchy, use colors that align with your business brand.
You’ll want to use colors consistently in the same place.
Your CTA (Call To Action) buttons should all be the same colors, and titles should all be the same colors.
Legiit is a prime example of utilizing the same color scheme on its Website. The white and blue colors also go for every CTA button.
Update Your Portfolio Regularly
Since the portfolio aims to keep the orders coming in, you should regularly update your portfolio to ensure you are up to date and that your prospective buyers don’t see your skills as obsolete.
Constantly revamp old project descriptions to show your skills and expertise currently in high demand.
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