How to Make An Online Portfolio | 9 Simple Steps

1 Pick the Perfect Portfolio Platform

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The best place to start a great portfolio is with a great web building platform. You’ve got a few to choose from, and the best one for you will depend on your needs and preferences.

Website Builders

Website builders are great if you want a professional website without needing tech skills, or if you’re looking to save time and money. All you need is an internet connection – you can then pick a template, drag and drop images and text to customize your design, upload your own content, and publish your site.

Website builders are quick, easy, and affordable, and you can use them to build a truly stunning site – as long as you pick a top quality builder. There are tons of free builders available, but for an advert-free website, you’re looking at around $5 to $15 per month as a starting price.

Builders like Wix, Weebly, and Squarespace are especially good for creating online portfolios – discover the full list in our review of the 9 Best Portfolio Website Builders.

WordPress

It’s the world’s most popular open source platform, and for good reason. WordPress is the most powerful and customizable platform for creating an online portfolio, giving you total control over your site’s design, features, and functionality.

With that control, however, comes responsibility – you’re also in charge of security and running software updates to keep your portfolio running smoothly. A lot of beginners use WordPress, but it helps to be fairly technically confident, and to have plenty of time and patience when getting started.

WordPress is a free platform, but you’ll need to pay for hosting, as well as any premium plugins or themes you might want. Every WordPress site is different, so it’s hard to predict an exact cost, but realistically it’s likely to fall between $11 and $40 per month.

Portfolio Builders

If you’re looking for something super simple and straightforward that can hold your hand while you build, then a portfolio-specific builder could be worth considering. It’s a good idea to research thoroughly before picking one, though, as their designs and features can sometimes be more limiting than a website builder such as Squarespace or Wix.

You want to check for powerful SEO tools, marketing and blogging features, and customization options that let you create a site you’re 100% happy with.

Popular choices include Fabrik, Pixpa, Viewbook, and SmugMug – these builders cater to niches, though, so make sure you’re totally dedicated to a particular sector before you start building!

Here are some quick tips for choosing the right platform for you:

• Always try before you build or buy – put a platform through its paces before committing if there’s a free plan or trial available.
• Try a couple and compare them – even if the first one you try is The One, there’s no harm in trying others to compare and make sure it’s the best choice.
• Don’t get distracted by the free plan – everyone loves free stuff, including us! But for building websites, free isn’t really an option – not if you want a professional portfolio, anyway. Look at the cheapest price that will remove adverts from your site instead.

2 Design Your Portfolio

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Whichever platform you’ve chosen to build your portfolio, the next step is the fun one – you need to start designing your portfolio website.

You need your site to look its best in order to show off your work and highlight how professional you are. This is important because people will judge you on the design of your portfolio – indeed, 75% of people base the credibility of a business on how its website looks. You can bet that the same applies to online portfolios!

Of course, hiring a web designer is a great way to ensure you end up with a beautiful portfolio, but you might not have the money spare to pay for this sort of service. And the good news is, you don’t really need to – especially if you’re using a website builder like Squarespace, which comes with stunning pre-built designs for you to customize.

If you’re looking to build and design your online portfolio yourself, we’ve got some handy tips to get you started.

#1. Keep It Simple

It can be tempting to throw everything you’ve got at your webpage, especially if you already have a lot of work that you want to show off. However, it’s important to avoid creating a cluttered portfolio, as this will send visitors fleeing straight back to Google.

Instead, try to keep your design simple. People expect to see certain elements on a website – a menu, a footer containing helpful links, an easy-to-spot link back to the homepage – so make sure to follow these design best practices.

Don’t create hundreds of pages, either. A portfolio should be simple, and easy enough to navigate in one sitting. A homepage, an About Me page, a contact page, and a showcase of your work are the key pages to include. (We’ll walk you through creating these pages soon!)

#2. Use White Space

To avoid cluttering, make use of white space. This is the empty space that surrounds images, text, buttons, and other design features. White space helps to direct the user’s attention, and prevents pages from becoming too crowded or messy.

Surrounding an image, heading, or paragraph with white space will draw more attention to it. It can be very useful for directing the visitor’s gaze towards your most important features, such as a positive testimonial or your best piece of work.

#3. Pick a Color Scheme

Picking a color scheme is an important part of designing your online portfolio, as it can make or break your site. Choosing colors that clash, using too many colors, or even picking colors that are too similar can have dire effects on visitors’ engagement.

Different colors evoke different reactions and feelings in people – for example, blue is supposed to inspire trust, while red generates excitement. So, think about how you want visitors to feel when they land on your portfolio.

You should pick a primary color, which is the main color you’ll use on your website, and a secondary color, which is used for providing contrast and drawing attention to features like buttons or boxes.

Erika Senft Miller’s online portfolio uses a subtle but clever color scheme, switching from calm blues to sunny yellows once you’ve clicked on one of her projects.

#4. Choose a Readable Font

Fonts are all about readability – if you pick a super fancy font that looks awesome, but is difficult to read, you might find people aren’t getting the most out of your written content.

Different fonts have different “personalities” – check out Google Fonts for a huge library of free fonts, along with descriptions and examples of each one. Google Fonts is a good way of finding fonts that work well together, if you want to use more than one – fonts can clash just like colors can, so be careful about your choice and don’t pick at random!

#5. Spread Your Content Out

Don’t try to fit everything onto a single page. This might sound like the easiest option, but it’s actually quite challenging to create a really good one-page portfolio.

Instead, spread your content out over multiple pages. Put all the essential information on your homepage – people should get an instant idea of who you are, what you can do for them, and how to get in touch with you.

As we said before, don’t get carried away creating too many extra pages, but do dedicate pages to your most important content. For example, your “About” information deserves its own page, as does your work showcase.

3 Show Off Your Work

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Okay, so your online portfolio is starting to look good. You’ve got your color scheme in place, you’re ready to use white space galore, and your fonts are frankly stunning. But there’s something missing – something big.

Your work! The whole point of building an online portfolio is to showcase your skills, whether you’re an artist or a designer, a writer or an architect. People want to see what you can do before hiring you, and this is your time to shine.

Be Selective

When uploading examples of your projects, our top tip is: be picky. This applies whether you’ve been in your industry ten years or ten weeks. If you’ve been at this a long time, it’s likely you have years’ worth of projects to show off. If you’re just starting out, you might feel the need to overcompensate by uploading every bit of work you’ve ever done.

Don’t overwhelm your visitors. Pick out the very best projects that you’re most proud of – the ones that show off what you can do. Ask yourself why you want to show this particular work off, what it tells people about you, and which skills it demonstrates.

Remember that your personal favorites might not always be the best examples to showcase on your portfolio – look at all your work with an open mind, and try to see it from a client’s point of view.

Play and Display

Once you’ve picked out your portfolio showcase, it’s time to get it on your website!

We recommend dedicating a page to showcase your work, but how you do that is up to you. A slideshow, a gallery, a video, a timeline, or even a map – how you display your work will depend totally on what you’re displaying.

Play around with different formats and styles until you land on the one that feels right for you. Remember to use white space to avoid cluttering the page, and give context to each example to highlight your skills.

You should also include examples on your homepage, as this gives visitors an immediate idea of the work you do and whether your skill set matches what they’re looking for. Make sure that any work you put on your homepage is top quality and shows off your skills. Let the work speak for itself – don’t overcrowd the page.

Tell a Story

Instead of just randomly placing work into your portfolio, try to tell a story with it. Weave together your work, any client testimonials, as well as your own words describing the project. Each piece of work has its own story, which will help visitors understand and connect with your portfolio.

Visitors won’t know why, when, or how you created your work, so provide context to help them understand exactly what you did and what the results were.

That said, don’t write too much – the work should take center stage and speak for itself, with any text simply there to support and give backstory, framing each piece with context.

4 Use Social Proof

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In the last section we talked about including testimonials, which are an example of social proof.

This is a phenomenon where people are more likely to do something if they see others doing it first. Social proof is why customer reviews and star ratings are so important, and why testimonials are a portfolio’s best friend.

Gather Testimonials

If you’ve ever done work for a client, ask them to provide a testimonial. Testimonials are like goldust – you can sprinkle them over your online portfolio, and make visitors sit up and go “Huh, this person sounds like the sort of artist/designer/writer/architect I want to work with!”

It can be hard gathering testimonials when you’re first starting out, but don’t feel disheartened if you don’t yet have any glowing reviews to put on your portfolio. Try collaborating with someone else on a project to get a quote from someone who’s worked with you, even if you don’t have any feedback from clients.

Check for reviews on social media or via email, and if you can’t find any, then reach out to clients and ask if they’d like to give you one.

Get Social

You can also leverage social proof by using social media. Create accounts and link to them from your portfolio website – this will show visitors that other people are interested in your work and following your projects.

You can even embed your social feed onto your portfolio. This can be a great way of showing what you’re working on currently, or to chat about any works in progress that aren’t yet ready to  be fully featured on your portfolio.

If you do go down the social media route, make sure you always keep it up to date, relevant, and professional!

5 Write an Engaging “About” Page

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Come and let us get to know you a little bit. Who are you? What are your skills? How did you get started? What sets you apart? Why should a client hire you?

Now, we’re not saying you should write out your whole life story, but these are just some of the questions you want to answer when writing your “About” page. People want to know who is behind the portfolio – after all, they’ll want to get to know you a little before hiring you!

A common mistake people make when writing “About” pages is to focus too much on themselves. Yes, you want your personality and skills to come across, and to make the page as unique as you are – but you mustn’t forget about the clients.

People want to know what you can do for them, so make sure you tie this into your “About” page. Okay, you’re a fun and easy going person – that means you can create an enjoyable experience for your clients. Or maybe you work well under pressure – that means you can deliver fast results on tight deadlines.

You want to strike a balance between not seeming bland and not seeming too self-centered, which is easier said than done!

Let your personality shine, but also remember you’re talking to potential clients. Always bring it back to why you’re the best for the job, what you can do, and how you can help them.

6 Create a Contact Page

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Even if you took our advice and put a contact form on your “About” page, it doesn’t hurt to have a separate contact page on your online portfolio too. You want to make it as easy as possible for people to get in touch with you, after all!

If you’re building your portfolio to generate more work, make contacts, and connect with people, then the main aim of your site is to get people to reach out. This makes your contact page a vital part of your portfolio. 

It’s pretty easy to create a contact page – most design themes come with a contact page already built-in that you simply need to customize. If your theme doesn’t include a contact page, you can find an app (or plugin if you’re using WordPress) and add one to your page in a few clicks.

Here are some top tips for creating your contact page:

1. Make it easy to find – list it in your main menu and in your website footer.
2. Summarize who you are, what you do, and why people should contact you – don’t assume that people have taken time to read through the rest of your site.
3. Provide some contact details – such as a professional email or phone number, so that people can get in touch quickly.
4. Add a contact form for people to fill out – this will help you to sort through submissions.
5. Keep it simple – make it clear exactly what action the visitor should take on this page.

Don’t be afraid to have fun with your contact page – let your personality shine through, and make visitors really want to reach out and say hello!

7 Make the Most of SEO

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For people to admire and hire you, they need to find you first. You can help them discover your online portfolio by optimizing your site for search engines, such as Google. Search engine optimization (SEO) is the process of trying to help your website rank higher in search results.

SEO is a whole new world of continually evolving tactics, but we can start you off with the basics right now:

1. Use Headings

Splitting your pages into headings – like we’ve done here – helps Google “read” your page.

Google puts user experience first, so it doesn’t want to send people to websites with one great wall of text. Using headings shows Google that your page is digestible, structured, and easy to read.

2. Optimize Images

Chances are your portfolio will feature many images, and maybe even some videos. This is perfect for showing off your work, but it can slow down your website’s loading speeds.

Slow-loading websites are a huge no-no if you want to rank highly in Google’s search results, so you need to find ways to keep your pages loading quickly. One of the best (and easiest) ways to do this is to optimize images.

Compressing the file size means it loads faster – however, the more you compress an image, the more it will affect the quality, so don’t keep compressing the same image over and over again.

3. Write Meta Titles and Descriptions

When you search for something in Google, you’re met by pages and pages of results. The results are usually made up of a link and a short description, that look like this:

Did you know that this is called metadata? The blue link is the meta title, and the short bit of copy is called the meta description. Writing your own metadata can make it more convincing, and encourage more people to click through!

If you have target keywords, try to use them in your metadata. See the words highlighted in bold in the example? Those are the keywords that the user searched to find your page, so try to use relevant keywords in your meta title and description.

Make it clear what your site is about, and try to use some persuasive language. For example, the result shown above asks a question, and uses the words “discover” and “today” to encourage people to click on this result rather than someone else’s.

Always keep metadata short, otherwise it’ll get cut off!

4. Create Links

Link between your own pages to help Google’s bots understand your website. This is called internal linking, because you’re linking within your own website. For example, you might link from your About page to your contact page.

It’s also helpful to get other websites to link to your portfolio. This is called backlinking. 

The more trustworthy these other websites are, and the more links you get, the more it helps your own site. This is because these links tell Google that other established and trusted sites are endorsing you and talking about you, which improves your online credibility.

You could ask clients to endorse you on their websites, or you could write helpful content for other blogs and include a link back to your portfolio.

5. List Your Services

Make sure potential clients can find you in places such as Google Listings and Yelp – anywhere that people may be searching for services online. If you’re a local freelancer or business, this can help narrow down the competition, as you’ll appear in the “near me” searches from anyone in your area.

When listing your services online, always make sure your contact details are the same across the board. Google will notice if they’re not, and will rank you lower down if you’re inconsistent.

8 Spice It Up and Stand Out

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Your portfolio is looking awesome. No, seriously – everything is in place, and you’ve optimized it for search engines to help people find it. But wait… in doing research, you notice that everyone else’s portfolio looks pretty good too. Amazing, in fact. So you start to wonder: why would people pick me over them? 

We’re not championing self-doubt here, but this is actually a great question to ask. Why is someone going to choose you over your competitors? Your unique style and sparkling personality will win them over most of the way, but what else makes you stand out?

It’s time to spice up your portfolio with some fun extras to make people really sit up and pay attention. You can get imaginative with this yourself, but here are some ideas to get you started while you build your online portfolio…

1. Get Blogging

Start a blog, they said. It’ll be fun, they said. Well, we can tell you from experience – it is fun! And it’s a great way of catching visitors’ attention, showing you know what you’re talking about, and letting people know that you’re staying active online.

A blog is perfect for building your portfolio’s reputation – it’s great for getting links and boosting SEO, as well as engaging followers. You can give updates on projects, write thought pieces about goings on in the industry, and even interview clients or fellow freelancers for contributions.

Do start a blog if you have something to say. Don’t start a blog just for the sake of it – that will do more harm than good. And if you’re already running a relevant blog, you can always link to it from your “About” page – simple!

2. Shout About Your Achievements

Got awards? That’s amazing, and you should let people know. Don’t be braggy, but don’t be shy either – get those prizes, commendations, or nominations on your portfolio for all potential clients to see.

If any of your work has been featured in the press, or even if you helped out for free in your local community, talk about it on your portfolio – it’s things like this that show you’re a cut above the rest.

Don’t sweat it if you don’t have any awards yet. Be honest about where you are in your career – people won’t expect you to be armed to the teeth with trophies if you’re just starting out!

3. Think Outside the Box

Can you use your skills to make your portfolio stand out? For example, could you create animations, or add an interactive element when building your online portfolio?

Don’t try something fancy just for the sake of it, but think about how your unique set of skills could bring a new level to your portfolio. 

Often creatives are hired for their imagination as well as their skills, so if you can demonstrate the ability to think outside the box on your portfolio, you might be one step ahead of the competition already!

9 Stay On Top

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Sit back and relax – you’ve finished creating your online portfolio!

However, the work isn’t yet done. You need to stay on top of your portfolio to stay ahead of the competition – nobody likes an outdated website, so keep it fresh and relevant by adding new projects you might be working on.

Always make sure that your contact details are correct and up to date, and that your content is too – if you move to a new area or switch your project focus, for example, be sure to update this information in your bio!

If you’re running a blog or various social media accounts, be sure to post regularly, and remember to update the testimonials on your portfolio pages as new ones come rolling in. In a few months’ time, review your portfolio’s design and content, and see if it still matches the work you’re producing.

People, ideas, brands, and goals change – as you grow, make sure your portfolio keeps up too!