A good portfolio is a key to getting new clients. Today, portfolios are online, and competition between them is high. Make sure yours stands out by following some simple yet crucial guidelines.
Build Your Brand First
Before you offer to build brands for clients, make sure yours is top-notch. Don’t save your best efforts for a client; use them for yourself! Design your logo to stand out among other logos’. Choose your colors and design elements to best represent you. This is your time to shine.
Build Your Online Presence
If you don’t already have a website, build one. A URL is crucial on your email signature tag and business card. There are many platforms available that cater to design professionals, and your work will be displayed to its best advantage on one of them.
You can pay someone to build your site, but it’s possible that you may be able to do it yourself. Most builder sites are user-friendly and easy to navigate. If you’d rather not deal with that, consider joining a portfolio website that will host your portfolio, giving you that coveted URL.
Advantages to doing this:
They already get traffic looking for good designers.
They’ve done all the hard work, leaving the easy things for you.
Your URL will be recognized, and that’s better than hearing, “I never heard of you.” Not until now, you haven’t!
Collect Your Best Work
It’s assumed that you’ve taken extensive photos of every job you’ve done. Now present them along with the short story of the job. Every photo gets a title, and an explanation is always appreciated. Every job has a story behind it; share a little of it if you can. This engages the person viewing your portfolio, and the more they enjoy what you’ve put out there, the more likely they are to hire you.
Be sure to include a variety of projects to show your versatility. Start with your best work to make sure it’s seen, don’t save it for a big finale. Learn more at G2 about creating a great design portfolio.
Include information about where your work is displayed and any positive reactions to it. Highlight your clients who hire you on a continuing basis.
Won any awards? Be sure to include your winning design and details of the competition. Provide a good balance of information to informs, rather than overwhelms. The emphasis is on the design.
Ensure all your material is of the highest quality, don’t include photos that are dark or fuzzy. Double-check all your work before publishing to be sure it’s exactly how you want it.
Build Your Physical Brand
Wherever you do your work, whether at home or an office, carry over your brand into that space. Consider some large format printing to create a printed canvas of your award-winning design or a flag to fly over the entrance. Ensure your office is attractive to the type of client you’re looking for.
Be Easy to Find
Make sure your contact information is found easily. Search your website and find out how easy (or difficult) it is for a potential client to contact you. How many pages did they have to look at before finding your contact information? Hopefully, it’s on every page in the footer and a dominant position on the home page.
In conclusion, position your strong portfolio in a good place. The days of lugging a large leather folder with handles from office to office are over; now, your portfolio is viewed with the click of a mouse.
