Portfolio Tips
If you're an advertising or digital media college student, you need a website! Don’t even question this, you need it. This page has some options and tips for you. [Note: if you want to build websites for a living, do not use any of these suggestions — build your website “from scratch"!]
SAVE ALL YOUR CLASSWORK
The first step to building a good portfolio site is having something to show on that site. So, save your homework assignments in the cloud!
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Scribd.com — This is a nice option for creating an document that can be embedded into your site, like this.
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SlideShare.net — This is owned by LinkedIn, so there may be some LI integration some day. (See an example of an embedded SlideShare document.)
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Google Drive — Store all kinds of different documents here: Word files, Excel files, slideshows, images, etc. But they have to be publicly viewable! (See an example of a Google Doc in a website.)
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Flickr.com — Store photos here and/or your design work (in jpg format).
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Use SoundCloud for audio projects.
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Keep screenshots of your social media data reports, like this.
Another option is to be very organized with your homework — save everything in several locations. Include Dropbox.com as one of your locations. Then, when you’re ready to build your site, you can import each homework item in an appropriate format. You have to look through many portfolio samples (like the ones listed here) to understand the variety of ways to show different types of files.
THE ABSOLUTE EASIEST WAYS TO HAVE A PORTFOLIO SITE
LinkedIn.com: You should have a LinkedIn account anyway, so why not just upload documents to it and use this as your one-stop web site?
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Trent Spinner (sports media)
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Kia Jones (UX)
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Matt Meier (photography and analytics)
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Kelsey Johnson (PR, see “Featured”)
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Calvin Silvers, (sports media, see “Featured”)
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Bree Walter (UX)
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Hannah Brod (SEO)
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Annastasia Tuttle (broadcast)
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Mark Ludwig (broadcast production)
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Brandon Painter (content)
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Avery Broner (media planning)
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Juwan Bush (sports broadcasting)
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Molly Gardner (journalism, broadcasting)
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Allie Wolf (UX)
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Jocelyn Contreras (social media)
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Tim Gillissen (UX)
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Jake Mlnarik (social media)
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Thomas Dressler (multimedia journalism)
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Kayla Thomas (digital media, digital ad sales)
LinkedIn Pro Tip: If your name is hard to pronounce, display a pronunciation icon linked to a recording of you pronouncing your own name.
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SlideShare.net: You can upload your work (and you should) but just use this as your one-stop website. (You need to use a site like this, anyway, to host your documents, so you can just have this be your first/starter portfolio site!) Kayla Yehle Here’s mine.
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SoundCloud.com: If you’re a broadcast major, particularly audio emphasis, you’re already familiar with SoundCloud. But have you thought about just using this as your “portfolio” site to showcase your audio work? Here’s a good example: SoundCloud.com/BenNuelle
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YouTube.com: Of course, if you’re a broadcast major, you’ve got a YouTube account with all your work. You can just use your YouTube account as your “portfolio” site, like this, and Brandon Painter, Tim Hannah,
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Vimeo: Host all of your video projects on your personal Vimeo page, like this: Mark Ludwig
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Flickr: https://www.flickr.com/photos/153456898@N08/Annastasia Tuttle’s photo stream
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Adobe Portfolios: For as low as $10/month, you can use an Adobe portfolio, which is a good choice for graphic designers. See Emma Wiseman‘s and Brady Netzel‘s.
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Issuu: Show pages of the Missourian you designed or worked on. See how Jake Mlnarik has done this on LinkedIn.
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Scribd.com: This option is best for storing document examples, and then embedding those examples onto your site. You can also use Scribd as a stand-alone source for your portfolio. See my example at: Scribd.com/jplamer.
FREE AND EASY: CMS [CONTENT MANAGEMENT SOFTWARE]
WordPress or Wix are your best bets, but be prepared for a learning curve. The benefits start with a simple integration of a branded URL for only $17 per year (sign up for this from the beginning, as you are starting your “blog” — it’s more difficult to add this after your site is already built.) WordPress also automatically creates a mobile version of your site, and even an iPad version, if you’d like. You’ll have dozens of templates to choose from, and options to add a custom header, if you’d like.
WordPress Examples:
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HireMadisonBenda.com — general
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TaylorLJohnson.com — UX, design
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Megan Frerking — event planning, social media, PR
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BenNuelle.com — A good example for broadcast students.
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MaddiePospisil.com — Creative and strategy documents.
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Elicia Reuscher — UX design student at NW.
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ErinFunk.com — Erin has continued to build out her site after graduation. See her SlideShare plug-in resume.
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AdInk.org — See this page to see how SlideShare.net content can be embeded.
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TimGillissen.com — Another branded URL; this site has a nice large photo, so if you’re a photographer, you can check out Tim’s approach to showcasing photos. Note: Tim uses the advanced version of WordPress, WordPress.org, so you may see features here that aren’t available on the free version.
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JacquieLamer.com — And then there’s my WordPress site.
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Adding audio to WordPress: See Soundcheck-specific WordPress themes like these and this WordPress help page.
Weebly has been consistently offering good web-building tools, and continues to make improvements to its offerings. This is a reasonable source for your portfolio site. Check out some examples and see what you like. Weebly does have a mobile format available, a must!
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CatieDrummond.weebly.com — Broadcast heavy.
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Erica Brade — general UX and design.
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BethanyMuller.com — media planning, advertising campaign design
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MichaelaFernen.weebly.com — web and general design
Wix.com
Wix has some similar tools as Weebly and WordPress.
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Savana Wiederholt — IDM new media, social media
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Anna Swink — Photography, Social Media, Writing
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Avery Broner — media planning
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Jenna Kauzlarich — ag comm, UX/UI
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Madi Nolte — multimedia journalism
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Madeline Mapes — multimedia journalism
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Tierra Hogan — social media, content creation (great custom site!)
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Madi Glass — see her Web Pub assignments page
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DesiKerr.com — general advertising and sales
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Nelson Butler — broadcast
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Kaci Guerra — copywriting
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Ivory Lacina — HeyIvory.com — design
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Whitney Hall — https://whitneynikolehall.wixsite.com/mysite
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AngelaNBode.com — design
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www.CaitlynBurkemper.com — design, UX, coding
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First: start by going through the guided portfolio builder at SquareSpace.
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SpacesSquared.co.uk — This site hosts several good examples of portfolio sites build with SquareSpace.
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Nolan Harless — (Digital Media, CS) — custom website
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Cameron West — GoDaddy website builder — Mass Media
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Adobe Portfolios: For as low as $10/month, you can use an Adobe portfolio, which is a good choice for graphic designers.
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See Emma Wiseman‘s
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See Brady Netzel‘s.
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About.me
This is a quick and easy way to bring together all of your social sites, so it’s possible to use this as your one-stop web site.
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Here’s my site. This site recently added a widget for WordPress, so you can show a summary of your About.me items on a WordPress site.
Some promotional sites
Consider building a site just to promote yourself. It’s a bit different than a portfolio site.
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See Kia Jones’ HireKia.com site
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Shelby Simpson’s Hire Me site
Some portfolio sites
CargoCollective and BehanceNetwork are places where designers can showcase their work. They aren’t really portfolio-building software-based sites like the ones above, they are more like designer communities. But, they’re worth mentioning here because you may find these useful if you are a designer. Some of these services also are plug-in options at Flavors.me and About.me. For broadcast majors, post your credentials at StaffMeUp.com.
Links to my example pages
Here's some old content you might be looking for:
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Resume Examples
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Cover Letters
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How to Dress
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How to Write a Killer Thank-You Note