Instructions on how to make a simple portfolio for beginners

 As a designer, you need to have a portfolio in the form of a personal website to introduce the products you have designed. Thereby, you can introduce yourself to viewers (potential customers, employers...). So do you know how to make a portfolio ?

Even though the portfolio is personal, it must always have a specific purpose and goal. They may include the following bullet points:

• You're a recent design graduate looking for your first full-time job.
• You are looking forward to having a freelance design job and attracting your first clients.
• You simply want to build a space to save your design projects.
• You want to build a professional portfolio to attract fans.

When starting your career, don't be too pressured to have the perfect portfolio. Most importantly, don't compare yourself to others. You are on your own path. Others may have been at a different stage in their career. Focus on yourself and what you want to achieve.

Here are some tips on how to create a portfolio that may be helpful to you.

Plan first, then write, and finally design your portfolio

As a designer, jumping into design immediately is a natural reflex. The excitement builds as you think about interesting design ideas and what your portfolio will look like. You feel "itchy" and want to start doing it right away.

But when it comes to building a portfolio for the first time, “design it now” isn't the first step to take. First, write down the core purpose of your portfolio, the information you need to include to achieve your purpose, and how you want to accurately represent your story. Only then should you start digging into the design details.

Quickly think of the message you want to convey through your portfolio. Then sort those ideas by priority:

• What is the goal of your portfolio?
• Who is your target audience? Potential customers, recruiters, fans or yourself? List the most relevant information these people want to know about you.
• Who are you as a designer? What information should people know about you? Describe yourself and the work you are doing (or want to do in the future).
• What projects and products do you want to show off in your portfolio? Sort them by job type, duration, or show off your most impressive projects at the top.
• Your contact information.

Please outline the necessary information before starting to design.

Make your portfolio site look neat, scannable and accessible

Once you get to the design stage, put the viewer's experience first. During your research, you may have come across inspirational websites or design trends that you want to apply to your portfolio. But do this in moderation. A good portfolio should first of all be scientifically arranged and easy to read, without visual disturbance. Here are some rules:

1. It's okay to skim for information: remember that some visitors just skim your website. Make browsing easy and don't overcomplicate things. Shorten text into multiple paragraphs, add titles and illustrations, include rough sketches, and images that show your design process
2. Have clear categories: Your website menu should include:

• Your work: Design samples, projects, quotes
• Introduce yourself: Where visitors can read more about you, what you are doing, future ambitions, hobbies or anything interesting about you.
• Contact information: An easy way to reach you if a client needs to work with you.
• Homepage: A link to the home page so viewers can easily return to the beginning.

3. Simple images, fonts and colors: if you want to be safe, install a basic typeface with a font that displays well in any browser.

4. Note the portfolio viewing experience on different devices: think about how people access your portfolio. For example on mobile devices, on computer browsers. A paragraph of reasonable length when viewed on a computer may be too long and difficult to read on a mobile device.

5. You don't need a personal logo: Of course, if you are a designer who focuses on branding and logo building, a portfolio is a great opportunity for you to show off your skills. But if you're a product, UX, or web designer, it's better to focus on showcasing your skills in your portfolio.

6. Use a code-free portfolio builder: Once you've planned and written your content, there are plenty of website builders to choose from. Try WordPress, Webflow, Squarespace, Cargo, Tumblr or Dribbble Pro. These pages allow you to choose from pre-made templates, drag and drop images, and show off your designs very quickly with no coding required.

Visibility is the top criterion when making a portfolio.

Focus on the projects you enjoy most

If you are a new designer, chances are you don't have many products to show off in your portfolio. Do not worry. Everyone has such a starting point. School projects are also valuable. If you're proud of it, don't hesitate to show it off.

Even for those who already have multiple products, you should only include in your portfolio design projects that represent exactly the type of work you want to continue doing. Eliminate projects you don't like.

Just because you're just starting out, doesn't mean the content you showcase isn't valuable. Always keep your confidence.

Write details about the work process

Make sure you're getting the most out of each section of your portfolio. Customers want to know how you approach problems. You can add the things you love, the experiences you learned from each project and what you would do differently if the design was revised.

Show off the projects you're most excited about in the first most visible position.

Collect and organize your work as soon as possible

• After completing a project, you'll want to jump right into the new project. But the best time to organize and write about a case study is right when you've finished it and everything is still fresh in your mind. It will help you summarize what you've done, record your progress, and reflect on what you've learned.
• Always start by writing: the goal, the hypothetical problem, the implementation process, the solution, your conclusions, the knowledge you have learned.
• Visualize design details with videos or slides or short animations (keep original design files available). Screenshots of finished works on different devices.
• Use cloud storage to store documents.

Write down information as soon as possible, because if you wait too long you will forget it.

Bottom line: Treat your portfolio like a "living document" and invest your time as soon as you've completed a project you're passionate about. In the future, you'll thank yourself for this note, as it's easy to forget details that you made a long time ago.

Remember, we all start small. We learn and grow as we work. Immediately apply the knowledge on how to make a portfolio in this article.