While most freelancers rely solely on word of mouth, social media platforms like LinkedIn, and freelance websites like Upwork, Fiverr, etc, an elite few build professional WordPress portfolios to create, organize, and showcase their work and establish their expertise to potential clients.
They understand that, as a freelancer, a strong portfolio can make a huge difference in your career. And with a WordPress portfolio site, they increase their chances of landing high-ticket clients.
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Unfortunately, many freelancers make use of social media and third-party platforms to build their portfolios in a bid to avoid costs. These platforms are great places to connect and pitch new clients, but they could be better as portfolios.
They are free and might present you before your potential customers in a subpar light. They also need the structure to create, organize, and showcase your previous work. You are also limited in the length of your sales personal copy and the kind of images or videos to include.
In addition, social media can also expose your clientele to your competitors and allow them to poach your clients with cheaper work.
You can overcome these limitations by building your personal WordPress portfolio.
Suppose you are a freelance WordPress developer and wish to join the ranks of the elite few. In that case, you are lucky because this article will provide tips for building a professional WordPress portfolio to showcase all your projects, skills, and achievements.
Critical Elements of a Professional Online Portfolio
For you to come off as a professional WordPress freelancer, there are several essential elements to include in your WordPress portfolio, including:
Domain and Hosting
A website is the first thing you need to get for your WordPress portfolio.
You need to get a professional domain name and a hosting space for the website. You can buy domains from reputable domain registrars like GoDaddy, Namecheap, etc, and get hosting from a reliable hosting provider, preferably a managed WordPress hosting provider like InstaWP Live.
Homepage
With your WordPress site created, create your home page. This is the first page your potential customers will come across, so you want to do your best to impress them.
Using a drag-and-drop page builder to design your home page is best.
Start with a hero section with a simple, compelling headline, a quick intro, and one or two CTAs.
Next, showcase your most recent or best work. Also include prominent customers you have worked with and glowing testimonials and recommendations.
Then, add other sections that intrigue potential customers and convert them into paying clients.
About Page
The next thing you need for your WordPress portfolio is an About Page.
This is a page where you extensively sell yourself, portraying your best attributes, from your background and experience as a WordPress developer to your skills and qualifications.
Add your face, either a headshot at a minimum or a couple of professionally captured photos of yourself.
Portfolio / Work Samples
It is only a complete portfolio if it has your actual projects and work samples. So include a gallery or list of all your projects, starting with your best work.
You can use images, videos, links, or a combination. If your portfolio is lean, include personal projects, demos, and collaborative work to beef it up. Y
You can also include a brief overview or description of each project, from what the customer wanted to what they got. Showcase your portfolio on both your homepage and a dedicated portfolio page.
Your Services
What kind of WordPress services do you offer?
So, do you offer website development from the ground up? Do you offer website revamping? Do you offer website management and maintenance?
Do you offer WordPress error fixing and troubleshooting? Do you offer site speed and SEO optimization? Do you offer WordPress content writing?
Include and briefly describe all the WordPress services you offer. It’s also good practice to reveal your work process and pricing so potential customers can decide immediately if you are the right fit for them.
Contact Details
If your potential customers decide you’re the right fit for them, how can they reach you?
Include your contact information, email address, phone numbers, and links to your social media profiles.
Add your contact details to easy-to-find places, including your website header and footer, a dedicated contact page, and CTAs, which will be added to your contact page on your homepage, portfolio page, service page, etc.
Clear Navigations and Calls to Action (CTAs)
Ensure that you use clear navigation, such as header and footer menus, and links to important pages of your site, including the homepage, About Page, portfolio page, service page, contact page, etc. Use distinguishable link colors and poppy CTA buttons. Also, ensure that all links lead to their appropriate destination and use relevant CTAs on every page on your website.
Testimonials / Recommendations
Testimonials are people saying good things about working with you. Positive feedback from your colleagues and past and existing customers builds trust and credibility. It reassures potential customers that you are the right person for the job and increases your chances of getting hired. So include testimonials on your homepage, service, portfolio, and pricing page.
Where applicable, include logos of prominent brands you have worked with and press mentions to increase your value. Customers will be more than willing to pay premium bucks when they see your value in the WordPress community.
Free Resources
Although optional, free resources are another item to include in your WordPress portfolio website. Free resources for a portfolio website include free checklists, templates, blog articles, podcasts, etc. Free resources help you share your insights, experiences, and knowledge in your field. This, in turn, engages your potential customers and establishes you as an authority while keeping your website updated for both customers and search engines.
Choosing the WordPress Perfect Theme for Your Portfolio
Note: The above examples were from the free template – Personal Portfolio by Astra.
WordPress is a very user-friendly CMS that allows you to build theme-based websites without technical expertise. You will need the perfect theme to build a professional WordPress portfolio. But there are tons of free and premium WordPress themes, and that makes choosing the perfect one for your WordPress website overwhelming.
So, to help you pick the right one, here are some elements to look for when choosing a WordPress theme for your portfolio.
1. Visual Appeal
Choose a beautiful theme with intuitive and captivating features like smooth scrolling, crispy, high-resolution imagery, retina display, animation, and other micro-interactions that give it that premium look and feel.
2. Responsive Design
Choose a responsive WordPress theme. Your portfolio must be mobile-friendly and look good on all devices, including smartphones and tablets.
3. Customization Options
Branding is an essential factor in today’s business world. You need to source for WordPress themes that allow you to customize its layout, font, and palette to match your branding.
4. Special Portfolio Features
You need a theme that includes some special portfolio features, such as full-width page view, sliders, galleries, image zooming, testimonials, project pages, project filtering, and project pages. The WordPress theme repository has themes explicitly designed for portfolios, and you can find them using the search box or the feature filtering option.
5. Speed and Performance
Choose a lightweight or minimalist theme with features such as clean, minimized code, lazy loading, etc., to ensure a smooth user experience and fast loading speed at all times. Slow-loading websites will drive your visitors away faster than a prairie fire with a tailwind.
6. SEO Optimization
Ensure your choice theme is optimized for search engines. It should provide the tools and features to optimize technical SEO for your website. This will help your WordPress portfolio rank better for your target keywords.
7. Plugin Compatibility
Ensure the theme you select is compatible with critical plugins that enhance your portfolio website functionality, such as your choice SEO plugin, page builder and block editor, contact form, social media feed plugin, etc.
How to Curate Your Best WordPress Projects
You must be selective and prudent when curating a collection of your projects to include in your portfolio. Here’s how you can create and showcase the best of your work in a great light:
1. Select Your Best Work
Start by selecting your best work and putting them in the spotlight. You know, those who gave you glowing feedback, exceeded expectations and achieved specific goals.
2. Organize Your Projects
After selecting your best work, divide it into groups based on project and service type for easy navigation. For example, WordPress sites (e-commerce, coaching, etc.), WordPress content writing (How-tos, listicles, product descriptions, etc.), WordPress products (child theme for XYZ theme, variation swatches plugin for WooCommerce, etc.), and so on.
3. Use Quality Visuals
Create captivating, high-quality images, screenshots, or videos of your work to create a more intriguing and engaging user experience.
4. Ask for Testimonials
Contact your previous customers and politely ask them for testimonials to include in your WordPress portfolio. Make it easy for them by creating a short questionnaire asking questions such as:
- What project and service did you hire me for?
- What were your goals?
- Were your goals achieved?
- Will you be open to working with me again or recommend me to others?
- On a scale of 1-5, rate my performance.
5. Use Case Studies
Don’t just display your projects in galleries; practice a little “Show and Tell.” Take advantage of the power of storytelling to create brief case studies for each of your projects, outlining and discussing the project’s objectives, your role in the project, possible challenges, and how you overcame them and delivered the desired results at the end of the project. To show authenticity, you can include the customers’ testimonials and pictures at the end of the case study.
6. Set Up Demo Sites
By creating demo sites, allow potential customers to test and interact with your WordPress products. As mentioned earlier, you can include demo sites in your portfolio. You can take advantage of InstaWP to create demo sites and templates.
If you build WordPress products, you can use InstaWP’s shareable template feature to make templates with your product pre-configured and include the links to the templates in your portfolio. Potential customers can use your shared templates to create free sandbox WordPress sites with your products included for a firsthand experience.
How to Optimize Portfolio Content for Engagement
Make sure your WordPress portfolio is exciting. Optimize your content to captivate, engage, and convert by:
Writing Persuasive Descriptions of Your Work
Use compelling words, active voice, and powerful words. Be bold and adapt storytelling and even humor to your content. Hire the services of a copywriter to write compelling content to sell your services.
Using Media: Images, Videos, and Interactive Features
Use high-quality images and videos to capture the essence of your work, and include micro-interactive features, such as cool fonts, graphics, internal links, animations, etc., to bring your portfolio to life.
Marketing Your WordPress Portfolio
Keep your WordPress portfolio website from sitting and gathering dust. Market it using the following methods:
Tips for SEO and Keyword Optimization
SEO is a very vital element for attracting organic traffic. With the proper SEO practices, your WordPress portfolio website can rank higher in search engines and attract more customers to your business. Perform keyword research for your WordPress portfolio using tools like Semrush, Ubersuggest, Google Trends, etc. Include and regularly update your blog with content targeting those keywords. And write guest posts on WordPress niche blogs and increase backlinks to your site. All these are practices that will help you rank better in search results.
Promoting Your Portfolio Through Email and Social Media
Provide downloadable resources as lead magnets to capture potential customers’ emails. Create a personalized social media presence and include links to your social media profiles in your portfolio, encouraging your website visitors to follow you. Send informative and engaging updates to your social media followers and email subscribers, and do some soft selling now and then, providing discounts, free consultations, etc.
Conclusion
When you use social media and freelance websites as your portfolio, you are bound to face various limitations. Having a WordPress portfolio website can help you overcome these limitations and land high-ticket customers. It’s critical for the success of your WordPress business that you pick the right theme and include the right elements to showcase your portfolio and engage your customers.