How to Make Your Portfolio Work for You
Clients can sometimes be nervous or hesitant about purchasing freelance services. Most of the time, freelancers (whether they are writers, designers, or something else entirely) won’t have a tangible product to sell, so it’s difficult to show clients what they’re paying for up front. This can provoke a lot of remarks from clients such as, “You design the logo for me and if I like it, I’ll pay for it,” or “Can I tell you if we plan to purchase the press release you write after we see it?”
I’ve found that to make clients feel more secure about purchasing services and to avoid spec work requests, a well put-together portfolio is key. People like to interact with portfolio pieces and feel the paper, see how an item folds, etc. If freelancers can use more than one of the five senses to show work to clients, it becomes a little more interactive, engaging and interesting.
Hard-Copy Portfolios
Even though a lot of freelance professionals are driving prospective clients to view their work samples online, I suggest keeping a printed copy on-hand for meetings and consultations.
Let Clients Play: Instead of mounting a brochure you designed or wrote the copy for to an illustration board, try actually handing the client the real printed piece. Sure you’ll have to keep a few extras around to replace the used ones with smudge marks, but watch as your clients flip the item over, look through it carefully and really interact with it. You’re giving the person a chance to look at the material up close, thus, allowing them to get comfortable with the work.
Get Creative: Use your portfolio presentation itself as an example of how creative and skilled you are. For example, instead of just printing out a sheet of paper with logo designs on it, I format one logo to a blank business card-sized piece of cardstock. I then slide these “logo cards” onto a binder ring and create a logo swatch-book. Again, it allows the client to interact a bit more with the work I’ve done and it shows the ability to think outside the box.
Package It: I once saw another designer’s portfolio that was kept in a tool box. They wanted to design specifically as a freelancer to construction companies. The designer catered to this audience by pulling their printed samples out of a tool kit. They branded their business cards and leave-behinds accordingly as well.
Digital Portfolios
For those prospective clients that may live too far away or may be searching for freelancers online, a digital portfolio is pretty much a must-have.
Create A Website: Should your skill-set or budget allow, think about creating a website for yourself. This allows you to show not just samples of your work, but to offer your contact info, an online resume, a short bio, etc. Be sure the piece is easy to navigate, professional-looking, and most importantly, is representative of you.
Portfolio Services: If you grasp the importance of gaining an online presence as a freelance professional, but just don’t have the funds nor the time to create one, consider posting your work online using a portfolio services such as Carbonmade.com or CreativeShake.com.
What Better Place to Show Your Digital Work? With an online portfolio, why not allow clients to actually click around a website you’ve built to gain a sense of how you organize and develop a site? Or how about offering excerpts of certain articles you’ve published online with a link to the full article? While convenience and efficiency is very important, it’s also nice if you can find a way to allow for your prospects to experience your online work first-hand as well.
The possibilities for portfolios and presenting samples are endless. The important thing is to show your work in a way that helps prospects to feel comfortable, educated and impressed.
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Great article and great timing.
I’ve been meaning to update my personal portfolio for over 18 months.
I certainly think putting a portfolio out there is an important and often a tactile experience for buyers.
With that in mind, mine needs a make-over, quick-smart!
Must make it representative of my greatest work, version it to focus on each area of my work, and an engaging and tactile adventure or at least a favorable experience. (No paper-cuts allowed)
Great article – I have a lecture at college on Digital Portfolio creation tomorrow and I am currently working on projects as part of my degree that develop me portfolio. As a photographer my physical portfolio is going to be very important in generating more clients. So my aim is to design photo books that meet specific new clients needs. Wheather it be family portraits, weddings or fine art gallery prints.
I’m currently finishing off my online portefolio – and I had (actually still have) some doubts whether I try to sell myself on too many areas – or if it’s just showing my diversity… Difficult line to walk…
And further more I’ve been ordered to make a physcical portofolio, and at the moment I’m wondering how I do this the best… My printed works contains 2meters high posters, heavy, thick books, flyers, brochures, logodesigns and so on…
Perhaps an article on different approaches on how to “struckture” the un-homogenic content in a physcical briefcase is a topic for the future – I would read very intensely!
Thanks for the motivating article.
– again.
Too many people think their portfolio has to be a simple, boring display of their work. It’s just like a resume, you want it to stand out. Pull it above and beyond and people will really take notice.
I love this idea and will be sure to use this in the future:
“I then slide these “logo cards” onto a binder ring and create a logo swatch-book”
I would also recommend taking a look at these Unikeep presentation binders. They are large portfolios for exhibiting print work, and fold to stand up on there own.
http://www.univenture.com/acatalog/presentation_stg.html
Has anyone created a book (using Blurb.com or some other service) to show their work? Care to share your experience?
Really nice article Angela.. I like the first half part most about Hard Copy Portfolio. I had never thought about it. But thanks for the article now I am going for making the Hard Copies.
Nice read! The portfolio is really the deal breaker. It has to be good. I read some other tips on how to get new clients with our current economy over at http://www.graphicdesigntwist.com, you guys should check it out. Combine a good portfolio with a few simple marketing tips and you’ll be good to go!
Interesting as a virtual assistant I’m just putting my portfolio together myself. I noticed you mentioned to software applications for creating portfolios. One question for you is can other freelancers other then artists and designers use this software?
Also is there anyone that is a GURU on one of these two software packages that would be willing to enlighten people on an upcoming podcast?
I’m currently freelancing as a web developer. My day job is a teacher and I created a portfolio of work that I have done for my department/school along with sample student work that I printed up on professional paper (in color) and had professionally bound. I made one copy for each job that I applied to, I was interviewed and offered jobs at every place I applied to.
During the interview I repeatedly heard comments along the lines of being very well prepared, not having seen anything like it before. Watching employers flip through the book and then go back over previously seen pages was priceless. Everyone was impressed when I didn’t ask for a copy back.
In any case, what I’m saying here is that the advice in this article works for any industry.
Portfolio examples and TESTIMONIALS from happy clients. That’s all a potential client needs to see.
And of course your lovely well written proposal.
My degree is in graphic design but I now do web too. I’ve always used a physical portfolio but I was at an interview and the guy seemed perturbed when I didn’t bring a laptop along for my digital samples! (I had them printed and mounted in my portfolio.) So I guess what I’m saying is you should think about taking along a laptop too.
Awesome article! I never thought of the tactile experience of a portfolio presentation. Love it! Thank you so much!
Of course you should bring a laptop with you if you do screen design. It’s just as simple as that: Present things for the screen on the screen, things for print printed. For my print portfolio, i have found a quite ingenious folder. Every single transparency cover can be easily detached just by ripping it out and can be put together afterwards. So you can put aside all that the client likes and show it alltogether.
Great tips! I still know designers and developers without portfolios!
Great tips!
I think we can all relate to what you said during your introduction:
“Most of the time, freelancers (whether they are writers, designers, or something else entirely) won’t have a tangible product to sell, so it’s difficult to show clients what they’re paying for up front. This can provoke a lot of remarks from clients such as, “You design the logo for me and if I like it, I’ll pay for it”…”
I really like the recently I came across an interview Steve Jobs gave about his experience working with Paul Rand when Paul designed his logo for NeXT Computer, Inc. Check it out:
http://www.paul-rand.com/video_stevejobs_interview.shtml
Cheers!
Nice article and really inspiring. Makes me feel that I want to upgrade my portfolio right now after reading this. ^_^
Thanks!
I’ve gotten way more clients using a printed portfolio as opposed to an online portfolio. I designed mine like a book using InDesign and printed it through Lulu. In addition to showing a lot of my work, the book design/layout itself served as an example of what I could do. It was 50 pages so it got pretty expensive (at the time about 12 bucks per book). I ordered five of them, kept one, and gave the other 4 out to the clients that got me the most referrals (so they could show prospective clients).
Btw, Blurb also offers book printing if you want something more high-end. I am considering using them for my next book.
Nice read. I just finished my online portfolio site, now need to update it with some works.
Good read Angela! Agree with the importance of the printed portfolio besides the online ones and also advise the to create multiple portfolio’s (Like Behance) besides your own portfolio website on own domain. It all adds to your reach and has different advantages.
Last year we developed a portfolio website creation tool for people who don’t have tech skills but do like to create and manage a unique site. For some examples check http://www.viewbook.com/examples/