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Five self promotion tips to help land a job
With jobs getting harder to come by, it is increasingly more important to promote yourself creatively and thoroughly. Regardless if you are in between jobs, still in school, or employed, you need to spend some more time on you – professionally speaking. Here are five tips on what you can do to enhance your online presence to ensure that potential employers will notice you.
1) Build an online portfolio
This should be a no-brainer. Everyone working with new media has to prove that they can actually use their skills. In an older post, I listed 40 innovative online portfolios. Make sure to check them out and take some notes as to what they feature, and what tools they used.
If programming isn’t your thing, I would recommend using Carbonmade, an incredibly simple online tool that builds a Flash Website for you. It is free to post five projects and 35 images, and relatively cheap to post more. Check out fellow Poynter alumnus Joey Kirk’s portfolio, which features his work from The Arizona Republic, Poynter, college, and side interests.
Another simple tool is WordPress, whether you use the .com or .org version. (Read this article if that last sentence didn’t make sense to you.) Some great examples of WordPress portfolio sites are AP producer Matt Ford, USA Today producers William Couch and Tory Hargro, and freelancer Megan Taylor.
If you are primarily a Flash developer (like myself) it makes most sense to build your portfolio in Flash to show some of your skills. On my Website, I have integrated multiple elements, such as a video player I programmed, an embedded Soundslides player, and external content.
Another option is to build your site with HTML/CSS, like 10,000Words blogger Mark Luckie, or with Joomla, like UNC professor Don Wittekind.
2) Write a blog, or contact other bloggers to write a guest post
Nothing helps get your name out there more than to start a blog. I have thoroughly enjoyed “meeting” people through II whom I probably never would have conversed with otherwise. Allowing people to read your daily thoughts about your field proves that you value continued education and that you actually know what you are talking about.
Again, WordPress is a great tool for blogging. Former Roanoke photographer Josh Meltzer successfully utilizes the .com version to promote his Fulbright trip to Mexico. (And, let it be known that he taught himself Flash to build his Website, in addition to figuring out WordPress for his blog …) Another .com blog worth noting is MasteringMultimedia. On the other hand, great .org blogs include News Videographer, VisualJournalist, and Wire & Lights.
If WordPress is too daunting, start with Google’s Blogger. This is how I first started II two years ago, and it is relatively easy to switch to WordPress at a later date so you won’t have to worry about losing your growing archive. A good example is Randy Krum’s blog, Cool Infographics.
3) Tackle social networking and make it your job
I was hesitant about Twitter at first, but now I swear by it. I doubled my traffic to II within one month of joining Twitter. There are some amazing minds on there, and it is an incredible resource for anyone. Don’t know who to follow? Read this post to learn how to find people with similar interests, or just find a person that you relate to and see who they are following.
Needless to say, everyone should be on LinkedIn and Facebook. I also swear by del.icio.us, which is where I get most of my inspiration from depending on what my network tags for me.
Others also utilize YouTube, Vimeo and Flickr to engage with their community.
As a fair warning, each medium takes a serious investment of time, and it is not wise to join all at once and expect it to be beneficial. In hindsight, it is probably more detrimental to leave outdated profiles sitting around than not having one at all. You don’t want people to think you have commitment issues!
4) Provide a service to your community
The hands-down winner of this category is recent Miami graduate Greg Linch. Greg’s blog, The Linchpen, provides livestreams and liveblogs of almost every conference, seminar, and professional talk there is. I don’t know how he is able to attend them all, but it’s great for those of us that get to take advantage of these sessions from afar (and for free!).
Even though it may be a lot of work for him, I can say for certain that he will land numerous opportunities in life simply because he offered this invaluable service to others (while at the same time making him and his blog a common household name).
5) Add a creative element somewhere in your online presence to set yourself apart
This last point is actually what sparked the idea to write this post. Jen Reeves blogged about one of her students producing a creative promo video on his Website. It is never a bad thing to spend time perfecting your craft with self promotion, and this guy is a perfect example of it.
Another great example is Mark Luckie’s interactive experience timeline. What a great alternative to a boring resume!
Speaking of resumes, make sure you do not stick with a stale Word document. Utilize InDesign to create a resume consistent with the design of your Website. Give yourself a logo, color scheme, and maybe even a slogan. Carry this theme throughout your online presence, from your portfolio site to your blog to your social media profiles. Staying consistent with your look and feel will help others conquer an image with your name, which may improve the chance that they remember you.
Then, there is always Dave Werner, whose portfolio site is by far my favorite portfolio site for numerous reasons. He definitely set himself apart, even if it took years to build!
So friends, take some time to yourself and work on your self promotion. No matter what your intention is, claiming your personal spot on the Web can never be a bad thing.
Other posts that might interest you:
- Design Reviver offers excellent advice for web developers
- How to Create a Multimedia Promo Widget
- Need a multimedia copy editor? Look no further …
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Hi Tracy,
These are all excellent tips, thanks for posting them during what I’m sure are trying times for interactive designers and developers. Speaking as someone who makes hiring decisions at Stamen, I do disagree with one point you’ve made: Flash-based personal/portfolio websites are almost never something we respond positively to, even though most of our work is delivered in Flash. I personally put them in the same category as Word doc resumes from applicants who ignore specific warnings against them in our hiring announcements. Aside from personal recommendations, the absolute best indicators of good potential when we evaluate talent are relevant work done for paying clients first, and relevant work done for research/experimentation and released on the internet second. There’s just no substitute for publicly viewable projects.
Thanks again for an excellent site.
Thanks so much for this post! I don’t believe I’ve commented here before but I’ve had your blog in my Google reader for at least 6 months now and it’s been great. This post couldn’t have come at a better time for me since I’m getting my portfolio together. This is the first time I’ve seen Dave Werner’s portfolio and it blows me away!
Thanks a lot for the useful tips. During such recession times, its difficult to get a job. Building an online portfolio is a must to get noticed by the right employers. I agree wordpress is a great tool for blogging. I will definitely plan to start my blog. Its a nice idea.
@ Michal Thanks for your input. I find it interesting though that you look down upon Flash portfolio sites. Can you expand on this point?
You mentioned that Flash developers are ” … applicants who ignore specific warnings against them in our hiring announcements.”
Do you specifically ask for a specific kind of portfolio site? If so, that would make sense that applicants should follow instructions.
I personally believe that Flash sites are more time consuming to build than a WordPress and/or HTML site. Especially if they are just using template files, which doesn’t help to show their skill set.
Of course, anything is better than nothing. Maybe it comes down to personal taste …
Luck and taking advantage of opportunities. The only conference I ever had to pay for was a plane ticket to BarCamp NewsInnovation Philly (I stayed with a friend, so no hotel host).
All the others were either covered by The Miami Hurricane (ONA, ACP/CMA, etc.), the University of Miami student SPJ chapter (SPJ regionals and nationals) or the School of Communication (I was on school-sponsored project in DC when I attended first half of rev2oh).
Hi Tracy –
I think I may have mangled that sentence a little: I meant applicants who ignore the no-word-docs requirement, which will teach me to use indefinite pronouns in the future. =(
We don’t say anything specifically about Flash portfolios and our most recent hire actually has one, so it’s obviously not a hard & fast rule. BUT: we have a lot of internal ideas about what is or isn’t “of the web”, and the fact that using Flash for an entire site essentially forces you reimplement a bunch of stuff like URLs and widgets and links and scroll bars and stylesheets that browsers have for free often makes Flash portfolio sites look a lot like a misallocation of resources. Basically, if an applicant sinks a ton of time into a whizzy portfolio but it doesn’t contain several strong projects done for love or for money, then we’d ding that person in favor of someone who has plain-old-text with evidence of serious thought and effort and work and output. You mention they’re time-consuming to build, and I agree – it looks a lot better to me if someone’s used that time to address something out in the world instead!
I think there’s a deeper trend here, which is that in the Bad Old Days your portfolio was often the first thing an employer saw of your work, so that’s where you made your first impression. Now, the web makes it cheap or free to do a global release of interactive work even as a student, so we’ve often heard of applicants already from work they’ve done, and then check the portfolio later … maybe.
Thanks for share. i am looking this type news.
[...] Build an online portfolio: No matter what you do, create an online space to show off your work and achievements. [...]
I don’t know anything about Flash however I am learning about how powerful WordPress is. I really like blogging.
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Great tips and very useful, I might use this one myself and also refer to my friends and colleagues looking for a job!
-Val