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Advice

Posted: February 4, 2013 | Author: | Filed under: Advice, Life | Tags: , , , , |Leave a comment

This afternoon someone emailed me with a commonly asked question:

Happy Monday! Bleh. Could you give me some advice? I am trying to put together an online portfolio/website to send to possible employers.
 
First I tried Tumblr, then it got weird. Then I looked up articles about what everyone else is using, and the top ones were WordPress, Pressfolios, Flavors, and About.me. Dunno if you are familiar with any of those besides WordPress, I just assume you are because you seem to be a journalism genius (I’m not brownnosing). If I do use WordPress, do I sign in through the University or just WordPress not-affiliated with UofO? ANYway, what’s the best way to go about compiling the shred of work that I have for people to see? Any tips? I’m trying to get an internship this summer so I just wanna impress all the head honchos out there. 

To which I replied:

I don’t bother with other CMS (content management systems) because working with wordpress serves 2 functions.
  1. It gives me a space that I can reasonably customize for $26/year
  2. Learning WordPress is a very valuable skill out in the real world. Many organizations use WordPress, and knowing how to navigate their CMS from day 1 is a huge bonus. Alternatively, many organizations don’t have a website (or a very good one), which means I can easily design a new, fancy, functional and friendly website for anyone in less than 6 hours with my knowledge of WordPress if I needed to—something I could bring up in an interview and not be lying about. Also a huge bonus, IMO. 
Honestly, though, other than the above reasons, I see no benefit from one CMS to another—just as long as what you have looks organized, is functional, and has your name on it, you should be good to go.
 
If you do decide to go WordPress, I do not recommend using blogs.uoregon.edu—you’ll have to migrate your site after you graduate, which is the biggest pain in the ass. WordPress.com is a good place to start. In the long term, and when you have more time, look into web hosting + WordPress.org—that’s the only way you’ll ever have an original site, but that kind of things is most definitely not important. Never forget that you’re not selling your website design skillz, you’re a storyteller. That’s what counts in your portfolio—your stories!

Hope this helps!

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