Help for beginner at web dev/design?

The best thing you can do for an empty portfolio is personal projects. I was hired for my first job out of college because I had created a website for my personal business. I was able to show that I had talent because I was in charge the entire site.

You shouldn't ever rely on "your word" to get you jobs If you need ideas for a personal project, you can see if any friends/family need help, but that can be limiting. Still, it's another project to put in your portfolio to help you get more professional work I'd also recommend reading up on online articles dealing with starting a business. Some recommended reading: alistapart.Com/articles/startingabusiness alistapart.

Com/articles/business1 freelanceswitch. Com/general/101-essential-freelancing-resources.

The best thing you can do for an empty portfolio is personal projects. I was hired for my first job out of college because I had created a website for my personal business. I was able to show that I had talent because I was in charge the entire site.

You shouldn't ever rely on "your word" to get you jobs. If you need ideas for a personal project, you can see if any friends/family need help, but that can be limiting. Still, it's another project to put in your portfolio to help you get more professional work.

I'd also recommend reading up on online articles dealing with starting a business. Some recommended reading: alistapart. Com/articles/startingabusiness/ alistapart.Com/articles/business1/ freelanceswitch.

Com/general/101-essential-freelancing-resources.

If you don't have a portfolio and want business, it is best to make your own site look incredible. Show people what you can do with your own site. Once your site is incredible, network with companies in your area, friends, family and offer your services cheap if they'll let you use their site as a portfolio example.

Once your portfolio is up, referrals should be coming in and folks seeing your site should be even more interested. EDIT Per Martin's request, when you build your own site, please don't grab a run of the mill template like every other web developer out there. If you do take a template, make it yours, modify the heck out of it.

2 Add, please, please design your own site. I don't know how many "designers" have stock templates as their website. – Martin Aug 6 '09 at 23:38 1 @Martin: Done... – RSolberg Aug 6 '09 at 23:42.

Start by doing projects for people you know and work to create a small selection of work that reflects your current skill set. At the beginning, you may find that your talents are evolving so rapidly that your previous work doesn't reflect your current abilities — that's fine. Try to create a narrative on your portfolio site that shows people your progress and how each piece of work has built on the next.

Your portfolio site should demonstrate both technical and aesthetic skills. If you're an artist or industrial designer, you want your site to fade to the background and push your work forwards. Being a web designer means that your actual site is as important as the work featured on it.

Your code should be clean and organized (you don't need to be a standardista, but be tidy). If there's one skill you should really have before you start to work for clients, it's a sense of typography. You don't want to contribute to the ever-expanding world of poorly set websites.

Good luck.

Do side projects and see if you can build friends' websites (for free, or if they'll pay you, cool). Do whatever you can to demonstrate your abilities. Building a personal site doesn't hurt either.

I'd recommend making an online portfolio, if not to display past projects at least to post your resume and basically a cover letter. You can get a lot of free css templates if you're not comfortable with designing your own. I'm building a site for my wife and a friend of mine from high school.

If you're not getting work, its just the economy. I've been looking for work since March. It's tough.

Just keep at it, and it'll pay off.

You need to create a professional looking site. If you are a developer I also suggest that you start a small open source project (or a big one if you are so inclinded). It doesn't have to be any thing major...a widget or library.

Something useful for people to play with. On your website show examples of your work. If you have no examples then sign up for accounts on getafreelancer.Com, elance.

Com, scriptlance. Com, guru.Com, rentacoder. Com and any of the other freelance style sites.

Build up your portfolio by doing cheap work...but not work that is cheap! Create a resume and post it somewhere for google to find. Create a linkedin, facebook, and myspace account.

Make it easy for people to find you and for people to find your work. Write about the things that you are interested in either by way of a personal blog or by posting articles to a site that already gets lots of traffic. Speak at small user groups or conferences to get your name out.

There is a lot you can do it is just a matter of how badly you want to succeed. Programming or designing is just as much a business as selling physical products. It is all about how much you saturate a given space with good words about your services.

Marketing!

I completely agree with all of the above - if you can demonstrate your capabilities with some sample work, that will count for far more than a resume in the end. Most of my work has come through people seeing my other work, not knowing my employment history.

Get yourself a domain, build a bunch of sample home pages, create a bunch of sub directories on your site. Make one for a small business, then maybe e-commerce, then maybe a blog, make a few different example scenarios of the types of sites that you would likely be asked to do, I have seen some people design mock home pages in Photoshop and just show them all as clickable JPEGS, that can be quick yes, although I recommend using all live pages on your site to show what interactive things you can do. Up to you, depending how quick you want it up and how important it is to you.

I was paid $2500 to make this blog by a guy who was just completely web illiterate. I didn't quote that price mind you, he offered it to me out of nowhere after looking at a gallery of WP templates I had up as "possible" themes for a customer's blog. Sometimes, you are just in the right place at the right time.

Best of luck to you.

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