I recently made a comment on Freelance Folder’s article, “Open Thread: Do You Have a PDF or Web Portfolio?“:

As a designer who has constantly updated his website (6 times over 5 years), I’ve finally come to a solution I’m proud of for displaying my work (jasonlarosedesign.com). So therefore, if you’re a web designer, a pdf wouldn’t exactly suffice as it doesn’t show what you can do with your site (and code). I also believe that its best to have a print-based portfolio. Something that can ‘wow’ the person interviewing you to show the full extent of what you can do. If your print-based portfolio can easily be converted into a well designed pdf, then all the more better.

My bottom-line thought: Create your portfolio in what you do best (website for web design, print for print design, pdf for writer), and branch out from there.

I’d like to expand on my comment. It goes without saying that your portfolio is the most important piece about you and your career. Its one of the only physical objects that makes you stand out from the crowd and receive the call saying you’re hired. That being said, for a designer, I think its even more important what your portfolio and resume look like.

Resumés

Conventionally, resumés should be professional, easy to read, contain good grammar and follow a standard format. But what does that say about the designer who claims to think differently? They send in their resumé which looks like all others and gets lost in the shuffle as a result. Only upon skimming does the hiring manager notice what they can do, with no initial impact of design. As a designer who is currently thinking of updating his resumé, I’ve realized that I have subconsciously fallen into that category, providing a bland resumé. I think one thing a designer can do to generate that first initial spark to really stand out from the rest is to design their resumé under their personal brand—keeping it clean, professional and easy to read, staying away from small text, background images, etc. This can be tricky, and for it to work successfully, it would have to be well thought-out.

Portfolios

Everyone says your portfolio should contain your best work. I disagree with that statement. Your portfolio should BE your best work. After all, you’re applying for a job because you want it, why would you show your prospecting employer a mediocre display of great designs? A designer can leave a greater impact showcasing his work by shuffling through cards than turning pages. A designer’s best work tends to contain client critiques and suggestions, some of which are good enough for a portfolio, but yet, we still aren’t 100% satisfied with. There is no client involved with your portfolio, so why not make that the best work you do?

You’re a designer, show it. Do something different. Share your thoughts in the comments section if you have any.

This is part 1 in a series of posts that will record my experiences in building a brand for myself. Hopefully this will help someone out there looking to do the same.

Currently, I’m employed as a full-time designer. I work at a pretty cool place with great benefits, a great atmosphere and great people. Recently, my job has taken a turn for the worse and I am now experiencing every designer’s worst nightmare: working in PowerPoint. My job started out great, being the sole designer doing print and web design projects, until the recession came and with it, some our marketing initiatives were re-focused to social media. As a result, some print marketing stopped as well as some of my designing, replaced by editing and designing PowerPoint slides. Ugh.

Naturally, since I’m a creative, I need to create or else I’ll go crazy. This situation sparked the desire to build my own brand and business to work for myself. When I say brand, I don’t mean a logo, a portfolio, a business card and doing work on the side—I mean clients, major income, work in pajamas and slippers, passive income, and quit my day job. However, I have no idea how to get started, I only know what I want. Since I don’t know what the first step is, I decided to think about the last step and work backwards. This is the list I have created:

1. Get my name out there – Upon reading and researching through countless blogs, I am attempting to create a blog. One that generates traffic and readership as well as trust to potential clients.
2. Passive income – My next step would be to create a source of passive income, to supplement my design career and primary income. Something to fall back on should times get tough, yet something I don’t need to worry about all that much. Set it and forget it. What I came up with was: blog revenue, affiliate websites/reseller, design website templates and hosting.
3. Brand establishment – I already have a brand and logo, I just now need to bring collateral together, build a system of operation and get business cards.
4. Build up recurring clientele for constant income – Next up, I’ll need to build up my clientele by promoting and marketing myself.
5. Safety net in the bank – If I didn’t have to worry about finances, a mortgage and bills, I’d start right now. But I can’t, so I need to create a safety net of 6 months. I think I’d feel stressed with that much so I’ll aim for 100k. (Hey, shoot for the stars. Worst-case scenario, you hit the moon).
6. Register for LLC, and search for insurance – Legal stuff… ugh. ‘Nuff said.
7. Completely freelance – Leave my job on good terms with a freelance contract.

At the time of this writing, I only have a website, jasonlarosedesign.com and this blog, which still needs to be designed (and named!). I haven’t written a blog intro yet, and the whole idea feels weird. I’m also reading tons of articles and totally pwning Read it Later.

In my quest for wanting to know what to do and how to go freelance, I came across an article by Joe Falconer, “Jump on Your Domain Name while You Still Can,” which couldn’t have come at a better time, because I had just discovered jasonlarose.com was available. Twenty minutes later, I owned it.

As I build my brand, I know I want to create something that will generate passive income. I had been thinking about it for days but couldn’t figure it out. More ThemeForest templates? Another t-shirt design at Threadless? Nothing really caught my attention until I bought the server space and I realized I can host my clients. Not to mention provide myself with a playground in which to try out and host some pet projects. There were more benefits to this idea than just passive income, which attempt expand my mind to try to comprehend server technologies and grant me the ability to offer my clients an all-in-one package with print design, web design and hosting.

So now that I have hosting space, I need to port my website over to the new server and design and build this blog. Hopefully part 2 will be written after the blog is done, with a pretty sweet design and catchy name.