I want to start an online portfolio to show my skills and also to offer my services.

I am asking for suggestions on what my site design should look like? What do you think is the best set-up/look for a small design/portfolio site?

Thanks for any ideas!

Well you would obviously want it to look very professional. I think that it's important to keep it simple so people can easily find their way around your site. Take a look at a few portfolio/web design sites for an example of how their sites are made. I'm sure you can find quite a few well designed sites on this forum. Look around and keep in mind that some people that are looking for web design services may not know a lot about computers so keep your page easy to navigate.

Thank you very much Adam. I will take everything you said into consideration when I design my site.

No problem and good luck :)

I've seen many designers who link to the sites that they've created. This is great right after the site is complete and people can see the outcome of your care and skill, but can leave you open to:
- sites that the owners take down because they go out of business or decide they can no longer afford/aren't providing the return they'd hoped for, or
- companies that decide to make updates themselves and end up butchering your original handiwork.

These problems might not be terribly common, but can really take away from what you're trying to achieve in posting your portfolio.

So, the solution is to either use screenshots, or screenshots and links that you monitor frequently (my preference) or just links that you monitor closely.

And good luck with the project either way!

Wow SlapShot. Thanks so much for this advice. I wouldn't have thought of all these things. I will definitely use screenshots and use a text link below the screenshot and check it often. Thakns again.

My own preference for the link-rot problem is to keep a local copy of the site and link to that. Of course, this needs to be agreed upon by the client, but most (in my previous life as a corporate slave for a design company) didn't seem to mind much.

Thank you Zopester. Great idea.

My second question is domain name suggestions for a portfolio/design site? I have been thinking about it all night and can't think of one I like.

Should I put a domain ideas thread in a different part of this forum? For more exposure to get some idea?

If you come up with a good domain name, register it BEFORE posting it for opinions. Domains are cheap. Get a few and spend a few weeks contemplating them. Make your own decision on which fits you because you're the only who really knows.

If you are design a portfolio site, the site should represents you.
A site doesn't have to have all the bells and whistles, it should be clean and straight to the point..After all You are showing your skills and your designs.

Remember Designs is the soul language

Thanks for the ideas serialbeggar and gazal. Still having trouble finding a domain name that's available.

Made up words and/or compound words are probably the only way to go now.

We went the "made up" route. Kinkamono. Nice sound to it. Plus, .com, .net and .org were all available!

Actually i don't think a completely made up company name is the best way to go for the web unless you're a major company with a major marketing budget.

If you're not, then you wanna make 2 things sure:

- That people get a hint about what your company does just by reading the company name.

- That you get best possible placement in google search results for your keyword(s).

Despite what some people say, the domain name itself still is a factor when it comes to google results although not a very big one - but it is one.

So i think a better decision as far as domains go is to get yourself one that matches your keyword a 100% or at least has your keyword in it.For Google the extension doesn't matter so if your keyword domain isn't available in .com anymore try to see if it's still avaiable in .net or similar and go with that.

For instance, for my logo design business i have already 2 domains, logodesign.tv and logocastle.com ( for 2 different markets) and as you can see both have the keywords in it, the .tv one even matches the #1 keyword for my business a 100 %.

It might be wise though to look for a keyword that matches your business and has decent searches as a keyword on overture ( check out http://inventory.overture.com for that) but is more of a niche keyword so you won't have to compete with zillion others for the same keyword and respective Google listing.

Worked for us, and our advertising budget is tiny!

As long as the rest of your site is designed well, we've found that search engine placement doesn't matter one iota if your name is "wedesignwebsites.com" or "madeupword.com" (for example).

*shrug* Why not be creative with your name. After all, isn't a design company supposed to be creative?

Originally posted by Debz
Thanks for the ideas serialbeggar and gazal. Still having trouble finding a domain name that's available.

Well this is how i got my name, There's two main designers in our studio we have 4 designers and 2 programmers..

Anyway, My real name is Alan and my business partner name is Garry. Well if you shorten our names I.E.

Garry = Gaz and Alan = Al you end up with "Gazal"
Hence Studio Gazal ;)