After reading my first article, Why You Need a Personal Website, I’m sure you are convinced you need to create one to further your personal brand. This article provides the must-haves that you should include on your personal website. There is a statistic that floats around out there that says 56 percent of hiring managers are more impressed by a personal website than any other personal branding tool you can use. Just having a personal website site isn’t enough, it has to have the right elements to entice hiring managers to want to contact you.
Include these elements when building your personal website. The only element that is optional, but highly recommended, is the blog.
About
Your About page should include a brief introduction of who you are: name, title and things you are most proud of. A short bio that tells your story and provides a glimpse into your personality. Get a little personal by including interests, hobbies, favorite movies and books you have read.
Professional Photo
You should include a professional photo of yourself which can be located on your About page as well as in the Author section if you have a blog.
Resume, Skills and Education
Include your resume, skills and education, highlighting the points that you want your visitors to focus on. Include any special projects that you have worked on as well. Since this is your own website you can have a lot of fun with this and get really creative such as including samples of your work.
Blog
Having a blog on your site is a great way to establish credibility and to showcase your expertise. It can also be time consuming to keep it updated. You should do no less than one blog entry a week but ideally you should try to do at least three. If you are unable to post regularly, I suggest disabling the date stamp so that your readers won’t know how much time passes between articles.
Social
Include links to the social sites you are active on and that are relevant to hiring managers. Do not include links to sites that are more personal in nature such as Facebook (unless you have a Facebook business page).
Contact info
It is great that someone found your site but if they cannot contact you all your hard work was for nothing. Make sure there is a place where they can fill out a contact form or, if you are comfortable, include your email address and phone number.
No matter which elements you choose to include make sure you proofread and that your personal website is free of grammatical and spelling errors. Pay attention to the content to ensure its relevancy to the message you are trying to convey and the audience you are looking to attract.
Your personal website should be updated regularly, about every three months. The blog, if you choose to include one, should be updated weekly. As with anything, don’t venture down the road of building your personal website if you aren’t going to see it through to completion and be able to dedicate the time to keeping it updated. Nothing will ruin your personal brand faster than a haphazardly built or outdated personal website.
A personal website is another tool that you can easily add to your personal branding toolbox. Including these elements on your personal website will increase your chances of being found and ultimately hired.
Last updated on March 2nd, 2018 at 06:44 am
