LESSON 3 - SELF PROMOTION & PRODUCTION

lesson objectives

• lesson overview
• resume defined
• portfolio defined
• portfolio guidelines
• the 8 second window
• job objective
• freelancers services and fees list
• resume formats
• dark background warning
• digital images

lesson overview
The next 2 weeks will be devoted to portfolio production. It's time to brush up on your HTML skills, or invest in a web authoring software package like Dreamweaver, GoLive, or FrontPage. Because the creation of your portfolio site is the heart of the course content, two weeks are allocated for this objective.

You will continue refining your Portfolio over the remaining lessons, but your goal during this 2 week period is to create a basic, functional Portfolio website that contains your concise and powerful Job Objective tag line, your Resume, and your work example(s).

NOTE: It may be that some of you already have a large body of existing work examples from which to choose, to display your best work in your portfolio while others may have only a few examples. Some of you are ready to begin your job search immediately, others aren't. These differences don't matter.

By the end of this class you'll have a very powerful tool to showcase your skills and talents to potential employers or clients, whenever you decide that you are ready -- either a fully functional Portfolio, or a functional template into which you'll be able to plug work examples as you create them, over the next months, or years. Even if you begin your job search this semester, you will want to update and expand your sites as your experience and skills evolve, over the years.

In the reading material you'll find tips on website design, links to HTML tutorials, and information about online resumes. You've read a number of articles concerning good and bad resume and portfolio design, and you've critiqued a Web portfolio. It's now time to apply what you've learned as you create your own portfolios and resumes.

It's important to understand the difference between a standard resume and a portfolio.

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resume defined
A resume, submitted to a potential employer, is the primary tool for maximizing the chances of getting an interview. It is, traditionally, a hardcopy chronology of your work and education history, along with a summary of personal and career accomplishments. As the World Wide Web began to develop in the late 80's, student and business people began creating resume web pages. These resume pages were usually in standard ASCII text, created by pasting a word processing file inside a set of <PRE> tags (for PREformatted). They didn't look fancy, but the advantages of having a resume online for the world to see was obvious.

As time passed, web-based resumes began to get more complex. Rather than a page that looked like it had been typewritten, people began to take advantage of HTML capabilities, and added fonts, graphics, target links to other parts of the page, standard links to the web pages of past or current employers, and a contact method to their pages. Since then, resumes of varying degrees of quality have exploded onto the web.

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portfolio defined
A portfolio is a sampling of work done by an individual, displayed or offered for viewing. It may be displayed to showcase the work for pleasure, or as an incentive to potential employers or clients. The portfolio, then, can be viewed as an extension of a traditional resume.

A web user can take advantage of the hypertext, image reproduction, even multimedia features of the web to display and demonstrate their work. While there are times when a standard web page with ASCII text suits both the job hunter as well as the potential employer, most often, you can enhance your personal/professional image, and showcase your talents, by using web features.

As an example, if you're a graphic design student looking for your first job, it would benefit you to have more than just a standard resume on the web. That's not to say that a resume is unnecessary, but it's obvious that a sampling of your best work, presented in a clear and easily navigable manner, on a series of web pages, will greatly improve your chances for employment. If you're a web page designer looking for a job with a large company or for clients as an independent designer, it's imperative that you give your potential employer/client an idea of the type of work you produce.

When is a resume sufficient, and when does a full-blown portfolio become necessary? You must look at each situation individually and use your common sense. Perhaps the best tactic is to put yourself in the place of the potential employer or client.

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portfolio guidelines
Regardless of your resume and portfolio format, style, or location, certain standards are expected by every employer:

Page layout and presentation should be attractive

Graphics should be appropriate to the presentation

It should be easy to find every piece in the portfolio

The pages should be easy to read

There should be no spelling or grammar errors

I emphasize the last point because this area is often weak, especially for individuals who have a lot of email, instant message, and online chat experience. The e-culture that has arisen from the net uses a very informal, fluid spelling, grammar, and sentence structure, that may eventually become a separate dialect of English. However, the business world often judges people by their command of Standard English, not E-Speak, and to survive the competition for jobs, you need to make sure that this aspect of your Portfolio and Resume is letter perfect.

The most common spelling and grammar errors I have seen in past sections have been confusion between, or misuse of

• your and you're
• their, they're and there
• its and it's
  
• to and too
• weather and whether (never wheather)
• must of instead of must've (ie must have)
  as in I must of forgotten it instead of I must've forgotten it

your, their, and its are the possessive pronoun forms for you, they and it (meaning belonging to you, belonging to them, belonging to it) and shouldn't be confused with the similar sounding subject/verb contractions you're, they're, and it's, meaning you are, they are, and it is.

there is an adverb that points out where.

too is an adverb meaning also or in addition (as in I want to go too) or an excessive amount (as in too much, too large, too fast)

weather is a noun referring to the climate: sunny or rainy weather. whereas whether is a conjunction indicating alternative conditions or possibilities (whether you're a freelancer or employed by a company ...)

Even though this isn't an English grammar, or writing course, attention to these details is absolutely crucial when using your resume and portfolio to make a good impression on a potential employer/client. If you don't take the time to go back and proofread what you have written, making corrections and additions as necessary, you will lose score points on the assignments, because in the world of competing for a job, you'll lose 'impression' points with your potential employers.

Take the point of view of the busy interviewer who has a stack of several dozen resumes to examine to find a person suitable for a position that needs to be filled ... what do you think s/he will do with those that have misspellings and improper grammar? At the very least, these will be put aside to be looked at only if none of those without errors are suitable.

You DON'T want your resume to be assigned to the 2nd group because you didn't take the time to proofread it for spelling and grammar.

Your portfolio should contain no weak, sloppy, disorganized, or unfinished pieces ... therefore, it would be much better for it to be smaller and very well done, rather than larger and incomplete, or poorly done because there wasn't enough time.

For designers in particular, your portfolio will...

• Emphasize your understanding of design elements
  
• Show whether you are meticulous, or indifferent, to detail
  
• Spotlight the best...or the worst...in you

Ask yourself this question, over, and over, and over again ...

If I were looking to hire, based solely on the appearance and content of this resume or portfolio, would I want this person to represent me or my company to the public, would I want my reputation and my name in the business world connected with this person?

Since your portfolio site is designed to promote your business or professional identity, it needs to have a very definite, professional look and feel. You don't want to spend the time and effort working through all of the steps in this course, and end up with a web site that looks and feels like a Personal Home Page, with a weak, ambiguous, confusing, or rambling Objective. A site like this won't be useful in your job search, it won't work for you, it won't measure up against the competition of other online portfolios.

So, it's extremely important that you understand and make a clear distinction in your mind between a Personal Home Page, and a Professional, Business-oriented Portfolio, before you begin the creation of your portfolio site, or before you get too far along in the process.

A Personal Home Page is casual, informal, and very often has a chatty, rambling, conversational, or stream of consciousness, style about it. It could possibly contain abbreviations, slang, cyber-speak, and various nonstandard spellings, capitalization, punctuation, and sentence structure. It might not have a consistent look from page to page. It might contain all sorts of things, rather than being tightly focused on one topic... all of which are totally appropriate for a home page that will be visited by your family and friends.

A Professional, Business-oriented Portfolio site, on the other hand, is professional, and formal (even though it may have a relaxed, and casual looking formality). It will have a deliberate, concise, crisp, and to the point style, using standard English with all of the generally accepted rules for spelling, grammar, capitalization, and sentence or phrase structure. It will have an easily, and immediately recognizable purpose -- showcasing and strongly promoting a clearly defined set of skills and talents. In part and in whole it will be tightly focused on a single job objective, or industry target, and every page will have a consistent look and feel. Every item and image in it will contribute to and support its purpose ... and this style is totally appropriate for seeking employment, or attracting clients.

You want avoid wordings and phrasings like:

• My Portfolio,
• My Resume,
• Welcome to Adrea Moss's Online Portfolio,
• Electronic Portfolio for Adrea Moss, etc.

and all permutations of and variations on:

• I am seeking a position as ...
• I am looking for ...
• If you are looking for/seeking an employee who ...
• I can/will do ...'
• to advance in the [such and such] field based on performance
• to add value to operations

and any other chatty, overly wordy, weak, vague, or rambling phrasings, and especially the standard resume wording cliches.

In addition, you definitely need your name (and your fictitious business name if you have one and use it) to appear on the top page. You also need words that describe your Job Target as well, but NOT the single word Portfolio, because it doesn't give the visitor any info about the nature of the site, the nature of your skills. For example:

Adrea Moss Web Design
Web Design and Graphic Arts by Adrea Moss
Light Upon Light Stained Glass - Adrea Moss
Adrea Moss Programming Solutions
Tasty Toppings - Desserts Created by Adrea

on so on. Each gives a clear idea of what to expect at the site, whereas 'Online Portfolio for Adrea Moss' doesn't provide a clue.

Personal Home Page Style:

Hello and Welcome to Adrea Moss's Online Portfolio.

[photo: my favorite ocean sunset]

Please feel free to click one of the links below to learn more about my
site.

[following formatted as a letter]
Dear Visitor,

Welcome to my Portfolio Site. I'm still in the process of taking classes at the Santa Rosa Junior College, in the Computer Department. And heading for my Certificates in Web Design and Graphic Arts. You can see all of the certificates I've already earned by clicking the thumbnails at the bottom of this page. So my job objective, at this point, is just to finish my courses, so that I can learn more, and I learn very quickly, and then I will begin to look for a job later on. I'm probably interested in an intern position, so if anyone would like to give me a chance to prove what I can do, so be sure and contact me if you like.

This site is still in its early stages, because I'm still learning about how to put together a web site portfolio the way I want to. As you can see, if you take the time to look around here, I've included a lot of really cool things already, and as time passes, it will only get better, so please check back often. Since I'm a beginner, please excuse any links that don't work, and feel free to look around as much as you like.

Please email me [ no email link provided ], and let me know what you think of my site. And "Thanks" for visiting my site.

Professional, Business Oriented Style:

Adrea Moss Web Design

[graphic logo containing the words 'Web Designs by Adrea]

Cutting edge, creative designs, custom tailored to your needs: Web Pages, Graphic Arts, Photography, Copy Writing. Proven track record, excellent communication skills, able to meet deadlines.

[contact email link, phone, and po box at the bottom of page]

Which would you contact first?

Even if you aren't finished with your Certificate program yet...you NEED to set up your front page, your job objective, your resume education section, and any other info you present as if you were ALREADY FINISHED...being in the process is temporary, and putting that out on your portfolio presents a very weak picture of who you are, and as soon as you earn your certificate, it becomes old news which you need to change.

DON'T present yourself as a 'gonna be, wanna be' ... 'I'm gonna be finishing my Certificate and then I wanna be a web designer, graphic artist, programmer, etc.'

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the 8-second window
All of the professionals who give out advice about 'getting your foot in the door', about being noticed, about being called for an interview agree that you have from 5 to 8 seconds to make a positive impression and connection with the visitor at the top page of your portfolio site, or with your ink-on-paper Resume. If, in that first crucial time slice, it is NOT totally, powerfully, and self confidently clear:

• who you are
• what you want (ie what you're seeking or offering)
• and why you should get it (why you instead of someone else)

then you've lost this crucial first opportunity, and the online visitor, the recruiter, the interviewer will most likely go on to the next site, or the next resume in the stack. However, with the skills you're learning in this class, you will make the best use of that first time slice.

Consider the difference in written style, and in the feel of the 2 examples below. Then decide which one you'd contact if you wanted a web site designed for your company, or freelance business, or if you were looking to hire a web designer for your company.

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job objective
One of the weakest areas in student portfolios has been a sufficiently detailed and powerful Job Objective/Opening Summary, and enough self promotion to adequately highlight the portfolio owner's skills set.

One possible reason for this is that so much of the socialization of well-behaved, and well-brought up American citizens in general, and probably double for women, runs counter to effective, professional self promotion in a competitive job market. We're often taught to be polite, humble, and self-effacing, not putting ourselves first, not talking about or broadcasting our skills and accomplishments ... so much so, that often any self promotion may feel like crass boasting, and egotistical bragging.

This being so, effective self-promotion may require thinking about yourself and your skills in a totally different way.

To address this weakness, students will work through a self-promotional, confidence building exercise, which results in a powerfully concentrated Job Objective. Because it will help all portfolio sites, it is incorporated into the assignments so that everyone gets exposed to it

So, before you actually begin assembling your portfolio site, before you begin composing your Resume, you'll work through this assignment, to help clarify and concentrate your Job Objective so that it works powerfully for you.

You'll end up with 3 items:

• a self promotional paragraph,
• a self promotional sentence,
• and a self promotional phrase, or slogan

which you'll be able to use on an About Me page, as the Job Objective section of your Resume, and as a self promotional Tag Line or Slogan on your Portfolio top page. With this tag line, along with your name and your job target, there will be no question about what it is you're looking for, what you offer, and why you should get it.

Take a look at the following selections of Portfolio Site Opening Statement and Resume Job Objectives, culled from previous student sites, so you can see types that are considered well done.

This exercise will help you identify technical, work-habit, and personal skills that you can weave into a concise and powerful, self promotional Job Objective paragraph, sentence, and tag line, for your Resume, and Portfolio pages.

Having this type of powerful, concentrated self promotion present, it will be completely clear in the first 5 - 8 seconds of looking at either your Portfolio top page, or your Resume:

• who you are
• what you want & what you offer
• why you should get it (rather than someone else)

This element of the Portfolio and Resume is often the most difficult for students to get. The default response is usually to fall back on an ambiguous, nonspecific sentence or paragraph that is too wordy, too weak, and often rambling. Instead you should be using crisp, concise, powerful, and positive advertisement of skills that answers the questions 'Why should I hire you, and What can you do for me?'

Step 1: Keywords

You can't do effective self promotion without an extensive set of technical, work habit, and personal skills keywords to draw from. The more keywords you have that accurately and concretely describe the skills you have in each of the 3 areas, the easier it will be to create an effective, self promotional job objective.

For the assignment you'll need to come up with 10 - 15 keywords that describe the various aspects of your tech skills, your work habit skills, and your personal skills or traits.

The keywords for your technical skills describe and promote your technical knowledge, your competence, and your excellence in your chosen industry or field.

Those for your work habits describe how you work, and your approach to the work you do in your chosen industry or field. They promote you as a independent worker, a dedicated employee, perhaps as a team player or a self-starter (here are 2 keywords). They should support what you offer a client/employer, and why you should be hired, in addition to supporting your technical expertise.

Be aware that deadline driven is NOT a positive keyword, since it suggests someone who waits to the last minute, using the stress of a looming deadline to energize and focus creativity and work production. The keywords work well under pressure or easily able to meet deadlines are both much more positive, and responsive to employer/client needs.

The keywords for your personal traits and skills are the personal qualities that you bring to everything you do. These qualities exist even when working at something that isn't related to your chosen field, or when not working at all. These promote you as a person, perhaps as honest, trustworthy, reliable, etc and like the work habit keywords, should support what you offer a client/employer, and why you should be hired, in addition to your technical expertise.

If you need help with keywords, there's quite a bit of info at the eresumes.com site, which is discussed further in Step 9 of this lesson below, entitled "Master eRésumé Tutorial"

http://www.eresumes.com/eresumes_practice.html#Step%209:

Here you'll find discussions about keywords and about using them in keyword resumes, as well as lists of keywords for different industries and for various personal traits. Once you see the lists, I'm sure you'll be able to think of others that describe your own particular skills..

You can also do a web search for 'keywords'.

Step 2: Just the Facts 'About Me' Paragraph

Now take the 3 sets of keywords from Step 1, and write a medium sized 'About Me' paragraph (at least 5 sentences) that tells the facts about:

1) who you are professionally (don't word it as who you 'want to become if hired' ... no gonna be, wanna be ... claim your job target profession in the Now),
2) what technical skills and expertise you have,
3) what work-habit and personal skills and traits you have
4) what you have to offer an employer or client
5) what benefit they will gain if you work for them

This is the bare bones foundation for Step 3, that you will use next, to build a self promotional commercial, or an advertisement, for you and your skills.

Step 3: Exaggerated, Self Promotional, 'About Me' Paragraph - Your Elevator Speech

Now take the paragraph of plain facts you wrote Step 2, and make it more than 'Just the Facts'. Make it self promotional, spin the facts to your advantage. EXAGGERATE everything in it to your advantage, make it bigger, larger, faster, good-better-best, more, more, more. Use adjectives and adverbs to increase and intensify the keywords. Turn plain adjectives into superlatives: best, finest, most excellent, fastest, first rate, top of the line, etc. State everything as if it is already accomplished. If you discover any wording that is in future tense, or if you've used 'trying' or hoping' shift it all into the NOW.

This paragraph needs to have two elements:

• 1) It needs to have specific skills mentioned, and it needs to be spun and slanted towards promotion of you and your talents. You, your skills and talents need to stand out from the crowd. It needs to be clear why you are a better candidate.
  
• 2) At the same time, it needs to be focused on meeting the employer's or client's needs rather than on meeting yours. In has to be crystal clear how all of the above will meet the needs of potential employers and clients. It must be clear how this objective will benefit their businesses, or what your particular contributions will add to the venture.

This paragraph needs to promote you, right now (even if that right now is actually at the end of your Certificate program) -- claim it now, not some future desire that you'd like to accomplish, or will try to work towards.

No outright lies, or misrepresentations, just spin, slant, and exaggeration of what is in your keywords, to put you out in front of the others.

Make this version totally self-promotional, self-confident and perhaps even a bit boastful. As long as your actual skill set can support it, even if it's a stretch, you should probably go with it.

If you are normally shy, quiet, soft-spoken, humble, and self-effacing, then this exaggerated paragraph needs to be the absolute opposite--shamelessly egotistical, outrageous, and completely over the top, bombastic, fantastic, and incredible. In order to counteract your normal tendency to undercut and undervalue your own skills, to put yourself down, or to put yourself last rather than first. Make outrageous claims about your value and what will happen to the business of anyone who hires you. Convince the reader that you and only you can do the job that needs to be done, and that if you aren't hired, a tremendous opportunity for the employer/client will be missed or wasted. Pull out all the stops, shoot for the moon and the stars!

Make sure you cover both you and your skills, AND how well you'll meet the client/employer needs.

With a little polishing and revision, this exaggerated paragraph will become your Elevator Speech. This is the concentrated, highly self-promotional, totally self-confident, recap of you and your skills. Imagine that you happened to be alone with the President/CEO of the company in an elevator, for the length of the ride between floors ... 15 to 20 seconds of uninterrupted attention on you. What will you say about you, and your skills, and what you have to offer, that will make such an impression, that the CEO will want to hire or promote you, right there, right then?

Don't be afraid of what anyone might think of you as you work on this...it's only an exercise, and we can refine it, and if necessary tone it down a bit before it goes on your Resume, if it really is too much. This paragraph will become the primary text on your 'About Me' page. A condensed, concentrated version of it will become your Resume Job Objective, and the essence of it will become your Slogan/Tag Line for your top page.

If what you've written is really too unbelievable, you can scale it back a bit, but DON'T START OUT SMALL ... It's much, much easier to scale back some exaggeration, and tone down some bombast, than it is to pump up and vitalize a humbly conservative, or even apologetic Elevator Speech, or Job Objective Tag Line, once you've finished your portfolio. Take the time right now to juice it up and make it work for you.

What you end up with should be extremely positive, self-confident, and self promotional, detailing what you can or already have accomplished, and how you can be of use to your employer/client ...

• use past tense if possible, and
• avoid phrasings like
  • looking for
  • seeking
  • in the market for
  • trying
  • would like to, etc.

Step 4: The Sound Bite Sentence

Now condense the Exaggerated About Me/Elevator Speech paragraph down to one long, detailed sentence or phrase, that captures the essence, the highlights, the best of all of the claims and self promotion of your Elevator Speech from Step 3.

If you did a TV or Cable commercial for yourself and your skills, this sentence would be read as a voice-over when the commercial first starts, while the camera is panning in on you, before you begin talking.

It's your 'intro', your 'opening act', your 'tasty appetizer' since it introduces you and your skills, and gets the viewer ready for you, in person. Make sure it emphasizesboth your skills, AND what you can do for the employer/client.

Step 5: The Tag Line or Slogan

Now condense your Sound Bite sentence into a concise, sparkling, snappy phrase ... your Tag Line or Slogan ... that recaps the essence, highlights the best of what you're offering, emphasizes your special approach to your field, and gives a clear idea of what employers or clients will get from hiring you, or how they will benefit from your skills.

Typically, advertising slogans for consumer products try to capture a particular, different, or memorable feature of the product, that makes it different from, and better than the competition. You're probably familiar with dozens of advertising product slogans, like:

M&Ms: 'Melt in Your Mouth, not in Your Hands' (playing up their superiority over other bite size chocolate candy)

Avis Rent-a-Car: 'We Try Harder' (acknowledging their second place status in comparison to Hertz, and making 2nd place work for them instead of against them)

Coca-Cola: 'Things Go Better with Coke' (promoting the idea that your entire life and everything you do will be better if you use their product)

United Airlines: 'Fly the Friendly Skies' (emphasizing their superior in-flight service)

US Army: 'Be All That You Can Be' (emphasizing their job training programs, and the benefits they offer to enlistees)

Cotton: 'The Fabric of Our Lives' (building the association that the viewer is part of a widely diverse group of people who all wear cotton)

American Dairy Producers: 'Got Milk' (ending punch line to every scenario, demonstrating of how crucial milk is to all sorts of everyday activities)

Pillsbury: 'Nothin' Says Lovin' Like Somethin' From the Oven' (connecting feelings of home, security, and lovingly being cared for, with their products)

Nike: 'Just Do It' (building the association that Nike wearers are effective, productive individuals who don't get stuck in their heads just thinking about doing something, they get on with it, they get it done.)

Slogan creation is a highly lucrative slice of the advertising market, and while it may seem a bit more difficult for you to create a Tag Line or Slogan for yourself and your skill set, it is possible to relate to your skills as commodities to be promoted like any other consumer product.

Considering the information from your Sound Bite sentence, ask these questions as you condense the sentence down into a phrase or slogan:

• what about you, your skills, and what you offer, is the one most important thing you want to emphasize first? (or perhaps the 2 or 3 most important things--if you can accomplish that in a short slogan-style phrase)
• what is the particular aspect of the totality of your skills that you want to be seen, noticed, or thought about first?
• what is the specialty that gives you an edge over all the other people doing what you do?
• what is the angle, or the twist of normal perception, that will act as a teaser to encourage visitors to stop and take a closer look at your site, or resume?
• what would you like visitors to go away from your site remembering about it and you?.

If you have any difficulty, take another look at the Examples of Opening Summaries and Job Objectives to help get your creative imagination flowing.

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freelancers services and fees list
Many freelancers choose to offer a "Services and Fees" list, or pages, at their site, in addition to their resume. Some choose to skip the resume altogether and just rely on their Services and Fees List and their portfolio.

In order to make the grading consistent between students on the employee track and those heading towards freelancing, everyone MUST create a resume, even if you decide not to use it when you 'go live' with your site, after the class is finished. For those who may want to use the Services and Fees page approach afterwards, your page or pages would typically include some or all of the following...

• a summary of the designer's skills and background (not needed when there is a resume)
• a list of services the freelancer provides
• a summary of fees charged [sometimes incorporated into the list of services]
• a list of satisfied clients (you may or may not want other people contacting your clients ... so this is a very individual choice)

In presenting these pages it's important that you answer the two common questions most prospective clients will ask:

What can you do for me?
AND
How much will it cost?

Your answer to a third client question:

How do I know you can do it?

should be answered with your work examples presented in your portfolio

For our class, freelancers have a choice! You can:

1. Include only a resume (following the same guidelines as Employed-track students)
2. Include a resume and a Services and Fees page

You need to seriously consider what you believe will be most appropriate to accompany your Portfolio. Obviously the more pages you decide to include, the more time you will have to invest to complete those pages. If you elect option 'B', the Services and Fees page will not be evaluated as part of your grade, but if you plan to use it in your site after the class is over, having it present for your classmates and I to critique, will give you the opportunity to fine tune it to make it really useful.

The bad news is that there are no additional articles or guidelines to step you through the development of your Services & Fees pages, beyond taking care that your list of services and what you will charge for them is clear, concise, and organized, and that it contains a balance between too much and too little detail.

For example, if I were a Web Site Developer, and the only thing I stated was that my services were available at $75 an hour, this might be too little detail -- what does someone get for the $75 ... do I create graphics and write the text, or does the client provide these ... what about small upgrades and minor changes to existing pages, already created at $75 an hour ... and so on. On the other hand including a list of 50 services or items might be too much. Perhaps I might offer a combination of hourly rates and flat rate packages.

Somewhere between the two extremes of too little and too much, there is a balance that gives a clear idea of what major services you provide. A client looking at the list, should be able to calculate a ball park estimate of the cost of a project. I suggest that you revisit many of the portfolio sites you examined last week and those which you find in the Resources section this week. Bookmark all of the Services and Fees pages, so that you can find them again. When you find pages that you might use as samples, or examples to refer to when you create your own, add them to your Useful Resources and Links page

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resume formats
The online resume may be the front door to your portfolio. This document will be registered with Job Boards and will lead prospective employers to your portfolio site. It needs to catch and hold the attention of those who read it.

Even if you're in a situation where the portfolio is going to be the centerpiece of your web presence, it's usually a good idea to have some sort of biographical background that an employer can print for quick reference. Based on the type of position, the employer, and how wide a net you want to cast, there are a number of resume formats from which to choose.

These formats are not mutually exclusive. The keyword concept, for example, can be utilized within a standard HTML format. This is actually what the first of the 10 Principles for good resumes is referring to, even thought the term buzz words is used instead of keywords.

"List your technical knowledge first, in an itemized fashion. Use as many buzz words as you can conjure up which reflect your work and school experience."

In my view, the term buzz words has a rather negative connotation, implying jargon or technical terminology that 'those in the in-group' use, and that when used by 'others' they are often used without any deep understanding, or without any substance to back it up. If you substitute keywords for buzz words this principle becomes very valuable.

There are subtle but important differences between the HTML and WWW versions. A scannable resume deals more with convenience than content. Examine the types listed below and decide which type(s) is or are most appropriate for your situation, and how you can incorporate it/them into your entire web presence. To be ready for just about any situation, you probably will want to have your resume ready in each format type.

The following tutorials and examples are from eResume website, and eResumeIQ.com - two excellent resources for job hunters new to the digital employment scene.

The keyword resume (Step 9 from eResume) acts as a springboard from which other forms of resumes can develop. It's important to have an organized inventory of keywords, accomplishments, and background information. If you've never put together an official resume (electronic or traditional), start here. In addition, going through the tutorial for this type of resume will give you a jump-start on online resumes that are automatically created for you by certain job banks.

The Electronic Resume--ASCII is identified by the .txt file extension. ASCII files are recognized by PCs, Macintoshes, UNIX Workstations, and mainframe terminals. ASCII resumes became popular as e-mail became wide-spread, as a way of sending and receiving information across the Internet. An ASCII resume is plain text with no font or layout formatting, which is something one needs to get used to, since traditional resume writing advice for the past several years has promoted the use of fancy fonts, printed on specialty papers. If you want to submit your resume via e-mail, or post it directly to a resume database, you MUST use an ASCII version of it....go to the ASCII Resume tutorial below, for step-by-step instructions. ASCII Text is NOT an HTML page, NOT a Word .doc

There has been some confusion about what actually constitutes an ASCII version of a resume. It is NOT an HTML page...it has no HTML tags in it at all. It is also NOT an MS Word document, nor any .doc file created by any other word processor. It is a PURE TEXT file without any formatting, font codes or HTML tags, that has been created by copying the text of the resume into Notepad, on the pc, or into SimpleText, on the Mac.

Also, be aware that just because the web page version of your resume prints out fine on your printer, you CANNOT assume that it will do so for everyone--which is why having an ASCII text version available for printing is so necessary.

The other thing to remember when creating your text version, is to manually break your line length at between 80-90 characters, by using the <enter> key at the end of every line...DON'T rely on word-wrap!

If you don't physically break your line lengths, the printer will simply cut off the ends of any lines that are wider than the right margin, rather than wrapping the text onto the next line.

It's always a good idea to test out your alternate versions by printing them yourself.

ASCII tutorial (eResumeIQ.com tutorial)

Electronic Resume--HTML/WWW  - HTML provides the means for publishing your resume on the World Wide Web. HTML resumes take advantage of HTML tags used by search engines to index pages of information on the World Wide Web. Working with HTML documents on the Web requires a Web browser, Internet access, and an HTML generator application or knowledge of standard HTML.

Although the term "Web Resume" is used interchangeably with the term "HTML Resume," the focus here is on Web page design strategies for presenting information, rather than on HTML tags for indexing pages found on the World Wide Web. If you are in the kind of profession such as a consultant, publisher, attorney, or freelance graphic artist where people come to you, a Web resume may be just the thing. They are most effective when used in combination with other self-marketing techniques in a coordinated job search campaign. Web resumes are also ideal for people who are contingent workers or have a home-based business. Unlike Web-based resume databases that attract the attention of employers and recruiters by promoting their large databases, job seekers using Web resumes must attract the attention of interested employers and recruiters on their own.

HTML/Web tutorial (eResumeIQ.com tutorial)

Electronic Resume--Scannable - Scanning either with or without OCR (Optical Character Recognition) transforms an ink-on-paper resume into a digital image of the original, which can then be saved either as:

• a .gif or .jpg graphic (BAD idea since the text WILL look fuzzy and slightly out of focus)
• a .doc format word processing file, after being run through OCR software to translate the graphical images of the letters into actual letters as if you had typed the original into a word processor.

In order to enter a paper resume into an automated resume tracking system, it will need to be retyped, or scanned with OCR. Once this process has been completed, the electronic version of the resume data can be manipulated in several ways, the most popular of which is to provide data for resume databases.

Scannable tutorial (eResumeIQ.com tutorial)

Adobe Acrobat software (~$170) can save your Web resume, including graphics, in PDF format. Files saved in this format can then be viewed and read on any computer, providing the viewer has the Acrobat Reader software, which is available free from Adobe.

After your resume is saved in this format and uploaded to your server, you offer a link to it on one of your Web pages. When viewers click the link one of several things may happen. Usually the PDF file is then downloaded to their computer. However, depending on the viewer's software, the file may sometimes be opened in their Web browser, or Acrobat Reader may kick in and open the document. If your server is not set up to deal with PDF files, nothing may happen. Consequently, you should always check with your server administrator and test what happens before offering the link to prospective employers.

Test this: Acrobat Tutorial Click to view [ file size=340k ]
[Thanks to Susan Lucas, University of Alabama ]

Other Adobe products can save your documents in PDF format, but the limitation is that each saves only files created in that particular program. PageMaker, InDesign, Illustrator and PhotoShop all have this ability. Obviously, PageMaker or InLine would be the best options for your resume. In each of these cases, you use the Save As... option and elect to save the document in PDF format.

Other software is available to make the conversion to PDF because Adobe has made the PDF file specifications available to developers. None is as strong at Acrobat, but each costs significantly less. For a long list of 3rd party software utilities, check out PDFzone.Com.

Also, Adobe offers a free trial and/or a subscription service at their Web site.

For more information, check out
How to Convert A Web Page to PDF with Acrobat at Adobe.com.

>>> WARNING <<<

Test print your PDF format resume, from your portfolio web site, before moving on to something else. Don't assume the process was successful. Make sure your resume printout looks exactly the way it should. You don't want a prospect to download a pdf file that is corrupted. It will give the impression that you are not attentive to details.

A nice feature at your site would be to offer a variety of formats for your resume, so that visitors can make their own choices. However, if you do offer more than one alternate format make sure ASCII text and PDF are the first 2 you offer. The MS Word .doc format is only useful to those who have Word installed, so if you choose to offer a .doc version MAKE SURE it is the 3rd option you offer.

A Design Tip:
DON'T offer a page that has nothing on it but links to your different resume formats. When the visitor clicks the Resume link from your Portfolio site top page, they should see the HTML page that displays your Resume ... one click away from the top page ... put the links to other formats on this page, so that after seeing your HTML resume, they can print out one of the alternate versions.

URGENT NOTE:
All different formats of your resume should contain exactly the same information DON'T put different, or more, or less info in your ASCII or PDF versions. What changes from version to version is the format, and maybe the layout, NEVER the content.

Also remember that if you go back and make changes to your resume, you will need to make those same changes in your alternate format versions too.

Contrary to the impression given by some of the articles, the best Resume is no longer than one 8.5" x 11" printed page. Busy recruiters will often toss multiple page resumes into the 2nd or 3rd stack if they can't see on the first page your Job Objective, your Technical Skills, your Results and Accomplishments, your Education.

If a Job History is included on the Resume page it should be brief, concise and to the point, completely connected to and supportive of your Objective.

In other words, omit jobs that have nothing to do with your Job Objective. If you want to provide a link to a Complete Job History page, which itemizes in chronological order, all of your job history, that's your choice. This level of detail should be reserved for a secondary page, available if the interviewer is interested.

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A Warning about Dark Backgrounds

Dark backgrounds can produce a wonderfully dramatic, visually compelling feeling for a web page. BUT the text AND link colors have to be light and bright enough, and have sufficient contrast from the background color, so that they can be EASILY read against it. The smaller the font face, the more contrast you'll need.

Sometimes a student wants a very muted, quiet look and feel, and will choose dark colors for both background, and foreground, or will use the dim versions of colors for text and links. This can be a disaster for a web site, because unlike picking colors for a brochure or a pamphlet that is printed on paper, the colors you choose for your web pages will change depending on what monitor the visitor uses to view the page. Usually the colors don't change drastically, but if there isn't sufficient difference in colors to begin with, then even a small color or brightness shift could render text or links invisible--a VERY BAD situation.

What looks great and is readable in a darkened room, or at night, on your large, new monitor, may be difficult or impossible to read in the daytime or in a brightly lit room especially on a smaller, older monitor. The amount of ambient light in the room where the monitor is, can drastically affect the readability of computer screens.

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digital images
Many of you will be digitizing (ie scanning) images of your work to include with your portfolio. One of the most important concepts in this regard is to balance attractive photos with download time. There's usually a tradeoff here. If you require visitors to wait 3 minutes for your page to load, they will probably grow bored, or annoyed, and click off the site. Use smaller thumbnail files which link to single larger images.

The JPEG format works best for photographic images. GIF works best for large blocks of solid color or clip art illustration.

Also consider that whatever you put up on the web can be copied and reused by others. While it's illegal, it's not technically difficult. To help avoid web rip-off - include a copyright notice with your images.

Also be very clear about what your contribution was to group or team efforts. If you did the page design and wrote the copy, but someone else provided the graphics ... MAKE THIS CLEAR. If you don't, the implication is that if it's on your page, you are claiming it is your work !

Students who are weak in managing images for the Web may want to visit the Optimize Images Help Page which points you to online free help with reducing image file size.

After reviewing this lesson you will need to complete the reading assignment listed on the homework page, review the assignments for this lesson, and scan the resources page for additional links of interest.

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