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A marketing portfolio is a way to show your past work and build a professional brand for yourself, whether you’re a freelancer or a 9 to 5 employee. Having a compelling, easy-to-find portfolio online can build your authority as a marketer and open you up to new work opportunities.
Creating a digital marketing portfolio takes a little time, but with a good website template and a strong idea of the work experience you want to share, you can launch faster than you’d think.
1. Decide on your website goals
Your main website goal is what you ultimately hope someone will do after visiting your online portfolio. For most people, a digital marketing portfolio is designed to showcase your work to potential clients or potential employers. But even choosing who it is you’re trying to attract will help you make decisions about your website design more quickly.
A freelance marketer, for example, will want to attract potential clients and lead them to contact them for work. But their design should highlight the type of clients they’re looking for and include a custom contact form to help them vet new opportunities easily.
Learn more about setting your website goals
2. Choose a template that fits your work
Website templates are pre-designed layouts that you can customize to fit your needs. Even though templates are fully customizable, choosing one that’s already set up for the type of projects you want to share will save you some time. If you’re trying to show off your design portfolio, you’ll want something that puts the visuals front and center. A copywriter will probably want something text-forward.
On Squarespace, you can also design a custom website template with Squarespace Blueprint. The design system asks you a few questions and you choose only the pages you need to get started. Once you’re finished, you can use Squarespace AI to help draft some of the copy for your different template pages.
Every digital marketing portfolio should have at least four pages:
Homepage
Portfolio page
About page
Contact page
Decide which template experience is best for you
3. Highlight your skills and experience
The priority of your website will most likely be showcasing your top skills and strongest work.
On your homepage, start with a one- or two-sentence summary of your skills. For example, you might add a headline to the top of the page that says: “Hi there. I’m John Doe, a marketing strategist based in New York City.”
Your About page is an opportunity to go into more detail about your work experience. Here you should try to mention:
How many years of work experience you have
Which industries you have experience in
Notable companies you’ve worked with or for
Awards or recognition you’ve received
Your portfolio page is where you can dive into individual projects. Treat each one like a mini case study. Make sure to highlight any notable results from each project and your role on the team that produced the work.
Learn how to promote your new website
4. Add your best work
How you define your best work is up to you. You could pick projects where you got to work with a recognizable business or public figure, award-winning projects, projects that led to great business results, or a mixture of all three.
If you’ve worked across multiple types of marketing, it makes sense to split your portfolio into different categories. For example, you might have separate portfolio pages to showcase:
Brand marketing
Content marketing
Email marketing
Product marketing
Social media marketing
Just make sure you link to each of your different portfolio pages in your header navigation and a main portfolio page. Limit the number of projects you share so you don’t overwhelm a potential employer or client.
A good rule of thumb is to include three to 10 projects per portfolio page and focus on recent projects whenever possible. If you have more than one portfolio section, it’s probably safer to err on the side of featuring fewer projects per category.
That said, there’s no set rule for the combination and number of projects you feature. Include what you feel reflects your experience and what you want to work on.
5. Back it up with data
Even if your work looks creative and professional, a potential client or hiring manager will want to see measurable proof of your successes. That could be hard numbers, like increases in traffic, conversion, or awareness. If you don’t have access to performance data, you can include testimonials from happy clients or colleagues.
This is another place where knowing your target audience will help. A hiring manager will probably want to see how your work impacted business metrics. It’s more likely that a client looking for freelance graphic design will want to know other people enjoyed working with you and were happy with what you produced for them.
6. Make it easy to contact you
Assuming you want to hear from potential clients or future employers, make sure you have several links that lead to your Contact page across your portfolio website. It’s helpful to include a link to contact you from your:
Homepage or portfolio landing page
About page
Site header and footer navigation
That might seem excessive, but if your goal is to lead people to contact you, then getting to that step should be as easy as possible for your website visitors.
On your contact page, make sure to include an email address or contact form as well as links to any social media profiles that you use professionally.
Get tips on designing your website navigation
7. Customize your design
The website design for your portfolio doesn’t have to be too complex. Choose fonts and colors that suit your tastes or reflect the energy you want to communicate to site visitors. Bold fonts and colors will feel strong and high-energy, for example.
If you don’t feel confident about what to include, look at the websites of other marketers to get some initial ideas.
Your website goals can help you here too. Think about what you want to put front and center, then build your web pages around those things. Make it simple to move between pages and make sure everything looks as good on mobile as it does on a desktop browser.
If you find the design feeling a bit flat, try adding graphic elements like section dividers or licensed stock photos for more energy or visual interest.
See Squarespace’s guide to web design principles
8. Keep it updated
You don’t have to update your website every time you complete a new project, but it’s worth refreshing your portfolio at least once or twice a year. Of course, if you’re extremely excited about a recent project, there’s no harm in adding it right away.
As a best practice, try to keep your portfolio projects current within the last three to five years. And make sure your work is representative of the work you’re doing now and what you’d like to do more of in the future. If you don’t have new projects to add, you can always refresh your design or ensure your copy is still optimized for SEO.
Online marketing portfolio examples
Your digital marketing portfolio will be totally unique to you and your work, but it’s helpful to have some reference points to start with. Here are four marketing website examples from Squarespace to help you get inspired.
Hawley
Hawley’s clean design makes this a great portfolio template if you want to keep your site to just a few standout projects or want to split your portfolio into multiple categories.
Suhama
This template is designed to put your experience at the forefront. The colors and font are attention-grabbing, though they could be dialed back to suit your preferences. This may be a better starting point for an agency or in-house marketing professional.
Otto
The Otto template is another good option for someone working in-house or at an agency, and is pre-designed so that you can showcase both your experience and web or graphic design work on the homepage.
Agaro
Whether you’re a freelancer or run a small marketing agency, the Agaro template is a dynamic template that lets you share a strong headline and show off your work and skills, all on the homepage. From there you can lead users to explore your services or get in touch.
Want to build a custom template instead?