What makes a good web development portfolio

Creating your own distinctive brand

Creating a brand and identity allows you to showcase both technical skill and your individual identity to potential clients or employers, in many ways you want your portfolio to tell a story about you!

Make use of robust popular frameworks/CMS, industry standard tools and techniques to develop a portfolio site, this not only facilitates the development of your own brand and identity quickly but also showcases technical skill I.e. demonstrate that you can code!

Travis Neilson is someone whom I follow on line particularly his YouTube tutorials. Travis currently works at Google but in his spare time he runs his own YouTube channel DevTips. DevTips covers a number of Web Development topics with an emphasis on design and brand. One play list of particular interest that I think everyone should check out before embarking on the development of their own portfolio site is a series where Travis goes through the development of his own personal portfolio website. 

Travis started his career in graphic design and in the series he makes frequent reference to design and the importance of creating something that showcases his skills and talent, creating the brand Travis Neilson - TN.

Skills and Education

A good portfolio site should feature your educational history and any skills you have obtained. Showing what you have learned and what you are capable of can go a long way and helps demonstrate your personal level of dedication to a career in web development. 

Testimonials with links to Previous Work

Obtain testimonials from previous clients, employers or colleagues who can provide valuable feedback on previous projects you have delivered or collaborated on. Add value to your testimonials by including any mock-ups, design sketches, wireframes and screenshots/extracts of code (Javascript etc.) This again helps illustrate your skill/talent and your ability to develop/build a project up.