1. Creative Work Examples

Lead your site with creative work examples.  You want this to be the main attraction.  Make sure that every item in your portfolio is a completed piece.  If you have a large body of work, you may want to select your best 8 to 12 pieces to display.

Make sure to include the details about each piece including client’s name, start date, complete date, project objectives and materials used.  If you are showcasing a website, make sure you include an active link.

2. Client History

To maximize your credibility, showcase a list of the clients you’ve worked with in the past.  Highlight the most recognizable ones.  If a client has given you a positive recommendation, ask for their permission and quote them on your site.

3. Services and Work Rates

Potential clients should be well aware of the services you offer.  Make sure they are presented in a clear and concise fashion.  If you offer several different services, group them together by category.

Be careful!  Listing work rates can either work for or against you.  If your business has fixed rates for creative services, it will be important to list them openly.  Otherwise, if your rates change on a project basis, take the opportunity to direct potential clients to contact you for a discussion on budget and scope.

4. Company Info

Here’s a chance to tell your story.  Keep it brief and exciting.  Proudly showcase the awards and accomplishments you’ve received throughout your career.  Display the professional organizations that you belong to.  This may also be a great place to post a resume for download.

Don’t forget to include your logo and/or portrait.

5. Contact Form

Your contact form should be a place where clients can contact you directly.  You may want to include other contact information including your business phone number and address.  Feel free to provide links to the rest of your web-universe including Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn.

For more information about developing your portfolio, visit the Wix Learning Portal or visit these fantastic examples on Wix:

Enjoy!

“The Site looks fantastic and ‘Google analytics’ allows us to focus our marketing. The feedback page on the site also gives viewers an opportunity to hear their input.”

Sasha Hawley

http://www.yogabythesea.com.au

Born in Sydney but at home in the world, Sasha Hawley has taught & trained for 8 years in yoga, tai chi, Pilates and meditation throughout Europe, Turkey, South America, Asia & Australia.

On her return to Sydney she set up ‘Yoga by the Sea’ at Bondi’s iconic Icebergs, fast becoming the most popular outdoors yoga venue in the East.  Now Yoga by the Sea classes are also available at the indoors venue at Tamarama Surfclub as well, with both venues bragging oceanic views. Read the full story.

Have a story you want to share? We’d love to hear it! Please email us at mystory@wix.com with your suggestions and ideas.

Based on feedback you’ve supplied via the Wix forum and support calls we’ve spent a lot of time thinking of updates that will considerably improve your sites.

So what’s coming up?

Server Side Performance

Performance is the biggest issue for a rapidly growing internet company and Wix is no exception to the rule. This is our top priority. We’ve made many improvements during the last 6 months and are tackling it on all fronts: during the last couple of months we’ve added global CDN, tripled our servers and are now using 24 top dell servers for Wix backend infrastructure with more being added on a weekly basis. During the next couple of months we will be doing the following:

• Reducing the size of the viewer.swf – this is the Wix flash program that loads the Wix website, today it is 450K, we are now working on reducing the size to 280K.
• Better compression of PNG
• A major upgrade to our hosting software, which will reduce the amount of calls needed to load your sites
• Remove wix.monitor and static.wix.com

Once we’ve achieved these goals, we will be adding the following:

HTML Component

Adding HTML has been tricky due to security, flash, Java script, browser and OS version compatibility issues, we’ve been working on it on and off for the better part of the last 6 months. So far we’ve completed 3 rounds of pioneers “beta” testing which helped iron out the bugs and tweak the offering. I’d like to thank our fantastic Wix pioneers group for all their great input. Follow the Wix pioneers forum here.

On that note, we’re still experiencing a key problem with Flash technology being incompatible with HTML and non English keyboards at the same time (the infamous opaque/transparent mode bug by Adobe for you ‘techies’).

Password Private pages/sites

Allowing Wix members to define private websites and private pages.
We’re going to be implementing this towards the end of Q1 2010.

SEO for pages

Wix is the only flash platform that is fully compatible with Google and the other main search engines.

To prove our point and ‘put our money where our mouth is’ – Wix.com is built using the Wix editor just like your sites are. We have some new ideas on how to make your website rank even higher. These features are expected to roll out early 2010.

Changing premium documents & cancellations of premium accounts.

We are adding a premium control panel which will allow you to manage your premium documents without contacting support. This feature is well over due and we apologize to those inconvenienced. Naturally, you’ll still be able to contact our support team for special requests.

Flash Side Performance

Our Flash team’s top priority is elevating the quality of your Wix site. Sleeker graphics, faster performance & better all around quality. As a result your website will look and feel even more professional.

Better performance to the editor and to your sites. Faster editing, and improved loading speeds.

Visual loading of Wix documents.

Yes, the notorious blue bar! We’re working on a solution to give you the ability to choose how it will look. In addition premium members will be able to create their own customized loader.
We are also working on having the HTML background look better while the site is loading (Eliminating the current “jumps” in certain browsers).

Menu, Buttons & Languages.

More options for the menu and better graphics with a lot of new ways to customize them.

Improved selection in the Editor

New ways for selecting objects in the editor: editing objects behind objects, easier grouping and ungrouping and a better ability to manage galleries and mini pages.

Editor Liquidity

The editor is optimized for Hi Resolution. We are now making it liquid – meaning, it will work better on all resolutions, especially on Laptops.

Picture Galleries

We’re revisiting all our galleries to give them a better look and smoother movement. In addition we will be adding lots of new and exciting galleries which we’re sure you’ll love.

Mini page and Slideshow Transitions

We are fixing several bugs and improving overall performance. In addition we are working on the ability to add your own graphics to the transition – a great improvement for branded sites.

Shopping Cart

The shopping cart will be upgraded soon, more currencies, more options for your products (size, colors, etc), visual indication of when an item is added to the cart and more…We won’t be adding all features at once, but improvements will start being introduced soon.

For those of you who’ve been asking about inventory management, that will take much longer. Inventory management is complex, so we’ll probably be adding a 3rd party product in the future, which will take a while to choose and integrate into Wix.

Help Shape the Future of Wix

We get tons of great suggestions daily and we’ll gladly take more. To make it as simple as possible for you, we’ve launched a dedicated wishlist page for you to jump in and share your ideas and suggestions. Some of our best ideas are inspired by member feedback.

Thank you for your cooperation, assistance and perhaps most importantly, your participation!

Gig,  Avishai & Nadav

Wix Founders

Our studio is a name to reckon when it comes to finding new photographers and giving them platform to show their talent to the world.  Their latest find is too good not to share with everybody!

Meet Mira German, a bank clerk during the day and a relentless, passionate photographer in her spare time. Mira’s website is currently under construction but you can get a peek to some of her work here and many of her photos will be available to download from the Editor starting today.

Mira German’s Photography:

Hi Mira and welcome. We’re truly happy to have you here. Can you tell us a little bit about yourself?

- MG – Sure. I was born and raised in the former USSR, where I worked as professional photographer. I dabbed into almost any sort of photography you can imagine: actors and models, landscapes, artwork, doing gigs for publishing homes, I was truly out there, working as a busy bee up until 1989.

What happened in 1989?

- MG – Well, I decided to make Aliyah (immigrate) to Israel and that kind of turned the tables for me. I remember a conversation I had with a family relative, Lev Borodulin, a celebrated Russian photographer who had immigrated to Israel in the 70’s. I asked him how could I best go about establishing myself as a photographer in Israel, and I’ll never forget his reply: “go work at a bank” (laughing).

And you did.

- MG – Yes, I did. But I never stopped taking photos. I still pretty much live my life behind a lense. I have a friend from a local photography club, Shuki Sela, with whom I make adventure photo expeditions in Israel and overseas. Many of the photos I contributed to Wix are outputs of our joint travels. We spend most of our trips arguing and bickering about light and and angle but end up being happy with our outcomes.

What do you like taking pictures of most?

- MG – Fog is a real obsession with me. Which is funny, since Israel isn’t exactly a natural habitat for fog lovers. I have to travel to get my fog. I’ll never forget my first: I shot some incredible fog photos in upstate New York in 2005 and I haven’t been the same woman since. Fog simply fascinates me.

What are you up to today?

- MG – I’ve been recently in touch with Rechovot’s – my hometown – city hall and we’re putting together a photography workshop for underprivileged kids. My general world view is that a camera is a far more engaging and convincing tool of self-expression than a gun.

What do you dream of at night?

- MG – I dream of opening a photography academy here in Israel. We have photography schools here they don’t really provide budding artists with a platform and an opportunity to display their work. My vision is for an academy where talented photographers who aren’t supported by massive PR can still present their work and get the exposure they crave.

Thanks for being with us today. We wish you the best of luck and hope to see more of your work soon.

- MG – Thank you for uploading my photos to Wix. It makes me proud to know they’re out there, I can’t think of a better way to share with and reach out to people.

Memphis, Tennessee – This Thursday, October 8th, AIGA will host their biennial Design Conference in Memphis, TN.  The conference is titled “Make|Think”, a theme that includes writing, idea-making and content-making, as well as strategy and, of course, craft and traditional design.

Wix.com is proud to sponsor the official Wi-Fi connection for this event.  If you, or someone you know, will be attending the AIGA “Make|Think” conference this week, let us know!  Send an email to Designers@Wix.com.

AIGA Make|Think Design Conference landing page

Follow us at the conference here for blog posts and on Twitter @WixDesigners.

Wix.com will be hosting many workshops in the near future on topics that include:
• Web design
• Graphic design
• Marketing strategy
• Business strategy
• New technology
• And more!

http://www.meetup.com/digitalcreatives

The next Wix.com/ Digital Creatives Meetup event will be Oct 28th, 2009

For more information, visit: http://www.meetup.com/digitalcreatives

Please show us your pet & pet related sites in the comments below!!

And feel free to watch our hamsters:

Austin, Texas – The HOW Design Conference came to a close today.  Attendees reconvened for the last workshops and the closing keynote: Mark Randall, “Design Ignites Change”.  We now look toward the future with the lessons learned this week; motivated, energized and full of new ideas.

As designers, we must find the order in chaos.  We must visually express abstract ideas in a clear and compelling fashion.  We must produce cutting edge work without losing sight of our intended audience.  We must take risks, push the limits, and test our personal boundaries.  We must keep the ideas we love, learn from the experience of others, and stay mindful of parts to repair.  At the end of the day, one final product is displayed to the world.  Make it the best it can be.

Wix.com has been proud to attend the HOW Design Conference this year.  In the weeks to come, we will be showcasing the many talented attendees on our HOW Conference Wix Collective.  Stay tuned!