Building a photography portfolio website? Check out these simple tips before you start building.


Gone are the days when photographers and web designers traveled around with oversized folders crammed full of their latest and best work. The runaway growth of digital portfolios and their amazing versatility has made an online portfolio one of the very best tools that any photographer can have at their disposal.


And when the portfolio is combined with a dynamic website that optimizes your images and delivers great SEO, it’s a winning combination worth investing in.

Do You Need a Photography Portfolio Website?

 

Having your own portfolio website is a great way to promote your photography work. You’ll have the opportunity to customize just about everything, so it appears exactly as you want, without all the distractions and advertising that come with sharing your work via social media.


Your own portfolio site lets you control how the public views your work. What they see first, what they know about you, whether or not you share your pricing up front, how you want to present yourself - that all comes with building a great website.


Within your portfolio site, you can organize your work by themes that make sense for you. For example, if you’re a wedding photographer you may have albums such as ‘Wedding Venues’, or a ‘Gallery of Brides’, or ‘The First Kiss'. Or, you may want to categorize your images by individual shoot/client that you’ve worked with. Whatever makes sense for you, your business, and the work you want to showcase.

The Importance of Shareability

 


It’s never been easier to share your work, build up a following, and reach the level of professionalism that you aspire to achieve. In the past, getting your work in front of the right people was exhausting and time consuming. Not anymore!


Today, you can take the time in building your portfolio online, and then share it with whoever you choose with just a few clicks. Having a shareable gallery is also a fantastic tool for working with a photography client. They get to see a selection of images that you’ve shot and edited and can select the ones that they are really interested in.


One of your easiest ways to accept revenue as a photographer should be by delivering your images. Make sure to choose a portfolio website builder that allows you to share images with your clients and also accept payment before clients can download your images. No one likes to chase down payments, so why not make your website do this for you.


Choose a website builder that makes sharing images quick, easy, and painless for your clients to add their payment info and download the images right then and there.

4 Elements You Must Have in a Portfolio Site

  • Hassle-free Uploads & Publishing: Ensure that the website builder you choose makes it easy for you to upload your work and categorize it in an easy, effective, and aesthetically appealing way. It’s a waste of your time and effort to have to fiddle around with complicated filing when you’re building out your photography site.

  • Optimizing Images for Mobile: The quality and load speed of your images is becoming more and more important, especially when it comes to your SEO. Make sure that your website builder has good mobile optimization options, and take the time to compress your images so that they look great and load quickly on your site.

  • A Selection of Themes/Templates to Choose From: You want to have a certain level of flexibility in your display options so that you can make each page, album, and gallery really stand out. Make sure that you can do things like change the grid layout of your albums with a single click, tag photos, set featured images, assign categories, show photo names, and add photo descriptions. The more control you have over the customization of your website, the better!

  • Good Privacy Options: Not all photo galleries or albums are meant for the general public. Sometimes you want to privately send a gallery to a client, or add a password to an album so only select viewers can access it. Your photography website builder should offer you password protection that allows you to create, edit, and send password protected galleries and pages to your clients, friends and families.


What Makes a Good Portfolio Site?

 


At the end of the day, what you want is to have a complete online portfolio that is ready to go at a moment’s notice. You want to create something that you’re proud to show people, whether you’re sending a new client an introduction email or pulling up your website at the bar with your friends. A good portfolio site lets you easily manage your images, share them effortlessly, and allow potential clients to get in touch with you.


Spend some additional time to make a portfolio for each of your areas of focus (or revenue streams), showcase your best first, and keep your portfolio site updated and ready to share. When choosing a photography portfolio website, you should be as confident in your website builder as you are in your photography itself.


Folio Websites has years of experience helping photographers build great portfolio sites to showcase their work. Take the tour to see what’s possible and sign up today for a free trial today. Folio can help put you on the path to transforming the way you present your work and help grow your photography business.