Personal Websites - A Guide With Examples

Having a personal site is a super interesting aspect when working in the communication, marketing, journalism, design, architecture, or similar sectors where visual works reign. These are environments in which it is necessary to be able to demonstrate the work carried out and a personal web page is a perfect channel for this. If you have been considering designing a website for a long time, you are in the right place.

There are many websites for job searching such as LinkedIn and Glassdoor. Nonetheless, these have their limitations and your profile may not be adequate to display your skills. As useful as these tools are, it creates a one-size-fits-all presentation that you may need to post more content than usual to make it look good. This is where personal websites come to the rescue.

Personal websites give you the edge and chances of impressing your potential employers in a unique way, making you stand out from the rest.

Your personal website is your greatest ally when it comes to showcasing your uniqueness and character, as well as going into further detail about how you handled an assigned task. This is shown through your personal website design.

Your personal website can characterize who you are. That being said, a personal web page will help you distinguish yourself from other individuals when building your personal brand. 

Why You Need a Personal Website

Personal websites provide many uses. They can be used as a portfolio, as a resume, as a blog, or for both job search and personal branding purposes. 

If your creativity is a major asset you can offer, show it off with an attractive personal website design that displays your visual prowess. Moreover, visuals such as photographs or graphics can aid in showing your results on projects you undertook in the past, making it easier for your audience to understand you by looking at your personal web page.

You can attach multiple links all in one place on your personal homepage. This serves as a convenient way for employers to check any relevant social media accounts or other relevant work when browsing through your personal web page.

Nowadays, making a personal website isn’t difficult as there are many tools and ways to develop one. Everyone can have their own personal website to build their personal brand and online presence, giving you a kickstart during job interviews. 

Let’s cover all the possible uses of a personal website to have a better idea of why creating a personal website will benefit you.

🖋 As a portfolio

Personal portfolio websites showcase your talents, expertise, projects, and even your personality to potential clients and/or employers in an organized manner. Having a personal portfolio site boosts your credibility by allowing employers to see proof of what you say on your CV or during an interview.

This type of personal web page can help clients or employers visualize what it might be like to work with you, which may be more exciting and compelling than just stating your qualifications on paper.

🖋 As an online resume

Creating an interactive online resume is an easy approach to stand out from other candidates. There are several ways to demonstrate your knowledge with a resume online.

Many examples of online resume websites contain the relevant elements a resume has (contact information, work section, skills, etc.) but with an interactive way of displaying this along with content such as images or videos. There are so many ways to make accessible customization for these websites that will prevail over a generic PDF resume file.

🖋 As a blog

A personal blog website is a good way to show what you have to say out there. This type of personal site is ideal if you have something meaningful to say and you would like to express it to your audience.

When combined with good SEO practices, a personal blog website can also become means of income. A lot of bloggers make profit off reviewing products on their blog sites. With a good online presence, a personal blog website can improve your personal branding as well.

🖋 For branding purposes

A website aiming to deliver personal branding is necessary if you want your personal brand or service to thrive and be set apart from the rest of the competition. Remember that you are also your own brand. Thus, knowing how to present a personal website is important when it comes to promoting yourself and/or your service or product.

20 Best Personal Website Examples

Do you want to build a personal website and need some design ideas?

Well, you’ve come to the right place!

Personal websites vary depending on your background and what you are showing or offering on your website. Here are several personal website examples for different purposes. Once you look at these, you’ll have the inspiration you need to make a personal website now!

Student personal website examples

  1. Kimberly Horton
Student personal website by Kimberly Horton
Student personal website by Kimberly Horton

Horton’s student personal website is pretty straightforward in showing who she is and what her passions are. Her minimalist personal website is easy-to-read and is not filled with several pages.

2. Nikolos Sirmpilatze

Personal web page by Nikolos Sirmpilatze
Personal web page by Nikolos Sirmpilatze

Similar to Horton's site, this PhD student personal web page is simple in its presentation of the student and his interests. Sirmpilatze’s personal website is simple to navigate and does not have a lot of pages. You can either check the tabs or scroll down to know more about his academic background, competencies, and papers he published.

Personal trainer website

3. Matt Roberts

Personal trainer website by Matt Roberts
Personal trainer website by Matt Roberts

This personal trainer website is straightforward and the bulk of its content is on the main page, such as services and information about the staff. Alternatively, you can also use the 3 tabs on the right corner instead of scrolling down. 

Marketing personal website

4. Sean O’Connor

Marketing personal website by Sean O’Connor
Marketing personal website by Sean O’Connor

O’Connor only uses two contrasting colors and keeps his personal website as simple as possible. He is involved in marketing and the latest technological trends in the business world. He keeps his personal website with a handful of links and fewer gadgets and features for better simplicity.

Software engineer personal website

5. Garry Sheng

Software engineer personal website by Gary Sheng
Software engineer personal website by Gary Sheng

Gary Sheng's one-page interactive personal website is flawless, showcasing the software engineer's work, ideas, and passion. The website's descriptions are casual, fresh, and welcoming, with a few personal anecdotes luring the reader in.

Web developer personal website examples

6. Flamy

Web developer personal website by Flamy
Web developer personal website by Flamy

Fla.my is a personalized website created by two professionals who share a passion for web design and development. They do a solid job in showing top-notch animations and images that may vary from time to time. Their website displays what their intentions are: offering their services. You can scroll down or navigate through their tabs to see their past works, services, and contact information.

7. Iuri de Paula

Frontend developer personal website by Iuri de Paula
Frontend developer personal website by Iuri de Paula

Iuri de Paula is a front-end developer, designer and illustrator who has built one of the most cool personal websites out there. De Paula displays his selected works in his personal homepage in an interactive way whilst detailing his past experiences and accomplishments in his career.

Personal website examples using HTML

8. Nikoleta Žišková

Personal website example by Nikoleta Žišková
Personal website example by Nikoleta Žišková

Žišková is a content writer and editor has a simple personal website that is based on a slideshow presentation. It also works as an interactive resume.  Creating a personal website can be a simple slideshow rather than trying to impress with extravagant animations and designs.

9. Ana Santos

UX consultant personal website by Ana Santos
UX consultant personal website by Ana Santos

Santos is an UX consultant who offers coaching and workshops. Her personal website is a prime example that shows that you can't go wrong by including references on your personal website that speak about your professional competencies and highlight your skills once you've established a job history.

Doctors personal website examples

10. Dickson General Practice

Doctor’s personal website by Dickson General Practice
Doctor’s personal website by Dickson General Practice

This doctor's personal website does an excellent job in its call to action and showing they care for the people, who are their clients. On its homepage, they display why you should seek their services, a good approach in separating themselves from other clinics. This personal website uses simple color combinations, such as white background and their pictures aren’t flashy or too colorful.

11. Michael Chen, MD

Doctor’s personal website by Michael Chen
Doctor’s personal website by Michael Chen

Michael Chen is a medical professional with vast experience in Neurology. His personal website has characteristics other doctors have in their pages, such as testimonials, doctor’s background, contact information, and types of treatment they offer. You can book an appointment right away under the “Conditions” tab.

Graphic designer personal website examples

Here are two examples for a graphic designer's personal website. Both are straightforward and minimalistic, but amazingly interactive that both designers show their creativity to the max. The key distinction is Martin Pyšný’s homepage requires the viewer to click the left buttons to scroll down. On the other hand, Onimiya’s personal website can be scrolled down with ease.

12. Ojieame Onimiya

Graphic designer personal website by Ojieame Onimiya
Graphic designer personal website by Ojieame Onimiya

13. Martin Pyšný

Graphic designer personal website by Martin Pyšný
Graphic designer personal website by Martin Pyšný

Software developer personal website

14. Daniel Spatzek

Personal website by Daniel Spatzek
Personal website by Daniel Spatzek

Spatzek creates a dynamic four-direction navigation website by masterfully blending his two disciplines: Web development and design.

Personal brand website examples

For personal branding, here are two examples from entrepreneurs Mel Abraham and Marie Forleo. Both cater to their audience by inspiring them to live a better life. Both provide training services for clients. On one hand, Abraham’s personal website is more animation-driven and colorful, while Forleo follows a simple white background and keeping it simple with the color palette.

15. Mel Abraham

Personal brand website by Mel Abraham
Personal brand website by Mel Abraham

16. Marie Forleo

Personal brand website by Marie Forleo
Personal brand website by Marie Forleo

Teacher personal website

17. Alex Burchmore 

Teacher personal website by Alex Burchmore
Teacher personal website by Alex Burchmore

Burchmore is a social science professor who has a basic personal website containing all that a university educator has to show: publications, public appearances, research projects, and awards. His homepage is not full of extensive information, and it is up to the reader to go in deeper by clicking any of the sections displayed in Burchmore’s personal homepage.

Social media influencer personal website

18. Chloe Plumstead

Influencer personal website by Chloe Plumstead
Influencer personal website by Chloe Plumstead

Plumstead does an excellent job in blending image colors with her personal web page. She includes several built-in features in her website without making it messy or unorganized. To make things simple, this personal site has a few tabs in the corner, where you can contact her or see more blog entries.

Personal blog website examples

Emma Gannon and Kisty Mea, who both are bloggers, show two things in common: Displaying what they love to do. Both Gannon and Mea use light colors and avoid using multiple colors, especially Mea, who follows a minimalist approach in her personal website.

19. Emma Gannon

Personal blog website by Emma Gannon
Personal blog website by Emma Gannon

20. Kisty Mea

Personal blog website by Kisty Mea
Personal blog website by Kisty Mea

How to Create a Personal Website

Let’s now take a closer look at some of the most popular website builders out there. Nowadays, there are plenty of tools and sites to develop personal websites. We'll go through the major advantages and disadvantages, thus helping you decide whether they are ideal platforms for making your personal web page.

Cake

Cake is a resume builder where you can also build a personal website. Here are its relevant features for making a personal site:

  • User-friendly interface.
  • Link your personal website to your digital resume.
  • Create your user profile, where you can highlight different projects and highlights all in one place.

Pros:

Cake website builder is user-friendly and easy to use. There is no limit to the amount of media you can use, whether for a personal website or a portfolio. Moreover, it’s a free platform for creating a personal website.

Cons:

There’s a limited number of font types available for text tools, as also a limit for file uploads (5 MB). Also, it may not be fully customizable if you desire to add animations that require a blend of CSS and coding.

Develop your online presence and personal branding by creating your personal website. Check out these creative online portfolio designs and portfolio examples, and create your very own online portfolio for free on Cake!

Wix

Wix is a website building tool that has the following main features:

  • No coding is required for making a personal website.
  • Runs on independent servers, thus hosting is free.
  • No need to install any external software.

Pros:

Wix provides hundreds of templates for personal websites. Their templates provide a smooth and high-quality presentation when implementing photos and videos to your personal website design. Moreover, you can search their image library, which has free images to use on your personal website.

Cons:

One disadvantage you need to know about Wix is that once you pick a template for your personal site, you cannot change this later. Regarding pricing, a simple personal website does not need premium features compared to complex sites. The problem with their pricing is how they have pricing levels for storage, requiring you to need to pay more for more storage. Other website builders don’t have storage restrictions like this.

Squarespace

Squarespace is a website builder that allows anyone to create their own website and showcase their work. Here are some of its key features:

  • Custom color pallets
  • High-quality images from Unsplash
  • Flexible templates that can adapt on mobile devices.

Pros:

The Squarespace mobile app allows you to make changes to your website's pages, blog articles, and eCommerce features while on the road. Also, you can restore any posts or pages deleted within a month.

Cons:

Squarespace is not the fastest builder to develop a personal website mainly because it is not beginner-friendly. Another disadvantage is you are requested to save your work after each modification, but it doesn't save automatically.

Tips for Creating a Personal Website

💡 Include your contact information.

Without this, visitors won’t be able to reach you. You can either have a “contact” tab at the top or have all contact information details at the end of your personal homepage.

💡 Include an “About me” page.

Regardless of how amazing your personal website looks, employers will be interested to know you as an individual.

💡 Consider including your resume.

You can attach a PDF file so recruiters can take a closer look. Alternatively, if you want to incorporate an online resume for your personal site, you can create an interactive display of your career as viewers are navigating your personal website (refer to the personal website examples in the previous section).

💡 Frequently update your website.

The best personal websites are under constant check and undergo maintenance when necessary. Make sure your personal website is left out there with outdated content and information.

💡 Make your personal website user-friendly.

Rapid navigation, fast loading time, concise content, and well-structured use of visuals are some characteristics high-quality personal websites have. Be sure your website is easy to use and is compatible with mobile devices.

🔑 Key Takeaways:

To conclude all that you need to know about personal websites, here are the key takeaways:

  • Personal websites are used for job searching, as well as personal branding. They can be a personal portfolio website, an online resume, a simple blog, or a website aimed to brand yourself.
  • Personal websites can have many features and there are tons of ways to make it eye-catching and stand out from the rest, as shown with the examples provided for different fields.
  • There are many online personal website builders out there and it is important to try and see which one is a good fit. Outweighing their pros and cons can help you decide which website builder suits you.
  • Remember to make an “About Me” section, include your contact information, and try to make your personal website user-friendly to cast a good impression on viewers.

--- Originally written by Jose J. Rosales ---

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