5 Fatal portfolio mistakes and 1 thing that fixes all of them
There’s a power lever MOST people are ignoring when it comes to building their portfolios. Ignoring it leads to 5 fatal mistakes. But once you know about it, it organically fixes all of them AND your portfolio starts being the opportunity magnet it should be.
One of the guiding principles of copywriting is putting yourself in your audience’s shoes. When you’re brand new with little or no experience, the BEST place to put this into practice is your own portfolio.
When talking about your portfolio, your audience is made up of:
Recruiters
Clients
Hiring managers
We’re going to call these people your “target persona.” It’s through this persona’s eyes that you’re going to filter every decision you make for your portfolio…
What to include in your portfolio
How you’re going to frame things
What additional elements besides samples, if any, you’ll include
This is an exercise in audience research and empathy… I like to start by getting to know my audience’s agenda, common frustrations, and the main pain point they are trying to solve. Once I know these things, I can curate everything to address those concerns.
What your target persona is doing/thinking/feeling…
Filtering through dozens or hundreds of not-so-great candidates
Maybe have spent months or even years trying to find a talented writer
Even if they find a qualified writer, does that writer “get” them and their brand, product, or mission?
Think about this for a minute. What emotions are they experiencing? Emotions can run the gamut making your audience…
Exhausted
Desperate
Jaded
Hopeful
Motivated
Energized
When I think about this range of emotions and their challenges with finding a qualified writer who “gets” them, who can execute projects… Now I know I need to:
Be clear in what I can do (content types, skills)
Demonstrate technical expertise (formatting, grammar, style)
Show I have a point of view as a writer (Explain my process or approach to writing)
Storytelling (Hooks, headlines, calls to action, and content)
Remove risk (good quality samples, testimonials, client feedback, colleague shoutouts, etc.)
This is your mindset going into your portfolio build. This point of view will help you tell a succinct yet powerful story through your portfolio, checking all the boxes for your most ideal clients and companies.
With this in mind, let’s address the 5 fatal portfolio mistakes writers are making right now.
1. Too many samples
Too many samples will overwhelm your reader. They won’t know which is the best one to review. Seeing too many might even trigger decision fatigue that will have them clicking away from your portfolio, never to return.
Portfolios should NEVER be everything you ever wrote (unless you only have a handful). Instead, you should think about how to curate your samples. Include just enough to prove your point (you are a great blog writer, for example) and nothing more that could confuse the reader or lead the reader down a bunny trail.
👉Select a few samples that demonstrate your expertise in any particular content type, based on your career goal.
2. No focus or message
Your portfolio should tell a story… Of you, your skills, and what kind of content you write. But when you only have a bunch of random links and no organization, it becomes difficult for anyone else to understand exactly who you are and what you can do for them.
Messaging is…the curated story you tell your audience.
Here are some questions you can ask yourself that will help you figure out what message you want your reader to walk away with…
Are you a specialist in a certain kind of writing/do you want to be? Or are you a generalist?
What content do you definitely not want to write?
Do you have experience or insights in a certain industry?
Do you have special interests that influence what sort of companies you want to write for?
Are there social or environmental movements you want to support with your words?
What is unique about you or your background that makes you a good writer?
👉 Once you start exploring what you really want to accomplish with your writing and the type of writing you want to do, three things happen around your messaging:
Create a powerful writer profile
Select appropriate writing samples that align with your talent and goals
Identify samples that do not belong in your portfolio
3. No context / why should we care?
Without context, your content is worthless.
Think about sharing your work from the target persona’s point of view… They don’t know who you are. They aren’t familiar with your professional history. They have no idea what part you played in the sample they’re seeing… And they have no idea if what they’re looking at is any good.
You cannot leave your value up to interpretation. Literally spell it out.
👉 Start with a project description or brief. You can explain everything your audience needs to know by including a project brief. You can get very detailed or use a simplified version.
Here’s the simplified version:
Challenge/Goal
Solution/Plan
Outcome
And you can build an even stronger case for your ability and approach by creating a more detailed description. You can explain the company’s goal to overcome a particular challenge or implement its content calendar. You can explain whatever the plan was to solve the problem and your role in the sample you’re sharing.
This style is best if you need to do a little bit more credibility-building and prove your skill. It tells the story from the company’s perspective and the skills you leveraged to create the content.
This is where you can explain WHY someone should care that you wrote a 750-word blog with the keyword “macronutrients.” It’s because you were helping a fitness company rank on Google with SEO.
See? Relevant context that matters to the reader.
Here’s the detailed version:
The company name
Their industry
The problem they faced
The plan to solve it
Your role in the solution
Results, if you have them
4. Nothing to differentiate you
When pitching or applying for jobs, you are one person in a sea of applicants. Think about how you are going to:
Stand out
Magnetize great clients and opportunities
👉 To do this, you need to blend your technical skills with what makes you unique. This is where lots of people get stuck, so I want to give you a few ideas to figure out what makes you unique and frame it so great clients and companies will self-select you as their ideal writer.
This applies to that writer's biography we chatted about. But it also goes just one layer deeper.
You can add other differentiators like:
Your signature process or unique approach
Earned media (like an article published in a magazine or interview)
Podcasts, guest spots
Community or non-profit involvement
Case study of a great client win or experience
Testimonials, shout outs
5. Broken links
Nothing breaks trust faster than a broken link. A recruiter is interested enough to actually READ your content, they click on that link, aaaand it leads to a broken link.
There are two things to ensure this never happens to you.
Don’t share live links from websites you don’t own.
If you have content that’s been published on a website, you might want to share that direct link. DO NOT do that. You don’t own that site. That content can be changed at any point, which means it doesn’t reflect your style or best work anymore. It also can be deleted.
👉 Instead, take a screenshot of your content to share in your portfolio and link to the original Google Document YOU own.
Make sure your permissions are set to “Anyone with the link > Can view.”
2. Include clips of your content directly in your portfolio so if there IS an issue with the link, the reader can still read a sample of your work.
Create your portfolio
If you want to put these ideas into action, I recommend you check out my Copywriter Portfolio Start Kit.
Not only will it guide you step by step through creating a professional-grade portfolio in Google Drive, but it will also help you show off your best qualities and help you differentiate yourself from every other writer out there.
The Portfolio Dashboard, a short document you’ll use as your portfolio, houses your content samples alongside your
Writer bio with a prompt
Sections for a case study
Client or peer testimonials
And more.