Whether you’re fresh out of college or you’re looking to switch careers, job hunting is a daunting task that requires your full attention. You expect to spend countless hours pouring over job portals, social media platforms and local job openings, crafting that winning cover letter and making sure your resume contains everything that you’ve ever done that screams “I’m qualified for the role!”. If you want to take your job hunt on a whole new level, however, building resume websites can give you a leg up to land the job you’ve been dreaming of.
But what exactly do you put on your online resume? Here are a few ideas to get you started.
1. Start with your elevator pitch
When you look at the best resume website examples, you’ll find that they have one thing in common: they have an opening pitch that got you to stick around to read more of their content. This is your elevator pitch.
Tell visitors right off the bat who you are, what you do and what your website is about. Ideally, you want to add this pitch on your homepage or the top section of the resume website templates that you chose. Keep it brief and to the point - ideally about 2-3 short paragraphs will suffice. Give your visitors an overview of what you can do and the type of projects you’ve done in the past.
2. Do not put your entire life story
As interesting your life might be, your autobiography has no place in a resume web template. Keep your About Me page or section short and sweet. Headhunters and hiring managers are not likely to spend a lot of time on every free resume website they review. One or two well-crafted paragraphs should be enough for this section of your online CV.
3. Add your best work samples
It’s not enough that you state you’re good at something. Hiring managers want to know how good you are by looking at the things you have worked on in the past. These are a testament to your workmanship and the quality of output that you can produce if they decide to hire you. Using the Strikingly resume building website, add a section showing a gallery of latest and best work. You can also display active links to online pages that you have worked on before if you’re in the copywriting or web design industry.
4. Do not add every single project you have worked on
When you create a resume website, treat it as a curated gallery of your best projects and not your computer hard drive. Don’t dump every type of work you’ve done in the past because your visitors will likely feel overwhelmed at the volume of content they have to go through. There’s a very good chance that they will not spend some time browsing through every entry anyway.
5. Link your resume website to your social media pages
When you look at resume websites examples, you’ll also find that most of them link their social media profiles to their pages. Your online resume is actually the best way to bring all your professional social media pages together. You can also link to any other page or website that you have contributed to in the past.
6. Don’t add links that are totally unrelated to your profession
Your personal website is a good way to bring together all your professional pages. Adding them to your page gives your potential employer an overview of your web presence and your online image. Do not add outdated blogs or that Pinterest account that may not have anything to do with your industry.
