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As a journalist, your work tells a story about your talents, your values, and your areas of expertise. But this work is also your calling card. It helps you both build a career and connect with potential clients.
Whether you’re a freelance journalist looking to expand your client base or an in-house journalist looking to build your professional brand, building a website is a crucial step to achieving these goals.
Reasons to have a website as a journalist
Journalists often pick up new assignments or clients because of work they’ve done in the past. Having a hub to display this work is crucial. An online journalism portfolio is also an opportunity to shape your professional story—you decide what work you highlight and how you speak about it.
For journalists, a website can serve multiple purposes.
Organize your portfolio in one place. Having a website allows you to organize your clips in one place and demonstrate the diversity of your talents. Multimedia journalists can also display their work more efficiently. For example, a website allows photojournalists to curate a gallery of their best work.
Create a permanent archive of your stories. Keeping an archive of your work gives you control over your output. Digital content is unpredictable. Search engine algorithms change frequently, which can bury your best work. Online articles can be erased if a publication redesigns their website or removes your byline with a content refresh.
Signal you’re open to work. A website makes it easy for prospective clients or employers to hire you. You can highlight that you’re available for assignments and specify the kind of work you’re looking for.
Demonstrate your niche(s). Maybe you specialize in a specific subject, like culture, healthcare, or politics, or have clips in several niches. A website allows you to show the breadth and depth of your professional experience.
Establish you as a subject matter expert. Having a website allows you to promote your expertise. Many journalists also start a blog or newsletter, both of which can be linked to your website.
Establish your brand. Your work is one part of your brand. By pairing this with a website tailored to your personality, you’re communicating your value system and what you’re like to work with.
Signal your professionalism. A smartly designed website conveys that you’re responsible and professional.
A website is even more essential for freelance journalists. You’re effectively running your own small business, so your website gives you an opportunity to think like an entrepreneur and market yourself to potential clients. If you’re looking for additional work, consider putting together a content strategy centered on your website. This could include launching an email newsletter or a blog, a social media campaign, or soliciting testimonials from past clients to reach potential publishers and underscore the quality of your work.
6 steps to make a website for a journalist
Journalist websites give you the ability to show off all of your skills while maintaining control over your work. The design of your website will depend on what clips you want to share. For example, someone who works in audio storytelling and print publications might create separate portfolio pages for those formats.
1. Determine your goals
Consider why you’re launching a website before you start building one. Your goals will dictate the content and feel of your website.
You might be establishing an online presence to generate more freelance work. If you’re in a full-time role, you might want to build your professional reputation to lay the foundation for future full-time opportunities or speaking engagements.
2. Get a domain
A domain name—the URL that people use to visit your website—is part of your brand. Journalists commonly register a domain featuring their byline, since it connects their website to their work and likeness. It’s also good for SEO to incorporate your professional name into your website. That ensures that when people search for your name, your website is one of the first results alongside your live pieces.
See an expert’s guide to SEO for portfolio websites
3. Determine the information you want to include
Before starting to design your website, decide what information you want to share with your audience. Your goals can help guide what you add and prioritize on the page. Common things include:
A slogan or tagline: Many website homepages have space to summarize yourself. For example, you might say, “I’m a longform journalist who tells deeply reported feature stories” or “I’m a multimedia journalist with a passion for audio storytelling.”
A brief biography: Include some of your most prominent clients, employers, and career milestones, as well as honors and awards you’ve received. People also often post or link to their resume on their website, particularly if they’re job hunting.
Photos: Writers often get professional headshots or other photos taken for their website to convey authority and personality.
Your work: Choose the pieces that illustrate your strengths and areas of expertise. If you want to do more work in a specific niche, highlight more of those pieces.
Your specialties: Determine what sets you apart as a journalist and emphasize that. This could be your writing or interviewing style, subject expertise, or specific work experience.
Preferred social media handles: If you maintain professional social media handles, make sure these are prominently displayed. These typically appear in a website’s header or footer and your contact page.
A call to action: Encourage prospective clients to reach out by including a persuasive call to action somewhere on the website. Common phrases include “Work with me” or “Get in touch” or “Email me.” This could be a decorative button or hyperlinked text.
A way to contact you: An editor or client should be able to get in touch with you easily if they’d like to connect. Point visitors to your email address or a contact form. Investigative journalists might offer a way to submit anonymous tips.
4. Choose portfolio pieces
Pick the work that shows off your strengths and aligns with your goals for starting a website. For example, if you’re looking to do more interviews, include some of your best conversations.
You can organize your content in different ways:
Type of content: Separate your work into categories, like longform writing, criticism, feature profiles, reviews, video interviews, and podcasts.
Publication: Some people opt to share their clips by the outlet or publication, especially if they’ve contributed multiple pieces to a few places.
Subject matter: For journalists with a niche, sorting by subject matter is a good way to affirm your experience with a topic.
People choose to link to their work in various ways. If you’re confident the online version won’t disappear, share the direct URL. Other options include pairing the link with a PDF copy or a link to the article on an archive site. If your work has appeared in a print magazine, you can also make a PDF and share a link to it. No matter what option you choose, making PDF copies of your articles for your own personal archive is a good idea.
5. Customize the website design
Your website is a chance to reinforce your professional brand. Choose a color palette, fonts, and layouts that convey your personality. Make sure the designs you choose are readable and clear.
Design your page layouts so that they naturally draw attention to what’s most important for a visitor to see. For example, a freelance journalist will want to focus on their portfolio pages, so the copy highlighting their niche and portfolio on the homepage would be bold and high on the page. Someone full-time in-house may want to bring attention to their bio or resume page and feature those links prominently on their homepage.
On a portfolio page, you might link to relevant pieces but add visual interest by highlighting related photos or awards.
6. Add pages
Your website homepage should contain enough information so anyone wondering what you’re about has information at a glance. However, adding pages gives you a chance to tell more of your professional story. Beyond a homepage, bio, and portfolio, what pages you need will depend on your goals.
If you offer journalism-adjacent services, like editing or editorial consulting, you might add another page outlining these options. Other writers might have books to share or promote. Many journalists also provide marketing services, which can be discussed on a separate page.
If you put together a separate page for contact info, consider including an email address rather than simply a contact form. Although the latter offers more privacy, an email feels more direct and gives the sender confidence the message will get to you. You can create a public-facing email that you only use on your website if privacy is a concern.
4 journalist website examples
It’s helpful to have reference points when starting a website. Below are four Squarespace templates designed for different uses that could apply to a journalist. Use them as a starting point or as inspiration for a customized Blueprint AI design. We also recommend looking at other journalist and writer websites to get an idea of what excites or interests you in others’ designs.
See our favorite portfolio website designs
1. Myhra
The minimalist design allows you to summarize what kind of work you do in a succinct way. On the homepage, there’s space to include a slogan, your services, what differentiates your work, and a short bio. A line of photos adds a pleasing visual element that breaks up the text and gives the site some color. At the top of the homepage, the menu also gives you a chance to display multiple pages and reinforce your services.
2. Carroll
Another excellent example of minimalist design, this template is akin to sharing highlights of your resume. The text-only design forces you to zero in on your strengths and best work—and makes getting your site online quick and simple. This template is a good option for someone who does project work and is looking for more clients, especially since the contact and social media accounts are prominent.
3. Suhama
Suhama’s design centers the work you do and allows you to tell your professional story in a concise way. The structure of the website lets you share biographical info, define what work you’re looking for, and underscore your talents by sharing previous work. This website uses varied font sizes and a simple (but bright) color to convey personality.
4. Adri
Adri is a good design template for journalists who provide a variety of services. The design is set up to make it easy for clients to work with you, as the link to sign up for an introductory session and newsletter are prominent. Adri also emphasizes results via the use of testimonials and a place to emphasize the impact you’ve had. Alternating between photos and text, with a soft color palette, also shows off your personality.