When a job opportunity knocks, it can be difficult to prove you’re the one to hire. A one-page resume and a carefully crafted cover letter are important, but they can only go so far to help you get noticed. But hey, you have tech skills. You’re learning Salesforce skills every day. It’s time to create your own website and showcase a your professional portfolio of projects, resume, demo videos, and much more. Keep reading to learn how and why you should consider building an online portfolio of your Salesforce skills on the Salesforce platform.
With Trailhead, Salesforce’s free online learning platform, you can learn the skills needed to reskill at your current company or start a new career. Trailhead allows you to get hands-on with Salesforce tools for free. You’ll learn through guided lessons, test your knowledge, and practice with the same exact technology you’ll use on the job.
Build your own online portfolio of Salesforce skills
Create a public website to showcase your accomplishments, personality, and technical ability.
What is an online portfolio of Salesforce Skills?
Portfolios aren’t just for artists, students, or job seekers. Today everyone can and should have an online portfolio sharing their work. It’s always smart to keep a running file of your greatest accomplishments so they’re on hand if needed for performance reviews, promotion conversations, and simply keeping track of your wins.
Make it easy for teammates, leadership at your company, potential employers, collaborators, and clients to view a cohesive portfolio for your body of work. Your portfolio can showcase whatever you would like it to but some basic features could include:
- Tell your story with an “About Me” page
- Display your resume or CV
- Links to your Trailblazer and relevant social media profiles
- Embed demo videos showing your comfort with xyz skill
- Display accomplishments and document outcomes
- Share specific custom applications you’ve built
- Colleague endorsements, client feedback
- Personal interests and volunteer projects
- Let visitors get in touch through a “Contact Me” page
Show off your technical skills
Before Abdul Sultani got his first Salesforce job, he found that everyone wanted to hire someone with experience. But as the cliche goes, “how can I gain experience if no one will hire me without experience?” He decided to create his own opportunity. As Abdul earned Salesforce credentials and studied on Trailhead, he built his own online portfolio website. “My portfolio allowed me to demonstrate my technical expertise at a time when I didn’t have any Salesforce experience on my resume.”
Karen Engstrom, talent acquisition manager at Salesforce consulting firm CodeScience, says she’s a “unicorn hunter,” looking for people who have just the right skill set to work well at her company full of creative self-starters.
Cate Robbie, director of human resources at Salesforce Partner NuAge Experts, concurs that “Actions speak louder than words…the right portfolio will give me visibility into someone’s strengths and technical skills that are transferable to Salesforce.”
And you can demonstrate more than just Salesforce technical skills. Developers of all stripes can showcase their relevant work. Cate notes, “Out of our entire development team, so far, only two people have joined us with previous Salesforce experience. With online portfolios, developers new to Salesforce were able to show us their transferable skills and successfully demonstrated their passion for learning Salesforce.”
Additionally, just building an online portfolio can demonstrate that you have the following Salesforce skills:
- Data Modeling and Architecture
- User Interface Design
- Experience Cloud Site Building
- Access and Visibility Planning & Architecture
Demonstrate you’re ahead of the curve
As your AI knowledge base grows, there are so many ways to demonstrate that you’re staying ahead of the curve. You can get certified in AI and use your online portfolio to show what you’ve built with Einstein. You can show off that you know how to organize data, create prompts with Prompt Builder and connect flows to automate your processes.
Get innovative and creative
Salesforce professional Jessica Mills shares, “Building a portfolio lets you have fun and unleash your creativity and out-of-the-box thinking. It helps you showcase your unique perspective.”
Jessica believes that organizations favor hiring those who enjoy learning new things and demonstrate a different viewpoint. As a certified Salesforce Platform App Builder, Administrator, and Advanced Administrator, Jessica used her online portfolio during her job search to showcase her love of learning and passion for creativity and storytelling.
On her site, she shared important accomplishments and work, including web design projects and Salesforce certifications.
Jessica included a link to her online portfolio at the top of her resume so recruiters could check it out. And check it out they did. Jessica is now an implementation specialist at Fast Slow Motion having landed her first Salesforce job using her portfolio.
Salesforce Administrator Abdul Sultani also uses innovative thinking to stand out. He used Salesforce to keep a record of his career opportunities while he was searching for jobs and shared it on his resume website.
And, during his time at Climb Hire, an organization that prepares working adults to be Salesforce Administrators, members of his cohort, known as Climbers, specifically requested that he work with them to build their own portfolios because they were so impressed with his.
“When I created my portfolio and presented it in class, everyone was like, ‘Whoa, Abdul, this is really cool’ […] and so I held my own Zoom meeting, invited them all, and I showed them how to create their own.”
Highlight your values
Highlighting your volunteer work alongside your online portfolio of Salesforce skills gives potential employers and recruiters a sense of who you are and what’s important to you.
Jessica from Fast Slow Motion concurs and combines her work as a volunteer with her Salesforce experience. “Giving back to my community is one of the core values on my portfolio site.”
She explains, “I am currently volunteering as a Salesforce Admin for the Rocky Mountain Youth Leadership Conference. I helped the local volunteer coordinator at the National Alliance on Mental Illness learn how to use Salesforce and navigate the new Salesforce Community.”
Ready to stand out?
Building an online portfolio helps you show off your technical skills, get creative and innovative, and highlight what you care about. Your online portfolio belongs to you. It’s always available to update and it can grow with you as you learn new Salesforce skills.
Now you’re ready to get started building your own online portfolio of Salesforce skills.
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