Are you a young student looking for a studio? Are you an architect looking for new clients? Are you a designer who wants to showcase your skills? Are you attracted by web and communication? If you find yourself in one of these questions… This post is for you! Here we will discuss toghether the opportuity that offers the web to make a great personal branding for architects.
The most important thing, for sure, is knowing how to do your job well. But, in a highly competitive market as the Italian one is in the construction industry, it is becoming increasingly important how you present yourself. In the same way, we all know very well that it matters a lot how you present boards in competitions.
To impress friends, acquaintances and potential customers, the communication can also help to increase your authority on the web, that it is a further guarantee that does not hurt.
If you’re thinking that you do not have time to engage in these things, don’t be afraid, below there are few steps that you can afford to carry on one by one. And they are all very easy to be implemented.
You do not need each one of them in fact, some are definitely more suitable than others and you should start from those.
Personal branding can not be built in a week, and your reputation as an architect will need time, commitment and effort. During this period, never forget that the most important thing is your real network!
The importance of personal branding in finding a job or clients
More and more often, architecture studies, human resources managers and (above all) potential clients, monitor the candidates on the web before receiving them in front of their desk. You must surprise them from the first moment, so to let them know from the beginning that you’re the right person they are looking for. In addition to the portfolio – which must be absolutely flawless and amazing – that will be stored in a folder or on a desk alongside with all the others, you can bring forward your “branding” strategy in these new fields.
Here I will give you some advice on how to make the most of some online tools and platforms to promote yourself as an architect and reach people who normally would be very difficult to achieve.
And remember, once you have done with this, don’t forget to visit the post on “How to earn money as a freelance architect or designer”
Behance is the platform for the creatives. If you love art, illustrations, photography and conceptual works of any kind, then you will lose a lot of time here. Architects or designers can use this platform primarily for inspiration – thanks to efficient filtering options, you can find many interesting topics – but also to upload their projects and their works.
Surely the specific value of Behance is much greater for a designer or a graphic designer compared to what is for an architect, but everyone can find new networks of people and many sources.
Moreover, even in this case, as in Linkedin, you can create a profile with your own work experience and useful links. Behance has also a tool to create directly your site-portfolio, in this case you should already have a lot material to upload.
To find a job or to gain authority, you must first be good at what you do, whether you are an aspiring or an affirmed designer. What you will need to have is a beautiful portfolio, full of wonderful contents. We are of course speaking about projects. Unfortunately, we do not always have a lot of projects to be submitted, especially those who are just done with university. But you should at least introduce them well.
If you have not created your portfolio yet, then do not waste more time here, disconnect internet, turn off the phone and begin to create it! It is fundamental for your personal branding.
Issuu is the platform that allows to upload your portfolio, with a weight up to 45 MB. The only action you need to do is to create a free account. In exchange, you will get a very accurate presentation that will make your portfolio easy to read, as a book, sendable through a simple link.
This eliminates the need to send email attachments with a limit of 10 MB etc etc. Just a link – and it also makes a good impression.
To make it short, 500px is the Instagram for professionals. Here you can also sell your own pictures. Essentially. If you are passionate about photography, it is right to show to the whole world the fruit of your passions, your travels and your research. Being part of a network of this kind, and maybe also having a good number of followers, is definitely a point in your favor.
More and more work proposals come today from this social network founded in 2003. Especially abroad, but in Italy also it is getting better.
From the point of view of an architect what you have to do on this platform is simple. You have to show your own portfolio in the easiest way possible – by directly uploading the pdf file or by pasting the link to a platform like Issuu – and put all the links in the section dedicated to self promotion. So that anyone visiting our profile is free to navigate through the pages you have.
To get noticed, it is a must to insert appropriate skills. Do not be vague, but be very specific. Insert one or two is a pity, make sure you let people know well what you can do. To be clear: putting CAD among your skills will hardly bring many benefits to you. While putting Revit, Rhino, Autocad and sustainable design could attract more interest.
For everything else it works in the same way as for the other users: put a brief description that presents yourself, your interests and connect to other people, better if part of an active group.
The slogan says it all. For young graduates looking for a job, this is definitely not the solution. But if you are already minimally successful and want to upgrade your network it is ok.
You can provide a lot of information and introduce yourself in great detail. You are free to upload your projects and interact with those of other architects around the world. Archistars and all your idols included.
The section dedicated to the stories is really interesting. That is a place where you can tell stories, adventures and more. Everything related to the design world.
Google+ is much more than a social network. It is ‘the social network’ of the most popular search engine in the world. Many experts say that Gooogle is focusing on the authority of the people for its rankings – This means that if you have a blog, you will have more opportunities to be “rewarded” with the top positions if you are an influential author. This rule can be applied to all other fields. Even if you have a blog, you should cultivate your position on Google+ because one day it will definitely be useful.
Besides these technicalities is also useful because of the communities – a series of groups divided by interests and areas where you can sign up and grow your networks. A bit like Linkedin.
This page contains a lot of things to make in the right way personal branding for architects. And you will quickly notice it when you discover how can be useful these mock-up files. They will take you away definitely a long time if you’re like me. The mock-ups are nothing else but .psd files that graphic designers provide at a very low price or even for free, to do wonderful things. What are they? If by chance you have your own website or your own Behance page or just want to advertise with image communication, here it is that Photoshop smartobjects comes to your rescue.
In this way you will surprise customers with minimal effort. To better understand what it is click here, or watch some more examples on graphic river.
Create your own Website
If all these platforms are not enough, but you also want to express your own opinion, here there are three tools that suit you: WordPress, Blogger and Tumblr.
These are platforms to easily create websites accessible for everyone. WordPress requires many hours of study and a fair dose of knowledge of the field, while a tumblr or a blogger account, especially tumblr, may be open in a few minutes.
Making an online magazine / blog is a spontaneous choice that comes for some needs. Personally I opened Archiobjects to create a place to push me studying and traveling more and more.
The reasons to open a site can be a lot, as can be multiple the purposes. With WordPress you can create real professional websites that present your study or your portfolio to attract compliments and customers for example.
Use Social Media for Architecture
Social media are a powerful tool for everyone. They can be used as a waste of time by scrolling and scrolling your home feed, or they can be channeled to the service of your personal branding and your authority on the web.
The ways in which an architect can promote himself on the web through social media are many, and I’ll explain them in the guide that I am preparing: Social media for Architects and Designers. “So come back to visit Archiobjects!
If you have any question, I will be happy to answer you. And if you liked the post share it! I would be extremely grateful!
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8 Responses
This is great. Although you are talking with respect to Architects and Designers, what we’re essentially talking about here is the need to examine one’s own personal brand. We actually look at the importance of personal branding and give advice on how to approach designing a killer personal brand. Our approach is not specific to any one field and therefore a Designer or Architect would be able to take your very specific advice and combine it with our more general approach to design a branding plan relevant to their needs. The key is really to approach personal branding with a plan! We hope this will be of help to your fellow readers.
Your advise here about ISSUU is ‘spot-on’ for me. This is great.
Thanks you !
Thanks to you Gareth! I’m glad you appreciate it