Web Designer Resume

You’ve decided to pursue a career in web design, but how do you stand out from the competition to potential employers? You know you’ve got the skills you need to do an amazing job, but now you need to prove that to a recruiter.

In this article, we’re going to discuss exactly what you need to do to write a resume that’ll ultimately land you a job you’ll love. We’re going to talk about what companies expect from you, and describe step by step how to write a resume that’ll grab their attention.

What Does A Web Designer Do?

Web designers design web pages and applications. As a web designer, you need to create well-designed and user-friendly solutions. You should be able to create a website that reflects a company’s personality and goals.

When you look at a website, a lot of aspects that go into the website aren’t obvious at first glance. Web designers are responsible for choosing the colors, fonts, images, and other interactive elements.

A web designer has to think strategically to make the site functional and aesthetically pleasing. You need to consider who the target audience is. For example, a professional site for IT solutions or e-commerce needs to be practical. On the other hand, a children’s site needs a different style than that of an e-commerce or IT site.

You should know how the users will interact with a particular website. You’ll optimize user flow by creating a customer journey map, and finally, oversee the entire layout of the site.

What Skills Does A Recruiter Look for in A Web Designer?

Unlike classic visual design, web designers focus on digital products: the types of designs that entice users to click or read more. You need to have knowledge of design concepts and how to incorporate them into your work. These concepts include, but are not limited to, color theory, typography, and proportions.

User experience (UX) design is a specialized role in itself. But even if UX design isn’t your specialty, web designers need to have some understanding of UX. UX is the process of creating a pleasant user experience. Users have to be able to easily navigate the site. So recruiters want to know that you can make use of user personas to understand the customer's perspective. They want to know that you can create designs that cater to your target audience. Even if there’s a UX designer on the team, you’ll have overlapping tasks, so UX fundamentals are important to understand.

Recruiters also want to make sure you know how to use website design tools. Although there are countless design tools, there are some common software programs used by most companies. Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator are the most popular. Adobe products require paid subscriptions, so if you’re starting out, you can use free alternatives that perform functions similar to Adobe products.

Along with all these skills, recruiters sometimes expect you to know how to code. Specifically, you need to know HyperText Markup Language (HTML), Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), and JavaScript.

Using HTML, you can give structure to the content of a web page. This means you can build in headings, paragraph breaks, images, and many other elements. CSS lets you format the page and make it more visually appealing with colors, fonts, and more. JavaScript is a scripting language that you can use to design interactive elements and automate functions.

In addition to technical skills and knowledge, recruiters look for soft skills too. Some of the soft skills you need as a web designer are:

• Communication: Web designers have to collaborate with other teams and clients. They attend meetings and share the progress of their work. As a web designer, you also need to have presentation skills in order to convey your ideas clearly.
• Business Knowledge: You’ll need to understand the company’s goals along with the end-users’ requirements. You don’t necessarily need an MBA for this. It’ll be enough to have a basic understanding of business concepts so you can communicate with stakeholders.
• Time Management and Organization: You may find yourself working on different sections of a project or in different projects altogether. To keep your tasks in line, you need to be able to prioritize them. This will help you maximize your productivity and complete your tasks within deadlines. Many companies use task management tools, like Jira, to delegate responsibilities and track the progress of various teams.

Now that you understand what skills recruiters are looking for, it’s time to dig into the nuts and bolts of the resume-building process.

How to Write A Web Designer Resume

Most recruiters get hundreds of applications on any given day. So how do you make your resume stand out?

Here are the key sections and relevant points to keep in mind while you write your resume.

• Contact Information: In this section, you should include your name, email address, and phone number. Add a link to your LinkedIn profile and portfolio to help you stand out.
• Resume Objective Or Profile: Here, you can write 2-3 lines about your goals and skills as a web designer. If you don’t have any formal experience, focus on your skills. It may not be possible for you to pin down a suitable summary at the start. A good tip is to write this section after completing the rest of the resume to hone in on which points you should include.
  
  An example of a summary would be:
  ‘A passionate and creative web design graduate aiming to use my eye for design and love for user experience to help increase conversion rates of CompanyABC. Aspiring to build an interactive, high-quality website to showcase the professional yet friendly personality of CompanyABC to users.’
• Experience: Mention your work history, including your past responsibilities in those roles as well as your achievements. If you’re just starting out, instead of work experience you can reference projects from school, internships, or projects you’ve done in your spare time.
• Education: For entry-level applications, the education section is just as important as the other sections. You can highlight your strengths here. Mention your school’s name, location, and the course you pursued. Then highlight the skills you obtained from  your courses.
• Skills: Although you should include skills you’ve learned throughout the various other sections, there should also be a skills section. Create a list of your soft and hard skills using bullet points; this will make the recruiter’s job much easier and increase your chances of standing out.
  
  Additionally, you should show how you used these skills to get results. Use the job description to see what skills they’re looking for. If you have those skills, make sure to highlight them. They will act as keywords for your resume which will also help get you through any recruitment software.
  
  After these sections, you can add some additional sections like awards achieved and participation in relevant activities or competitions. Don’t leave any important information for the final sections.
  
  There’s no set-in-stone rule for the length of a resume, but recruiters expect your resume to be only 1-2 pages long.

Next Step: The Cover Letter

It’s important that you always include a cover letter with your resume. Your cover letter gives you the chance to convince an employer that you’re the right fit for the role. If your cover letter catches their attention, they’ll move onto your resume.

As a designer, you probably already know this, but it bears repeating. For both the resume and the cover letter, make sure your fonts and formatting are consistent. The fonts you use need to be easy to read. Proofread both docs one more time, and finally, convert them into PDF to preserve your masterpiece.

Get Ready for Your Web Design Interview

Web design is a fun mix of artistry and technology. As a web designer, you get the opportunity to channel your creativity and develop quality websites and apps. It’s a rewarding career, and the demand for web designers keeps growing.

If you’d like more help and guidance to launch your career as a web designer, our team is here to support you.