Leaving a Digital Footprint

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Choosing an Online Platform

So our assignment for the final in Digital Communications is to create a personal website where I can display my resume, my digital portfolio, and any other pertinent information. There are many websites where these can be created such as Wix or Weebly. Those were the two that I chose to explore when beginning my site, and both have advantages and disdavantages. Both had a video that popped up and explained the basics on how to utilize their sites, a brief tutorial.

Wix: 

• More of a foundation/layout set-up prior to building your site; there's more go off of
• More difficulty editing the text
• Harder to see the connections between pages

Weebly:

• Less structure to the initial site; requires more vision but allows for more freedom
• Easier to edit specific functions
• Easier to visual the pathway that pages are connected with
• Advertise that search engines find your site easily

I ended up choosing Wix to begin with simply because I felt like I needed more structure as I create my first website, but having search engines easily find my site made Weebly very appealing as well. However, this may change as I play around with both sites. I showed the list of possible websites to my biology Research and Analysis teacher, and when he read the website title, Moon Fruit, he laughed and said he'd stay from that one because it didn't sound professional. This is one reason why I chose not to explore this platform in depth.

Strategy

My strategy when creating this website is to help leave a digital footprint for myself so that I begin to brand myself online. In a Wall Street Journal article written last year, branding yourself was listed as the second most important skill needed when getting a job. Beyond this, I would be interested in using this to boost my applications to medical school and showing them that I have a wide-range of skills and am a well-rounded student. I would also be interested in an internship in either the sciences or communications studies departments. Research is always a job that I would be interested in. Ultimately, a long way down the road, I would love if future employers were able to find me on the Internet and see who I am and what I can offer. 

My audience is any future employers or medical school admissions administrators. I imagine that when they get to my site, the most important need would be to have easy access to my contact information. Behind that, they would need an introduction to who I am, what my goals are, and the purpose of my site. So I want to make sure that all of that is accessible on my homepage of the site. It would be important to include that I am a student and where I go to school as well. 

Scope

On this website, I would like to include a digital portfolio of everything I've created in Digital Communications as well as my resume. Other potential additions I can make would be photos from my trip to Nicaragua over last spring break because it was a medical mission trip. I think these photos would show my love for medicine, service, and travel. Another option would be to show photos from my study abroad trip to Belize. I'm not sure if that plays to my audience as well as I would like, but it could show that I'm well-rounded and love to learn about anything. There a special focus on learning about the people and the culture so that might help! Finally, when my project/paper is complete, I may put up my senior research paper and conference poster to show the work that I've done. My professor will be writing a paper as well with my name on it, so that will also be an option to show my work in the scientific field. But those won't be ready until at least next semester.

I definitely want to maximize the way that people can get in touch with me so I will have a contact form as well as social media widgets. My email address and phone number will be available as well. 

Design Inspiration
From online, there are lots of places to find inspiration! Here's a few of mine based on screenshots from these websites.

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Okay, so this inspired me because on the homepage of this website, the message for the purpose of the sight is clear, concise, and simple. I want my purpose and intent to be clear to user when they visit my site.

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The style of this site inspired me because it looks professional but at the same time is all rigid lines like a lot of corporate websites are. I think that this is tough to do because there must be a balance so that the site doesn't look to childish.

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This site inspired me because it's homepage was different. You can't tell from the screenshot, but the photographs change. This is a photographer's site so from the start I get to see his work and what he does. I might try to mirror this if I can.

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I was inspired by the colors of the buttons because it makes them obvious and stand out. I also liked the shape of the buttons because they actually look like buttons. I'm all about keeping it simple and intuitive.

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Finally, this website provided creative ways to present your information that wasn't necessarily a rectangular style. I think this makes the websites stand out if done correctly. However, I want to be careful with this because it can also make the website not as intuitive and throw users off simply because the information is structured differently.