Portfol.io is a social media for young professionals and students to easily create portfolios of their work to share with friends and colleagues. When creating this prototype, I felt that there wasn’t a perfect social media yet for sharing your professional, academic, or creative work with others. Social media platforms like LinkedIn exist for networking, but they really aren’t conducive to sharing work.

I designed this app because I’m always interested in the projects my friends, classmates, and peers are working on, and I don’t feel there is an easy way to follow their creative lives. People often have blogs and portfolios on all kinds of different websites, but it would be useful to have a simple, consolidated place to view others’ portfolios in a more social media oriented context.

This high-fidelity prototype was built using Adobe Illustrator and InVision.

Research + Design

The design of portfol.io was heavily based on extensive research and user testing.

User Research

Initially, I imagined this app could be intended generally for all college students. One of the main findings of my research was that this social media platform should probably have a more limited audience than just “college students.” People in areas of study such as economics or education did not really feel that they needed a portfolio service.

I also found that many people in design-related fields felt that it was difficult to create a portfolio or thought it was too much work. For two people, this is what prevented them from creating one at all.

When asking questions about existing professional social media platforms, I found that 6 of 8 used LinkedIn primarily. They enjoyed its networking features, and liked its ability to help connect them with potential employers. This meant that my social media platform could benefit from an emphasis on networking and employment.

7 of 8 said they would like to be able to stay updated on the creative and professional projects of their friends, which st

I also found that the majority of people would like to keep their professional materials more organized than they currently do (resumes, cover letters, etc.). They said they would like a minimal and easy to navigate design.

User Testing

The layout of portfol.io was heavily influenced by user interviews and tests to help work out issues in the ease of use of the app. This resulted in an app that was simple and intuitive to interact with.

Design

Through various phases of low-fi and high-fi prototyping and wireframing informed by user test results, I created the concept, layout, and design for portfol.io.

Prototype: https://projects.invisionapp.com/share/53PHXIZQPCE#/screens