Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links. Purchasing a product through one of these links generates a commission for us at no additional expense to you.
“Follow the plan outlined here and you can create your own website from scratch without writing any code for less than $300.”
Need help standing out as a top job candidate?
Building a resume website is a great way to do that.
With your own website, you can up your professional profile in a number of ways. For instance, you can:
- Add a downloadable PDF of your resume
- Display your full resume on site
- Include image galleries covering previous work
- Link to projects you’ve completed
Simply having a website will show employers you have initiative, but the interactive nature of your site will make it even better than a plain resume.
Of course, your website should also have download buttons for your standard resume as companies will need this too.
I’m sure you’re excited to get started, so let’s take a look at the steps required now.
How to build a resume site
Getting a site online is so much easier than it used to be.
It just takes a few steps to make your resume website:
- Choose a domain name
- Signup for hosting
- Install a resume theme
- Customize your website
- Share it with the world
In order to have a website at all, the very first thing you need is a domain name.
Get a domain name
For many website owners, it’s not clear what their domain should be. For a resume website, it’s a bit more obvious.
Your website’s address should be your full name followed by “.com”
Now, if you have a common name, this might be more diffult. The best way to find an available domain is to simply add some variation, so you can still score a .com. Here are a few ideas:
- Try both the short and full version of your first name
- Add your full middle name
- Use only your middle initial
- Use your middle and last name as initials
There are a few other possible combinations, but that will get you started. You can also add another term to the beginning of the domain name like “iamjohndoe.com” for instance.
If you head over to Namecheap and click on the “Beast Mode” link in the search bar, you can check the availability of dozens of domain names all at once.
That will save you a lot of time. You can generate a full list of all the variations and then you can check them together at once.
If you want some more tips for finding a good domain main then take a look at this guide:
How to Find a Great Available Domain Name
Once you’ve found an available domain, hold off on buying it until you finish this next step.
Signup for hosting
Every website needs hosting to run
With your domain picked out, you have a web address for people to visit. The next thing you need is a way to host your website so that it actually loads.
There are thousands of web hosts to choose from, but for someone setting up their first WordPress website, Nexcess is an excellent choice.
Nexcess is easy to use, and they automatically create a WordPress website for you when you signup.
This means you don’t have to install WordPress or carry out any technical steps on your own. Nexcess also handles a lot of site management work for you, like plugin updates and daily site backups.
It makes things a lot easier for beginners or anyone who’d rather not deal with boring site administration work.
With your new website ready to go, you can move on to the fun steps.
Install a WordPress theme
For most websites, you should spend a while outlining your content before you worry about the design, but this site is a bit different.
A resume website can have a blog and lots of pages, but normally, it’s a one-page website. Since the content is so simple and the layout is so integral to the content, it’s just easier to pick out a theme first.
My first recommendation for your site is the Unique theme.
This theme has a totally custom design made specifically for resumes. It does a great job of presenting you as a professional, and the design is just gorgeous.
There’s a demo importer which lets you setup your site just like the screenshot above. Then you can customize everything from the colors to the layout. There’s even a drag-and-drop page builder included which lets you completely alter the layout of any page template.
Overall, I think you’ll find it an attractive and customizable design for your resume website.
While Unique is an awesome theme, it’s of course not the only option. You can find more beautiful resume WordPress themes in this collection:
Once you’ve picked out a theme, you’re ready to really start customizing.
Customize your website
Start with the basics.
WordPress has a “Live Customizer” where you can make changes and watch a preview as you work. This video will walk you through the basics of using the Customizer.
With the Customizer, you can change all sorts of design aspects on your site. The site title, logo, tagline, menus, and widgets can all be customized from here.
If your theme includes a page builder, you’ll find additional customization options in the admin dashboard as well.
This guide can help you get started with customizing your website:
Beginner Site Customization with WordPress
When you’re happy with how your site looks, it’s time to move on to the final step.
Track your visitors
Before you launch your website, it’s a good idea to add analytics, and the best WordPress plugin to do that is Independent Analytics.
Independent Analytics is a free plugin that adds a full analytics dashboard to your WP admin interface.
It’s much easier to use than Google Analytics, won’t slow down your site, and is fully GDPR compliant. With this plugin added, you’ll be able to see how many views all your pages are getting, how many visitors have arrived on your site, and all the traffic sources sending you these visitors.
Once your site is finished you can launch it for the world to see.
To share the site, start linking to it from everywhere else you have a presence online. There are three places, in particular, you’ll want to promote your site.
First, add a link to your social profiles. LinkedIn is an obvious place to start, but a link in your Twitter and Instagram bios can be helpful too.
Next, add a link into your email signature. This will get people to see your site all the time without any additional effort on your part.
Lastly, you might want to add your website’s address into your resume itself. It’s informal, but can help you stand out even when potential employers don’t discover you through your website.
By following these three steps, your website will effectively promote you as a great job candidate around-the-clock. The best part about a website is that it’s always running 24/7, so you never know when it might generate a new opportunity.
I hope this guide helped you create a resume website, and if it did, make sure to share it with someone else you think would like it too.
Thanks for reading!
