Become a Successful Web Designer: Education and Career Roadmap

In today’s day and age, web-design is a modern necessity and certainly an industry where the amount of work won’t run dry. Ecommerce is one of the fastest growing markets in Europe and North America, with thousands of companies relying on web designers to give them both a slick online presence and an easy way for customers to buy their goods. If you’re looking to enter the field of web design, the learning curve may be steep at first, but once you’re on the right path, all you have to do is to keep on walking to success. There are several important things that any aspiring web designer ought to know.

Entry Requirements

With degree inflation on the way, it seems everyone’s got a degree in just about anything, but you don’t always need qualifications to become a successful web designer. Companies like Globalgraphics, a website design company in Toronto,  and clients will be much more interested in your core skills. Broadly speaking, core skills in web design include some of the following:

• User experience (UX)
• Search engine optimisation, social media management and marketing skills
• Visual design software skills
• CSS and HTML coding
• Skills in design software such as Adobe Photoshop and Illustrator

You could take either a college or higher education course in a multimedia or web design related subject to boost some of the core skills you’ll need. Not everyone has the time to go to college, or the money to fork out on expensive courses, but it’s still entirely possible to learn almost all of these core skills through free courses on websites such as coursera, or through various free online video tutorials. Distance learning courses are becoming much more commonplace in the design education sphere – you can communicate with tutors from all over the world and from the comfort of your own home. If you’re already busy in a career and trying to transition to web design, a distance learning course could be the perfect solution.

Grow Your Portfolio

In design industries, future employers and clients will be looking at a practical demonstration of the skills you know to assess your employability. If you’re an aspiring web designer you should start building up a portfolio as soon as possible. Try applying for some apprenticeships or internships where you’ll be able to contribute to the industry and add these examples of your successful work to you physical portfolio.

Make sure that you don’t just leave your portfolio as is. Keep this important document well updated to reflect your growing skill set over time. Refine and update not only based on new work that you do but also to keep up with the latest trends and programming to show that you have knowledge.

Soft Skills

Once you’re bursting at the seams with technical know-how, you’ll want to focus on your soft skills in order to advance swiftly down that career path. Being a web designer requires you to be technically savvy, but without soft skills, you’ll fit in nowhere and won’t be able to deliver.

Effective communication and interpersonal skills are particularly valued in this field. When it comes to web-design, it’s not all about the back end. You’ll need to be able to communicate with your clients in ways that they can understand, as well as other creative directors and developers, on a daily basis. Speak about web design clearly and let your clients know that you understand every aspect of your field, but don’t try to come across arrogant and like you know it all, because others may get the wrong idea about you.

You’ll need to exercise excellent organisational skills, time management and diligence to keep on top of tasks. Acting professionally and developing a good work ethic will be just as vital as knowing which piece of code to input where. Just because you’ll be spending a lot of time behind a computer screen, doesn’t mean to say that it’s not impersonal work. A business sense will be crucial to getting clients on board or staying friendly with fellow members of staff.

Further Career Prospects

Become a successful web designer and you’re likely to learn many transferable skills. With enough experience, you could end up managing a whole team or you could move onto business management. Getting acquainted with the internet could allow you to branch off to other related careers to become the essay writer or the web content manager of the new year. If you love the job too and have learnt all there is to know about the industry, you could start up your own reputable web design business and be your own boss. The great thing about web design is that it naturally allows for some degree of flexibility and working from home or freelancing remotely can both be credible options.

Wrap Up

So in order to make a success of yourself in the Web Design field, make sure you can carry out the following:

• Exercise strong creative skills
• Pay attention to detail
• Take a logical approach to work and develop problem solving skills
• Work to deadlines and keep on top of tasks
• Explain technical matters to clients in ways they can understand

Not only will you have to make good websites, you’ll have to learn to manage sites too. Planning, marketing and communication all fall into play here. Learn how to sell yourself as the perfect person for the job. As you’ll be working with businesses, develop a business sense from the get go, in order to give your career the head start it needs. Don’t forget that in this ever changing industry, it’ll be important to keep up with new tech in order to grow your career and be the best you can be.

This guest post was authored by Christina Battons

Christina is a web content expert from LA. Creative writer who is able to connect various thougts into a single theme. Christina loves to stay up to date on the latest content marketing trends. Her works have been published on theessaywriter.net and other resources. Connect with Christina on Twitter.