P1: Explain the Purpose of a Personal Media Profile

A media profile is a representation of your skills and talents. They are used to showcase your work to potential employers. The goal of a media profile is to help you progress in your career, this could be in the form of a new job, apprenticeship or even just some freelance work. In our modern society, it is essential to have some form of media profile to help employers pick you out of a crowd of potential employees. Companies always ask for some form of media profile so they can see if you are perfect for the role they are hiring for.

Media profiles can be in a digital or physical format. A showreel (video including your work), a website, a blog, a social media channel, even LinkedIn are digital media profiles. A written document (like a CV or cover letter), a paper portfolio, your media profile on a CD/DVD/hard drive/USB stick are all examples of physical media profiles. I am going to compare the advantages and disadvantages of physical and digital media profiles. If your work is computer based (especially if your portfolio will include videos, audio etc) then a digital portfolio would be the best option. Since you cannot play a video or listen to audio using a physical media profile, this would be ideal. Digital media profiles can be distributed to employers using the cloud, a link of some kind or just sending a file to the employer using email services. This is brilliant if your media profile file size isn't large. If the file size exceeds the limit (email services usually have a attachment file size limit for example) then this will become more difficult to distribute. However, if this is a website portfolio and you only need to send a link this will not be an issue. On the down side, digital media profiles may be off putting to some employers and they are not always reliable (internet may be down, file gets corrupted etc). On the flipside, physical media profiles are right there in front of you so you can hand this in to the hiring employer instead. You have more freedom with a physical profile and you can present the work however you would like. This means there cannot be any technical errors but you will need to make sure you don't scrunch it up and it stays presentable.  Physical media profiles can be more difficult to keep tidy and they also can take much longer to produce. In the tech industry, digital media profiles might be more favourable because they show that you can use technology.

 

 

 

A CV (also known as curriculum vitae) are media profiles that employers ask for during the hiring process. For example, for every job I have applied for I have been asked for one CV's were originally just physical media profiles. However, globalisation and the internet has changed the way in which we hire people so now it is possible to upload your digital CV (you may have created this in Microsoft Word for example like I did) to apply for jobs using websites such as Indeed.

A good CV will include the following: Personal information, especially contact details so employers can reach out to you. A short personal statement that highlights hard and soft skills that you have. Hard skills are physical skills you have such as computer skills, writing skills etc. Soft skills are your quailities such as being organised and being able to persevere in difficult situations. Your qualifications since you may require a certain grade or qulification for the job. Any work experience you have aquired prior. This lets employers see what similar roles you may have had, what skills you have gained and who they can get a reference from. Finally, CVs have a hobbies/interests section. This allows you to impress employers with your hobbies and interests that may be related to your passion for the job industry.

 

 

 Sometimes, employers may ask for a cover letter as well as your CV. A cover letter lets you explain why you want the job and what you have to offer. This allows you to tell the employer why you are ideal for the job and what you know about the company already. This is a persuasive written document. Cover letters are important since this is the first thing your potential employer will see. They will decide weather you are ideal for the job or not just by looking at your cover letter. They will not waste their precious recruiting time reading through your CV if you create a bad impression from your cover letter.

 

 

 

                                                    My Personal CV

This is my CV (I have removed personal infomation since this is a public blog). I have included all the different sections that a CV should have and I have also presented this in a suitable way. I currently have a job so I will need to change my CV slightly when I go for my next job, everyone has to do this so they have relevant work experience shown.

 

 

 

                                   RyuCreative Website Media Profile

https://www.ryucreative.com/ 

 This is a portfolio website for a company called RyuCreative. According to their About page, they specialise in social branding, PR and marketing and this is an all female company in LA. This is a digital media profile. The company can easily distribute the link to their website without having to worry about file size.

 

 

 

 

  Since this is a female led company, they have used classy typography. They have used the colours black, white and pink to establish their brand identity through their website which I believe works really well. This house style reminds me of famous fashion brands since they will also use simple the but classy style. Stright away on thier home page, you can see what they specialise in which is very useful for new potential clients. On their about page, they give a short paragraph explaining who they are to keep the attention of the users. I love how they introduce themselves, this helps the potential clients form a bond with the company right away before they even contect them.

On the flip side, I think that the website is a bit too bland. I don't like how the images on their home page and work pages are spaced out. This is annoying to me since there is a lot of unecessary white space. This also makes it harder for clients to see all of their work since they need to scroll to each image instead of the images beng close together. In a UX design perspective, I think they are lacking. They don't have a footer at the bottom of their web pages and their mavigation bar doesn't scroll down with the page. This is frustrating since users will have to scroll right back up to the top of the page just to change the web page.

                                   Avril Lavigne Instagram Social Media Profile

Avril Lavigne is a pop punk singer, some of her most famous songs are Skater Boy and Complicated. On her social media page, she promotes herself, her music and her brand which means she has created a digital media profile for herself.

 

Here you can see she is promoting her tour dates in Canada for her Bite Me tour. This then gives fans a chance to buy tickets for the concert.

She even has her own merchandise for fans to buy on her website: https://store.avrillavigne.com/

And this is a collaboration between the singer and the fashion brand Killstar which you can see on the gothic fashion brand's website: https://www.killstar.com/pages/search-results-page?q=avril%20lavigne

She also promotes her upcoming singles and her albums. For example, for the "I'm a Mess" song, she promoted the song but also the music video many times.

 As you can see, she promotes herself using an Instagram social media profile. As a result, fans will follow her and she will gain more from her different revenue streams. Globalisation meand we can share our digital media profiles for everyone to see. Social media is a brilliant media profile. The long tail theory by Chris Anderson states that both niche and popular products get just as much attention and revenue because of the internet. Social media is a great place for already famous talents such as Avril Lavigne and upcoming talents to present their work.

In conclusion, I understand that media profiles can help me showcase my talents and work to potential employers, weather in a digital or physical form. While analysing some profiles, I know what a good one looks like and what mistakes I can avoid doing when I create my own, In this unit, I have been asked to create my own digital media profile. Therefore, having an understanding of what a media profile is and what types there are will help me decide how I would like to present myself and my work. I am going to create a digital media portfolio so I can showcase all of my varied projects.