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Keeping an eye out for your career’s future is important for everyone.
However, for web designers, looking forward may be even more important than for many other professions. Many web designers are freelancers, or work for more than one company at a given time. Jobs can be short or long term contracts, so looking for the next job is often not too far out into your future.

What A Career Blog Can Do For You

In today’s business world, networking, whether online or in person, is an important part of keeping your career fresh and keeping an eye out for the next job. Career blogs are just one of the ways web designers and other freelance professionals can keep abreast of who’s hiring,
what’s hot in the industry and which skills they should be adding to their portfolio.

Following you’ll find five career blogs that are essential reading for web designers. They’ll provide insight on how to keep your career fresh, as well as give you important tips on finding your next job and marketing your skills appropriately.

1. Krop

This is an all around good site for web designers. Their blog is very informative, providing information about some of the most important sites on the web, including how they’re created. They also offer articles on job hunting and staying marketable. In addition, Krop offers a large database of available jobs, so it’s a great place to search for your next gig.

2. Smashing Magazine

Smashing has one of the largest design related blogs on the web, so you’ll find lots of useful information on their site. They also offer tutorials on lots of design programs. Their job database is quite large and is segmented into full time and freelance positions, making it easy to find exactly what you’re looking for.

3. AIGA

AIGA is the professional association for designers, and is one organization all designers should join. Their website has a great job bank, along with plenty of other resources for designers. Their “Voice” section is a great interactive blog that explores all aspects of design and encourages reader feedback. When job hunting, keep in mind that many large companies advertise first and foremost through AIGA.

4. AG Design

This site, known as All Graphic Design, offers lots of articles and advice for graphic designers, including a great design gallery. Their blog is a great resource for finding graphic design jobs and for keeping your skills sharp. In addition, there’s a design forum for addressing all sorts of questions and issues facing graphic designers.

5. A Digital Dreamer

One of the best sites for graphic designers, Digital Dreamer offers general information for all sorts of graphic designers, as well as some specialized categories, suited to specific types of designers, such as video game designers or animators. The career articles are particularly good for beginning designers who are still in the early stages of their career.

These sites are certain to be helpful to graphic designers in any stage of their career. Keeping up with these sites and reading their blogs regularly is sure to help any graphic designer keep abreast of all the changes and job opportunities in the graphic design field.

About the author

Mary Ward is a freelance author and writes about design job topics, such as how to choose a web design school, artist career tips, and more.

I didn’t attend the event myself but it looked like a good night.

And the winners are…

Best Popculture Blog

Raptureponies

Best Blog from a Journalist – Sponsored by Mamut

Markham Nolan – expad.ie

Best Food/Drink Blog – Sponsored by Bord Bia

The Daily Spud

Best Fashion Blog – Sponsored by Spinnakerpro

Beaut.ie

Best Arts and Culture Blog – Sponsored by Poetry Ireland

Pursued by a Bear

Best Political Blog – Sponsored by Digital Revolutionaries

Cedar Lounge

Best Group Blog – Sponsored by DineToMeet.ie

Dublinblog.ie

Best Use of the Irish Language in a Blog – Sponsored by Edgecast Media

iGaeilge

Best Technology Blog/Blogger – Sponsored by Bitbuzz

Justin Mason – taint.org

Best Sport and Recreation Blog – Sponsored by Boards.ie

The Kop Blog

Best News/Current Affairs Blog – Sponsored by IGO People

Suzy Byrne – Maman Poulet

Best Specialist Blog – Sponsored by iQ Content

IrishEconomy.ie

Best Newcomer – Sponsored by Teamworkpm.net

Trust Tommy

Best Blog of a Business – Sponsored by RedCardinal.ie

The Blacknight Blog

Best Music Blog – Sponsored by DownloadMusic.ie

Nialler9

Best Personal Blog – Sponsored by Microsoft Ireland’s Developer and Platform Group

Annie Rhiannon

Best Humour Blog – Sponsored by Beecher Networks

The Swearing Lady at Arse End of Ireland

Best Photo Blog – Sponsored by Pix.ie

Ryan Whalley – glasseyalley.com

Best Blog Post – Sponsored by KRO IT Solutions

K8 the GR8: “The Secret Fire”

Grand Prix Prize – Best Blog sponsored by McConnells

Suzy Byrne – Mamanpoulet.com

Happy days! Thanks Damien and all the judges involved.

The Irish Blog Awards are Saturday 21st February 2009 at the Cork International Airport Hotel (sold out).

Best newcomer shortlist

• thenationallottie.com
• leemunroe.com
• joescanlon.net
• irishtimes.com/blogs/outsidein
• Trust Tommy

Other finalists

Check out the full list of blogs shortlisted. Here’s a few finalists that I would regularly read.

• Contrast
• Pat Phelan
• Sabrina Dent
• Well Done Fillet
• Iced Coffee
• Darragh Doyle

Here’s 10 (+bonus) plugins that I used on my WordPress theme that should aid both you and your readers.

1. Popular posts

Over time your most popular and useful posts will slowly fade away into your archives. Use this handy plugin so you can showoff your top posts to new readers in your sidebar.

2. Redirection

Highly recommended. Takes a log of any 404 (page not found) errors on your site and then you can add 302 redirects for these errors, ensuring that future users don’t come across the same errors and search engine bots are directed towards the correct url. Particularly useful if you change the structure of your site and all your old incoming links break.

Edit: It lets you add 301 redirects (i.e. permanent redirects) rather than 302 redirects

3. Sideblog

I introduced a sideblog into my site so I could refresh my content daily without the need for having to write long articles. It’s good to share other sites you come across.

4. Similar

If a user enjoys reading one of your articles, chances are they’ll enjoy your related articles. Keep them reading on your site as long as possible by recommending similar posts.

5. Code Auto Escape

This handy plugin is for writing articles or tutorials that include code snippets. Everything you write between the code tags will be escaped, so you can just copy and paste the code from your editor.

6. Gravatars 2

Add a face and some personalisation to your user comments by adding Gravatars. Users can associate gravatars with their email address by uploading a photo on gravatar.com.

7. Sociable

Sociable adds the tiny icons to the end of your post that allows your users to share and promote your article via external networking sites. It is fully customisable so you can decide what icons you want listed.

8. Subscribe to comments

This is a good way to get conversations going on your blog. Allowing a user to subscribe to comments means that every time someone comments, they get notified, which can potentially get you another comment from them.

9. WP-Pagenavi

The default pagination with WordPress isn’t great so dicky it up a bit with this sweet plugin.

10. Akismet

Stops *most* of the spam that comes through as comments on your blog.

You will need an API key to activate Akismet on your blog. To get this, signup to WordPress.com and your API key should be emailed to you. Alternatively, login to WordPress.com and select ‘Edit Profile’ from ‘My Account’. Your API key should be displayed on this page.

Bonus: Amazon Showcase

Sign up for an associates account on Amazon then for every book you refer to someone, you will get a percentage of the sale in your pocket. This showcase plugin allows you to easily show your favorite books and links them through to Amazon with your referral ID.

Go one step further and setup an aStore so you can show your users all the books you recommend.

Further Reading

• WordPress plugin directory
• Yoast WordPress plugins
• Useful WordPress plugins