A buyer who has your name from a colleague will look for proof before asking for a quote. Where they look depends on who they are. A private client looks on Instagram. A corporate buyer looks on LinkedIn and on your website. The portfolio has to be in each.
What every entry needs
A photo gallery alone does not answer the buyer’s question, which is “have they done an event like mine?” Each entry should say:
- The client type. Named with permission, otherwise by category.
- The brief. What they asked for in one sentence.
- The venue and the scale. Where and for how many.
- The constraint. The tight timeline, the difficult room, the late change.
- The photos. The empty room, the finished room, the details and one moment.
On Instagram
Your three pinned posts are the portfolio’s front page. Pin one event from each kind of work you want more of. Make sure your grid’s covers show finished, lit rooms, so a visitor scanning the profile sees quality at a glance. Highlights can group events by type: Corporate, Weddings, Private dinners.
On LinkedIn
The Featured section on the founder’s profile is where a corporate buyer looks. Add a document post with three recent corporate events, one page each. A link to the portfolio page on your website.
On your website
One page per event, in text, not only images. Search engines and assistants read text. A page titled “Product launch for 200 guests at a Dubai hotel ballroom” with a paragraph on the brief gives Google and an assistant something to match when a buyer asks for exactly that.
Keep the page fast and readable without scripts. In our scan of five Dubai real estate agency homepages, one showed crawlers only 338 words with scripts off, because the text was built in the browser.
Keep it current
A portfolio whose newest event is two years old raises a question. Add a recent event every month or two and remove the ones that no longer reflect your work.
Permission first
Agree with each client what you may show and whether they can be named, ideally in the contract. Keep guests’ faces out unless they agreed. A room photographed well needs no names to impress.