I want to know what do you think of personal pictures of yourself on portfolios.
I will soon be taking a photoshoot with a proper photographer for my portfolio, I mainly want it for my hero image and one for a profile pictures on popular freelance sites.
Do you think it adds any benefits for conversion? and if what do you think it would be ideal, pose, wardrobe, etc. ?
My niche is web development for small to medium companies.
Personal opinion....
No. There's no reason anyone hiring me needs to know what I look like.
There's a very old resume rule which states that you never put your photo on your resume. There is a very good reason for this.. bias or outright discrimination. Not just based on sex or race, but on age, attitude, percieved personality, etc.
Placing your photo on something, where you are looking to gain work, merely allows those that are of that mindset to avoid you based upon your appearance. It offers almost zero benefit having your photo on anything seeking work.
For a 20 year old looking to gain work.... those seeking more experienced companies will immediately be turned away. For someone looking for an young, socially connected, fresh worker, a photo of someone ~40 years old will immediately turn them away. All based solely on the photo, not capabilities because they'll never even get that far.
That being posted, if you are branded well and you are your brand and you are well known, then using your photo may be beneficial. For example, if Neil deGrasse Tyson started a webdev firm.... using his photo would immediately lend creditability to the web site. Or at least confirm that yes it's his company. So in this instance using a photo is good. But this is the exception, not the rule. So, for most....
There's zero reason you need to include a personal photo and in most cases it will hurt you far more than it may help you.
Be dressed in formal business attire for your area, or just your face as in a passport photo. It must not set up a picture that can backfire on you in a few years time. A certain "G____" employee later found that his 'cool picture' caused problems when he wanted to change jobs. Leave the casual photos to your Facebook or real friends social network.
Depends on how you want to portray yourself, you want to be a "business owner" or a "freelancer for hire"?
For freelancer focus on personality, fresh, young, creative.
Fur business the focus is on serious, clean, reliable, professional.
good luck
