A year ago, my colleague Sandra Arta Kanaška and I started our own website, Contentopolis. We are currently facing technical difficulties, so I figured I would try out a different platform and reflect on it. (Psst! Sandra also reflected on this! You can read her article here.) I personally use Medium most of the time for reading on everything UX-related — there are a lot of fantastic blogs out there! Since I started my new position as a UX designer, I started to dig even deeper into Medium. I can totally recommend this article by my colleague Beate Öttl on “Three quick wins to boost User Friendliness on your website”.
However, I have only used Medium as a tool to read and lurk but never published an article. As a newcomer to this tool, I am pleasantly surprised at how easy and intuitive it is. I am a fan of minimalistic design and functions — I tend to be a victim of Hick’s Law sometimes. I cannot decide what to do next! Additionally, it is easy to pick out the right elements and add everything you need.
Same same but different
When we set up our own website, we decided to use WordPress. While it allows us to also publish text — just like Medium — there are a couple of more options available. Medium is a great tool to publish articles, and I love to use it for all things UX-related — creating something that is your own emits such a feeling of proudness. “This is my baby.” Of course, technical difficulties might happen much more likely when working on your own website, however, these ups and downs are what make the journey so fulfilling. Last night, I tried to fix an SSL certificate issue and almost pulled my hair out! But in the end, I feel really satisfied when I manage to solve a problem and get back on track.
Another plus point is the customization. Of course, there is enough of it on Medium as well. However, with WordPress the possibilities are endless: Add your custom color, fonts, etc. Another very helpful plugin is Yoast SEO: It allows us to check whether we meet most of the criteria or not. Additionally, WordPress allows its users to move elements where they want them to be. I personally love to use Elementor for configuration as it is very intuitive and does not even require coding. They also have an amazing blog with a lot of recommendations on optimizing a website.
A blog can be useful for a job application
This year I applied for a new job and I always made sure to mention Contentopolis. During the job interview, people were curious and asked questions about it. I felt really proud that someone took an interest in the content we created. But it was not just about the blog articles. It was also about the fact that we created the website on our own rather than using a pre-existing platform. As already mentioned, there is nothing wrong with that — I am sure, they would have also taken interest in the content of my Medium articles.
But since I applied for a design job, it was much more important to them, how I set up the site and designed it. I guess, it depends on what job you want to apply for. However, since a lot of UX people are on here as well, you can also share your knowledge on Medium and show your potential employer that you are knowledgeable in this field. Medium also allows its users to add pictures, graphics, etc. If you do not want to set up your own website, you can also share how you would create a website by putting screens and the whole progress into your blog — just like a portfolio! Additionally, Medium also allows its users to connect with other people. That is unfortunately a bit harder on a custom WordPress website. But if you want to get in touch with people in your industry, Medium might be a good tool for that.
Conclusion
Creating our own website means more work, but can be fulfilling at the same time. In the end, it is a personal preference. However, I want to continue to challenge myself and learn new things. I want to look back in 1 to 2 years and see how far I have come with my website. I plan to also learn more about front-end development and try to implement it into the website at some point. Of course, it is not perfect at the moment (and will probably never be), but most beginnings are hard and this is what makes the journey so satisfying. It makes you appreciate the celebrations more.
However, I think that combining Medium and a custom WordPress site could also be a possibility. I was thinking of using this platform to share the learnings I made while further developing my website. I want to provide insights that might help everyone interested in building their own website. Or maybe posting tutorials here on how to create certain elements for your website — for example, illustrations, buttons, etc. However, I still have to create a roadmap for this. In the end, the small hiccup allowed me to dive deeper into Medium and open up more possibilities for sharing my knowledge and journey within the world of content.