Put your portfolio in your pocket

Chances are you carry it everywhere you go – even when you're off duty. And while you could probably quickly show me pictures of your kids or your recent holidays, I'm guessing you couldn't show me what you do for a living.

Well, not any family friendly stuff anyway...

So many good business opportunities happen when you least expect them – at a barbecue, in a bar, in a hotel lobby, or at an airport when your flight's delayed. By putting some good portfolio examples of what you do on your phone, you could leave a lasting impression that goes beyond a business card.

Photos: all work no play

Photos are great – but separate personal ones and work ones. Create a "portfolio" folder in iPhoto or somewhere similar and place some good examples of what your company does, or maybe what you've personally worked on. Then sync your handset. Having a portfolio album means you're not accidentally showing pictures of the stag do you went on at the weekend, while you're trying to find shots of that product launch.  

Photos: find shots that show what you mean
Think laterally about good photos you might also need to sell your own story. If you work in a cool office, take some shots or blag some from your web guys. 

Videos: load them up
If you've got some video examples, actually load them on to your phone. Don't rely on them being online somewhere – chances are you won't have a Wi-Fi connection when you want to show them to someone quickly. 

Videos: keep them super short
Like a slide show of someone's holiday, no-one's really interested in everything you do. So cut your videos into small 20-second chunks if you can – under 20 seconds is best. Handing over your phone and saying, "It's only 20 seconds, take a look," sounds a lot better than, "Here's five minutes of our latest event". 

Videos: show the cool stuff
With those short videos, just show the interesting stuff, not people talking or anything that needs to be listened to. You need pictures that make an impact quickly. Put your good shots in the first five seconds. We do this for quite a few clients – just a few shots of their products or their set-up. It's really powerful. 

Documents and designs: show those too
On iPhones and iPads, you can view PDFs in iBooks. So if you've got good-looking documents such as proposals, storyboards or designs, save them as PDFs on your PC or Mac and import them in. They look surprisingly good. 

All of the above isn't limited to smartphones by the way. If you carry your iPad or similar around everywhere, load up that instead. 

Either way, do yourself a favour – start putting some stuff on your device now. I reckon you'll be grateful you did.  

Matt Smith is Head of Production at Tech TV

The article first appeared on Brand Republic