Even if you're an undergrad who doesn't think you need a website yet, get one anyway. When a professor receives your application or your cold email, there's a decent chance they'll search your name. What comes up matters.
A professional website ensures that what they find is exactly what you want them to see. It also solves the common problem of someone else with your name having a more prominent online presence than you do.
What to Put on It
You don't need much. Start with these sections and add more later if you want.
Biography
Who you are, where you've studied, what you're doing now. You can include a bit of personality here, but keep it professional. List your universities and any relevant past employers. Leave out anything political or religious.
Research Interests
Three to five topics, specific enough to be meaningful. "I'm interested in psychology" doesn't help anyone. "Implicit bias in organizational decision-making" does.
Publications and Presentations
List journal publications, poster presentations, conference talks, and anything else you've contributed to. For posters, you can link to a PDF. For published articles, the accepted manuscript (the version before final journal formatting) is what most publishers allow you to post, and it's worth asking your co-authors before you do.
A Headshot
Business casual, shoulders up, plain background. Your university career center will often take these for free. If not, a friend with a decent phone camera works fine. Don't skip it. A photo makes you look like a real person, which is the goal.
Your CV
Either write it out as a page on your site or link to a downloadable PDF. Update it before application season every year.
Links to Other Profiles
LinkedIn is essential. Google Scholar is worth setting up once you have publications. ResearchGate is useful for discoverability. Make sure anything you link to is actually current and professional before you put it on your site.
How to Build It
You need two things: a domain name and hosting. Here are your options, roughly in order of simplicity.
Free Options
WordPress.com, Weebly, and Google Sites all offer free tiers that will get you a functioning site with a subdomain (something like yourname.wordpress.com). Good enough for now. You can always upgrade later.
Paid Options
If you want your own domain name (yourname.com) and full control over the site, buy a domain through Namecheap or GoDaddy for around $12 a year, pair it with basic hosting at around $5 to 10 a month, and install WordPress (the self-hosted version at wordpress.org). For well under $100 a year, you'll have a fully professional setup with no platform restrictions.
Either way, a basic academic website will make you look more serious and more findable. Set it up early and keep it updated.
Related reading: High Impact Ways to Improve Your Psychology Grad School Application | How to Write a Top Tier Psychology Personal Statement | Should You Get a Master's or a PhD in Psychology?
