# How to Create a Personal/Portfolio Website - review & insight | Gareth B. Davies Source: https://garethbdavies.com/course-insights/how-to-create-a-personal-portfolio-website/ [← All courses](https://garethbdavies.com/course-insights/) Business & Marketing · Quick win · Rated 6 /10 # How to Create a Personal/Portfolio Website Updated August 2026 Create a Pro Website Beginner · 75 min A step-by-step click-through to a one-page WordPress site, but half the runtime is spent on hosting checkout and an affiliate coupon. [Get a Free Month on Skillshare](https://skillshare.eqcm.net/c/3155494/298081/4650?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.skillshare.com%2Fclasses%2Fhow-to-create-a-personal-portfolio-website%2F1614574009) New to Skillshare? Your first month is free, enough to take this course at no cost. ## What the course actually covers This is a screen-recorded walkthrough, not a web design course. Dale McManus's stated goal is narrow and honestly delivered: get a beginner from zero to a published one-page WordPress portfolio site using a specific stack (HostGator hosting, OceanWP theme, Elementor page builder, Contact Form 7) and a free template he provides. The eight lessons map directly onto that pipeline: buy domain and hosting, install WordPress, log in and change the auto-generated password, drag the template into Elementor and swap out images and text, wire up a contact form, build a transparent header with a hand-drawn signature logo and a footer, check mobile and tablet views, then flip the "coming soon" switch to go live. The course is genuinely procedural. Nothing is assumed. Viewers are shown exactly where to click for the Hatchling hosting plan, how to type a coupon code into the checkout form, and which submenu holds the password field. For a true beginner who has never touched a website backend, that hand-holding is the whole value proposition, and it delivers on it. ## Where it earns its keep The most useful segment is the anchor-navigation technique in the customization and header lessons. Assigning a Class ID like "films" or "contact" to a section, then linking a menu item or icon to "#films," turns a plain scrolling page into something that behaves like a real one-page site with working top navigation. This is shown repeatedly and clearly enough that a beginner could apply it to a completely different template later. Image compression via a third-party tool before uploading is a small but practical habit worth keeping. The mobile-editing lesson, where typography and padding can be set independently per device breakpoint inside Elementor, is also a solid, transferable Elementor skill. ## Where it falls short The course leans hard on one hosting company, complete with an affiliate coupon code and a sales pitch about a "special deal." A large chunk of the first lesson is essentially a checkout tutorial for a single vendor, not web design instruction. Viewers who already have hosting, or who want to compare options, get little payoff from that stretch. More importantly, almost everything taught is mouse-driven configuration inside a proprietary page builder plugin, not transferable web skill. There is no explanation of what a domain, DNS propagation, or CSS actually is beyond a one-line analogy. When the CSS shortcode field is used to change a form's background color, the explanation is "just type background, colon, white," with no context for what CSS is or how selectors work. Students finish able to reproduce this specific template with their own images, but not equipped to troubleshoot a broken layout, work in a page builder other than Elementor, or build a second page from scratch, since the whole exercise stays on one homepage. The pacing also drifts in the customization lesson, which runs long and repeats similar steps (editing icon boxes, replacing gallery images, adjusting hover colors) well past the point where the technique has already been demonstrated once. ## Verdict For a complete beginner who wants a presentable one-page portfolio site up quickly and doesn't mind following a template closely, this delivers a real, working result in about an hour. Anyone hoping to understand the underlying mechanics of web design, or wanting a site that goes beyond a single-page template, will need a different course afterward. The standout The anchor-link workflow, tagging each section with a Class ID and linking menu buttons to matching hashtags, is a genuinely reusable one-page-navigation technique. ## What you will learn - · Buying a domain name and a HostGator hosting plan, including SSL and privacy-protection add-ons - · Installing WordPress through a one-click host installer and logging in via the /wp-admin URL - · Using the OceanWP theme plus the Elementor page builder to assemble a one-page layout from a provided template - · Setting anchor-link navigation with Class ID and hashtag links so menu buttons jump to page sections - · Building a working Contact Form 7 form and styling it with basic CSS snippets - · Checking and adjusting mobile and tablet responsiveness before publishing the site Best for: A total beginner who wants a working one-page portfolio site fast and is fine cloning the instructor's exact template and hosting choice. Skip it if: Anyone who wants to understand web design principles, compare hosting providers, or build a multi-page or non-template site. Clarity of Instruction Engaging Teacher Organization of Lessons Actionable Steps [Get a Free Month on Skillshare](https://skillshare.eqcm.net/c/3155494/298081/4650?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.skillshare.com%2Fclasses%2Fhow-to-create-a-personal-portfolio-website%2F1614574009)