5 Ways Your About Page Can Win You Clients
It sure seems like just about every website you visit these days has an About page, and for good reason! The About page is one of the most frequently visited pages on a website.
A well-crafted About page can serve as a gateway to showcase your services, build trust, and win clients. A less-than-well-crafted About page does little more than tell your life story and why you got into business.
Don’t get me wrong - telling parts of your life story can be very useful and even beneficial.
But your website visitors don’t need your entire biography, and you shouldn’t dedicate an entire page on your website to the very few people who might be interested in that.
Research has shown that you have 8 seconds to capture someone’s attention online and keep them engaged.
That’s not much time!
If they’ve landed on your About page you want to make the most of those 8 seconds for sure!
So having 7 paragraphs of text about where you grew up and what you studied in school may not be the best use of space on that page.
Let’s take a look at what is a good idea to have on your About page and how it can win you clients!
#1. Introductions
The first thing you’ll want to do is outline who you are and what you can do for your clients.
You might have heard this called this your business tagline or your catchphrase. All it means is you want to introduce yourself (read: include your name!) and tell people what you do - but quickly and succinctly. No more than one sentence for this.
Ex: Lucy May is a show stopping florist.
Next you’ll want to include some information about what you do in your business. If you’re location-specific this is a great opportunity to throw that in.
Try and use examples of how you improve your clients’ lives/situations. If that sounds a little too dramatic, think about it like this: how do you help your clients? How do they feel after you’ve been able to help them? Now write that down!
Ex: Lucy May is a show stopping florist serving the Santa Barbara area, providing brides with the bouquets dreams are made of.
As you can see this doesn’t have to be an incredibly long section, but it absolutely sets the tone for the rest of the page.
Why is it important to include this? Well for one thing people need to know who you are! And for another thing they need to know what they can buy from you (since that’s the ultimate goal - to make sales!)
They don’t need to know where you grew up or what your dog’s name is. You might be able to throw those things in later in the page, but don’t include too many unnecessary details as they’re, well, unnecessary!
A good introduction is important as it might be someone’s first online impression of you. Even if someone landed on your Home page and decided to hop on over to your About page they’re still just getting to know you.
Clarity is crucial.
You should also take into account how your potential client is feeling. Are they frustrated with their problem? Maybe ready to give up? They need to know they can trust you with their time and hard-earned money, but more on that later.
#2. Get to the Problem
Next you’ll want to include a section describing your ideal client’s current situation - i.e. their current problems.
Don’t worry if this seems negative. You’re going to follow it up with how you can solve their problems in the next section!
You can go about this a couple different ways. First, you can choose to include rhetorical questions that they should be silently answering ‘yes’ to.
Do you feel like this?
Are you tired of that?
Have you been trying this with no success?
Frame these questions in a way that your client will answer yes to. Help them feel like you understand exactly what they’re going through. It’s important to focus on the negative aspects of the situation here.
Alternatively you can tell a story. Telling your own story is helpful when you can describe the struggles and problems you went through. Ideally they would be the same struggles your client is going through now.
Knowing you’ve been through the same thing helps build subconscious trust between your client and you.
Why is trust important? Well, you’re going to need to build quite a bit of it before someone is ready to become your paying client!
You need to be able to convince someone you are worthy of their time and hard-earned dollars. Demonstrating you’ve encountered the same issues and have worked through them in one step on the road towards building connection.
Don’t be repetitive, but do continue to infuse your copy with your customers’ pain points and problems, and then follow it up with how YOU are the solution to those problems (more on this in the next section!)
#4. Demonstrate Trustworthiness
Now is the time to follow up all that negative Debbie Downer talk with some positivity!
Now that you’ve described your clients’ problems accurately and in painstaking detail it’s time to show how you are THE answer to these problems.
Remember all those rhetorical questions you created?
Do you feel like this?
Are you tired of that?
Have you been trying this with no success?
Well it’s time to answer those questions with your solutions!
Do you feel like this? [Your name or product/service] helps people just like you to [alleviate problem #1]
Are you tired of that? [Your name or product/service] has been solving [problem #2] for the past 5 years!
You get the picture!
It’s also a good idea to include a bit about your background as it relates to how you help people.
So if you’ve been working in the same industry for several years make sure you highlight that to show why you’re the expert (people want to buy from experts).
Note: This is NOT the time to tell your life story! Just the important snippets that demonstrate why you know what you’re talking about and why you can be trusted.
If you’ve ever bought anything online I’m sure you’ve checked out the reviews first. You want some sort of assurance that the thing you’re buying isn’t a total waste of money, and will in fact solve a problem or function as intended.
You needed a sufficient level of trust before you felt comfortable spending that money.
People have the same feelings about investing in your products or services! Which is why this is a great time to show off a bit and inject some social proof.
What’s social proof? Testimonials, nice words, raving reviews - any and all of these will do!
If this feels like you’re tooting your own horn (in an uncomfortable way) I’m going to challenge you to power through. You’re not making this stuff up, after all! These are just kind words people have said after working with you.
It’s also a good idea to sprinkle in some pictures of you throughout this page. People like to put a face to the name!
The more you can demonstrate that past customers have been satisfied (or better yet overjoyed!) after working with you, the easier it will be for new customers to trust you.
#4. Sneaky Services
Prepare yourself. What I’m about to suggest is going to sound a little crazy.
Ok, are you sitting down? Do you have a fainting couch on hand? Are you ready?
Include your Services on your About page.
**cue gasp**
I hear you! I hear you! It may indeed seem counterintuitive to include your service or product offerings on your About page, but hear me out!
Your clients have just read all about how you get them, you get their struggles, and you are AMAZING at solving all their problems. What now?
Well, my friend, now is the perfect time to tell them what you offer!
I’m not saying you have to have a drop down list or a table outlining your exact packages or products.
But as you’re telling the story of how you’re the perfect fit for your client you should mention what you offer (aka exactly how you can help them).
If you’ve already built your Services or Product page you can just pull wording directly from there. If that feels a bit clunky or just not quite right - no problem. Just rephrase what you wrote on your Services page to fit naturally into your story on the About page.
Done correctly this will have people searching for the ‘Tell Me More’ or ‘Buy Now’ button straight away. Why? Because you’ve spoken to their problems, shown you’re the expert, and have a plan on how to fix it.
You should always end this section with a link to your Services or Products/Store page and a CTA to ‘Find Out More’ or something similar.
#5. Freebies
“Um… how is giving things away for free going to get me clients?”
I’m so glad you asked!
Remember when we talked about building trust? Well, the hard truth is that it can take time.
Even though you’ve written an ah-MAZing About page the reality is that not everyone will read through it. And only some of the people who do will be convinced and ready to buy from you.
So what to do in the meantime? You certainly don’t want those people wandering off and forgetting you exist! So instead you give them one of your super awesome and helpful freebies.
That way they get to sample your work and you get to put them on your email list! I’m assuming you have your freebie setup to capture emails, of course. If you don’t, check out this article from ConvertKit on how to set up a landing page to capture emails! They’ll even give you a free account!
Quick disclaimer: I am not sponsored by ConvertKit nor am I an affiliate, but I do use their services!
Building your email list allows you to stay top-of-mind with those people who might have liked you, but weren’t quite ready to buy. You get to stay engaged with them and keep building that know-like-trust factor.
Research has shown that it takes an average of 17 touches before someone is ready to buy from you.
It’s going to be pretty darn difficult to get someone to return to your website or blog 17 times! That’s why getting them on your email list is so important.
You should also keep in mind that this strategy only works if you are consistently engaging with your email list. Sending emails once a week should be your minimum goal. Twice is even better.
If you blog this is a perfect way to gain more readers. And now you have a warm list to pitch your sales or new products to! Hooray!
A note on email lists:
You might have heard about the importance of building a list, and it’s true. Conversions from email lists are significantly higher than conversions from social media.
I’m not saying social media is bad - you just need to pick the marketing strategy that’s a good fit for you (aka one you don’t hate and dread doing every day).
But if your goal is to make sales you need to be directing people back to your website or your email list. Just saying! If you don’t have an email list - start one!
Ok, let’s recap:
Your About page is not about you
Outline who you are and how you can help
Spell out the problem
Show why you’re trustworthy
Don’t hide those services
Give away those freebies