We all know that just competing on price is a costly strategy. Profit margins suffer. You’re extra-busy and you’re lumped in the same category as all the other low-priced vendors.
With other competitors setting up shop and encroaching on your stomping ground, you really must communicate something of substance to appeal to potential customers.
The bigger picture is that people want quality, transparency, authenticity and honesty.
It’s no longer viable to keep running discounts, promos and begging pitches.
This is where your “About” page comes in.
How Do You Write About Your Business?
Can you demonstrate personal and professional qualities that transcend the price you charge?
Is there an intriguing or relevant backstory to your business?
Although all the content of a website is important, let’s discuss what this about page should ideally include if you’re to persuade a person you’re truly worthy of their wallets.
Be Interesting, Useful and Informative
Today’s websites are media assets, not just product brochures. Local businesses and organisations, for example, all have a place in the minds of the populace, whether it’s top of mind and hard to miss or on the periphery and not all that remarkable.
You should be looking to cement your position in the community using your site to show pictures, written articles and embedded videos.
A variety of media and a tendency to over-communicate is better than visiting a site only to discover there’s little on it.
The point of the about page is to tell people who you are and what you’re about. This is your opportunity to put your best foot forward without puffery, chest-beating or bragging.
It also means you can see all the important stuff up front before potential customers contact you. You’re less likely to have to start from scratch with every single individual if the website has provided a decent amount of info.
When writing about your business, be sure to touch on the following:
- Community
- Identity
- Purpose
Naturally, you’re in business to make money – that’s obvious. But why else? Dig deep and bring your “why” to the forefront.
- Be honest, be sincere, be yourself
- Share your passions, but avoid politics
- Have a decent picture of you! Your face, smiling!
- Consider adding a short, talking-head style video
Demonstrate that you, the person behind the business, is not just interested in product, price, place and promotion but that you actually have interesting things to say. Marketing is about communication, about establishing a dialogue.
But You Hate Writing
Writing is not easy if you think you don’t have much to say for yourself. It feels like homework. It feels like a chore.
But I’ll bet you’ve several things in common with your website visitors worth taking the time to communicate.
You probably live by certain principles, deride shoddiness, work hard, have a family, want to make a positive difference and have self-respect.
So, communicate your values, knowing that the people who would buy your products/services will find the non-aggressive approach in the way you deliver your messages appealing.
That’s marketing.
Going Even Furthur: About the Area(s) You Serve
Some of my clients are local businesses and very passionate about the regeneration of our failing high street (hello Ilkeston residents!) and the About page of their website is the ideal place to discuss the local area, the town, the council and so on.
Writing long-form content is an opportunity for meaningful and legitimate uses of geographical keywords, which can be picked up by Google and contribute to page ranking.
If you wanted, you could come up with an about page on the area you serve itself . The history of a place in the context of how you serve it would be interesting and possibly pull in some organic search engine traffic if done right.
A client of mine commissioned me to write two pages for his site. One about Derby and one about Nottingham.
The resulting pages are the two best pages on my client’s website and have attracted organic search engine traffic and many compliments. Steve also uses these pages for some of his Google Ads landing pages.
Steve was full of interesting information, it turns out, which led to me researching all sorts of topics and bringing it all together. Many of his customers have complimented him on how engaging this content is when they call up to book consulatations with him.
Watch the video below where you’ll hear me talking about the concept of a good quality, well-written About page in greater detail.
