Five Ways to Use Your About Page to Drive Engagement

It should come as little surprise that a business' About page is usually one of the most visited pages on their website. Customers want to know who they're buying from and the confidence of knowing that the company has a history of good service. It's your responsibility to make sure your About page represents your company in the most positive light and is as informative to your customers as possible. However, it’s often given the least thought and populated with very basic and uninspiring information, which risks turning a lead into a bounce. Here are a few things you can do to maximize the usefulness of your About page and help convert leads into customers.

Make It Consistent with Your Company's Personality

The primary purpose of the About page is to educate and inform your customers about your business. It should give them an idea of who they're interacting with and what kind of experience they should expect -- both online and off. If it deviates from your product page copy or blog posts, the site can look inconsistent, which could plant the seed of doubt they need to turn away from your business. If your product page copy is formal and business-minded, make sure your About page shares the same tone and word usage. If it's full of personality, fun, and engaging, then create your About content in that voice as well. What you're looking for here is consistency. Consistency implies reliability, which is something all customers want in their providers.

Make It About Your Value Proposition

Contrary to what it the name implies, your About page isn't necessarily just about you or your online business. Your customers aren't there to read your resume, they're there to read about how your qualifications and experience can benefit them and solve their problems. At a glance, there may not seem to be much difference; but when given greater consideration, the difference becomes clear -- a resume is focused on you, while something focusing on how you can benefit your customers is focused on them. Talk about your skills in relation to their needs and try to answer a question the consumer is likely to ask. Dedicate your opening sentence(s) to your audience's challenges and goals -- if you open with the reason your customers are on your website, you will demonstrate that you have their needs in mind.

Make It Goal Oriented

Every page in an online business' site has one goal -- to generate leads, and then convert them into customers. Each page may employ a different strategy to achieve this, but the goal is the same. Your About page should be no exception. It's not just there to be informative, it's there to help educate customers to make the decision to purchase your product or service. For example, you can add a call-to-action at the end of the page encouraging people to check out one of your products. Or you might want to collect data before unlocking new content. Whatever your offering on that page, the content should be structured in such a way that it always drives to your desired goal.

Include Videos and/or Images

Much is made of videos and images, and for good reasons. They're more shareable and can lead to greater engagement from visitors. They're also easier to digest. There's no reason your About page should be just filled with text. Videos and images can also be used to represent your business. Your customers want to know more about who they're dealing with. Photos of your location or key staff members can help personalize your business, or create a short video detailing the people in the company and/or how you create your products. 

Tell a Story

While bullet points are easy to read and digest, it’s difficult to use them to inspire an action. If your goal is to to convert your leads into customers, it helps to tell more of a story. Give your customers a reason to read through the entire page. After you finish writing its contents, read through it. Is there a logical progression in the content? Does the content direct you towards taking a specific action? Take note of when you start losing interest or when you're tempted to switch off the page. That's where the story breaks and where you risk losing your  customer's interest.

Wrapping Up

It’s easy to relegate your About page to an afterthought, assuming that your customers are more concerned with the immediacy of your products and services, but a well-crafted About page acts as an ambassador for your business. And if you want to connect with your customers and increase their engagement, then any opportunity to do so should be exploited.