Create a more human-friendly ‘About’ page to convert more leads

Filed under Tips

I guess everybody has his/her own way of scanning through a newly-found website. Some people might focus on the services, the portfolio, the prices, the product range….etc
However, one thing all of us do certainly have in common is our interest in the company/shop/service provider’s reputation and basic information.

 

Trust and credibility are very important in the virtual world. No doubt we would go and check the shop, meet the artisan or assess the chosen venue physically if it was just a question of walking round the corner, but the fact is we cannot. Therefore looking for basic information, potential credentials, is something more than natural.

 

A Must-do

Sharing this basic information on an ‘About’ page has therefore become a pre-requisite when it comes down to building a website, web designers and other web professionals aware that the presence of such a page is likely to boost their site’s or their customers’ sites’ conversion rates.

 

Of course, anybody building a website could lay down the wildest hallucinations and other porky pies on their ‘About’ page, but let’s give the millions of honest people out there some credit: the basic information found on those pages is usually not only true, but also verifiable.

 

Boring your audience may harm your website’s health

Golden rule when building an ‘About’ page could apply to all the presentations you may give an audience. Don’t make it a boring one. Who is going read a 2500-line manifesto looking more like terms and conditions of a contract?

 

Don’t give your readers an old-fashioned sales pitch either. We are here to serve our customers, and tell them the truth, during both good and less-comfortable spells. On top of that, it is more than likely somebody out there is doing a better, quicker and cheaper job than you ever will be able to do. Hence, unless you really are, just drop the ‘we are the world leader in our area’ marketing gimmick.

 

Make this page a concise, straight-to-the-facts clean one. Give your readers a bit of historical data about your structure, and more importantly a clear understanding of the mission statement of the company. Answer the basic who-why-where-whom-when questions, and add a few credentials/customers’ references if any.

 

Anonymously yours,… NOT!

Acquiring the trust of your visitors is, as stated above, a must-do if you want to convert those leads (visits to the website) into what could become a great opportunity to build a relationship between both the customer and you. One thing I like doing when visiting company or service providers’ websites, is reading a few words about the business owner and his staff.

 

For a start, it shows the decider took some time to gather valuable information about his personnel, and is not considering his business as a one-man band (unless it is!), by bringing colleagues, collaborators, friends-on-board (whatever you may call them) on the front stage.

 

I also find it so much more polite to get introduced even virtually with some people I may hand my house, money, or projects, even for a short and temporarily mission.

 

Finally, I appreciate relate to those people one way or another when taking a look at their pictures, roles, experiences and maybe hobbies. And knowing that decisions (including buying or hiring ones) are more than often based upon emotional factors, it emphasizes the importance of a well-constructed but more human-friendly ‘About’ page .

 

Practical example

Enough chit-chat, let’s take a Practical example and therefore a look at something I would recommend to do on an ‘About’ page, i.e. focus as briefly mentioned above on presenting wisely the company staff.

 

Go to: Spice up your ‘About’ page with a jQuery Zoom effect on your Staff presentation.