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How To Write A Killer About Page That People Will Actually Read

Your About Us page is one of the most important pages on your website.

It’s one of the first pages visitors click on. And it’s one of the pages visitors click on MOST.

Studies show that…

  • People are five times more likely to buy from a company when they visit the company’s About Us page.
  • Folks who visit the About Us page spent 22.5% more on their purchases.
  • The better the About Us page is, the more these figures increase.
  • The WORSE the About Us page is, the more conversions decreased. From the study: “On sites with weak About Us pages, visitors dropped off like flies after seeing the About Us page. It was as if the pages were so horrible that customers were scared off.”

I know… this is information you probably don’t want to hear.

For most companies (not just contractors), the About Us page is the hardest page of a website to write.

Sure… you could write enough about your services to make the 1,090,739-word Harry Potter series look like your kid’s favorite picture book.

But when a company has to sit down and write about their history and, well… THEMSELVES?

They come down with a case of writer’s block the size of Rhode Island.

As a result, almost all businesses end up writing an About Us page that’s boring, clichéd, and literally repels potential prospects.  

For proof, here are a couple snippets of bad About Us pages I randomly found with an internet search, along with my comments…

Example 1

“I want to take a few seconds to tell you a little about (ABC) Roofing and why you can count on us every time to do a good job. We have been servicing the Metroplex for seventeen years and have established a quality reputation in the DFW Metroplex.”

We appreciate your interest in our company and thank you for the opportunity to submit our proposal for your roofing project. We understand your home is possibly your most valuable investment and we want to assure you that we treat it accordingly.”

My commentary: What a snoozer. It’s like the company bought Mad Libs for Contractor About Pages and filled in the blanks. “Quality reputation.” “Your home is your most valuable investment.” “We appreciate your interest.” It’s all just so… blah.

Example 2

“For thirty years the management team at (XYZ) Windows, has been involved in the fenestration industry. Their vast experience covers all phases of the window industry including building our own window systems (which we’ve been doing since 2001) to consulting, installation, and after-care service.

Today we offer to the public TRUE factory direct value. We build a wide variety of products from the most affordable line to our most feature-rich energy-efficient product system. All designed to ‘keep out heat, cold, and noise.’”

My commentary: This starts off in the third person and unexpectedly shifts to first person. NEVER do that. It’s confusing to readers. And “fenestration industry”? Excuse me, but… hahahahaha! This is a case in which a company tries to sound professional but comes across as Pretentious. Yes, with a capital “P.”

People, we can do better.

Your “About Us” page represents a fantastic opportunity to HUMANIZE your company. Tell your prospects what kind of people you really are… so they can connect with you on a HUMAN level.

Nobody wants to read a truncated history of your company (“We started in 1984…”), a rehashing of all the crap you sell, or a bunch of platitudes about your dedication to customers and service.

Here’s a better way: Tell a story.

Make it a personal story.

A story that illustrates why you operate the way you do.

A story that shows how your mentality and philosophy were molded.

A story that helps people know and love the real you.

Let me show you some examples:

As you read some of these examples, you might be tempted to think that there is “too much text” and that “nobody is going to read all that.”

Newsflash: You’re wrong.

The people reading your About Us page are potentially pay you tens of thousands of dollars in their hard-earned money. They are ACTIVELY looking for reasons to hire you. And if your About Us page is engaging and well written, they’ll eat up every morsel of info you provide.

Let’s take Freelite’s About Us page that I linked to above. I interviewed the owner, Chip Marvin, to get a feel for him and his company. Here is what I discovered:

  • He’s a genuinely nice guy who cares about others.
  • He’s soft-spoken and the type that wouldn’t hurt a fly.
  • He has a strong aversion to pushy sales techniques.
  • He’s passionate about helping customers make the right choices for their situations.

So I started asking him about his background: How did he start this business? Why is he so put off by sales pressure? What was he like growing up? What did he want to be when he grew up? How do people react to his easy-going personality in a sales situation?

What I discovered didn’t surprise me. It turns out Chip had a religious-studies degree from Yale. When he moves to Tucson, AZ in the 1970s, he had zero business experience—but he was looking for opportunity.

So I came up with the following headline for Freelite’s About Us page:

“If ‘Type A’ Personality Means Somebody Is Driven, Aggressive, And Forceful, You Might Say That My Personality Is ‘Type Z.’”

It’s not going to get much better—or much more engaging—than that.

To recap, here’s how to write a powerful About Us page people will actually read:

  • Tell a story.
  • Make it a personal story.
  • Illustrate why you operate the way you do.
  • Show how your mentality and philosophy were molded.
  • Ditch the clichéd and robotic “We’ve been in business since 1985 and have a quality reputation” approach that’s been done to death and back.
  • Never, ever use the word “fenestration” to describe your services. 😉

Yep… if you’re a non-marketing expert, creating a world-class About Us page can be ridiculously hard. Like trying to craft Hemingway prose if the last paper you wrote was Senior year in college. writing a thesis on quantum physics if you’re science education ends at Biology 101.

So if you need help with crafting powerful copy for your website, get in touch.

Give us a call at (817) 416-4333. Or, use the live chat box in the lower right-hand corner to talk to someone about your marketing needs right now.

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Please, Don’t Treat Me Like Family

Roof construction site
To tell people how great their service is, a lot of contractors say, “We treat you like family.”

You probably even say this (or something similar) somewhere in your own marketing.

Well, yesterday I realized that treating your customers like your flesh and blood could be the WORST thing for your business.



I’ll elaborate…

Yesterday I came home for lunch. I made a sandwich and plopped down on the couch.

I turned on the television, and Judge Faith (one of TV’s 857 court shows) was on.

The case is something I see all the time on these “court-room dramas”: A case involving a homeowner and a contractor.

And when I say “all the time,” I mean it.

It seems like every episode of Judge Faith / Judy / Alex / Whoever has a case involving a client-contractor dispute.

This particular client-contractor case, however, kept things “in the family.”

A woman was Hugesuing her brother, who was a handyman. She hired him to complete some roof repairs and paid him the full $4,700 UP FRONT.

HUGE mistake.

Turns out, the brother was a lazy sleazebag.

He started her roof project, and then took on another job for someone else. He began neglecting his sister’s project and told her he would “complete it in time.”

Five months later…

The woman’s roof still wasn’t done. The brother was nowhere in sight. The shingles he never installed were still on the roof… and started to MELT from the sun!

Meanwhile, the brother put up a fence and redid the kitchen… at HIS house.

The sister finally had enough and hired someone else to do the job.

Then she sued her brother for the $4,700 she paid him.

treating customers like family doesn't always mean good service
Needless to say, the sister won the case. The judge awarded her $3,500 (she subtracted $1,000 for materials and $200 for labor).

But that’s not the most interesting part…

During the episode, the judge sarcastically asked the brother why he thinks he’s being sued.

His response: “Because my sister is a nut.”

Yikes.

If this is how contractors treat their family, I certainly don’t want the flesh-and-blood treatment from whom I hire.

What’s the point of telling you about this courtroom family drama?

Well…

If you say you “treat customers like family”—or anything else to indicate you provide great service—you better back it up.

Tell people EXACTLY how you treat your customers. Then follow through on those claims on every single job.

Here are a few examples of true “family” treatment:

  • Moving your customers’ potential “breakables” for them before starting work.
  • Having a strict “no radio, no swearing” jobsite policy to make customers feel more comfortable.
  • Providing your personal cell phone number to customers and tell them to call any time—day or night—if they have questions.
  • Require no money up front (a GIANT show of trust).
  • Giving your customer’s dog a treat when you show up to the jobsite every morning.
  • And, oh yeah… providing kickass installation.

There are a dozen and one other things you can do, both big and small. But you get the picture.

Don’t just say you “treat people like family.” Show people how you walk the talk.

Homeowners put up with jerk contractors like the brother in this court case constantly. It’s why contractors get the (dis)honor of being on the BBB’s “Most Complained About” list every year without fail.

Simply telling people you treat them like “family” means nothing to your prospects. Bad contractors say it all the time, so your prospects have zero reason to believe you… unless you provide ample evidence to back up your claim.

So GET SPECIFIC.

Precision is one of the “3 P’s” of a powerful, profit-producing Identity.

That means not only saying you do something well… but informing prospects exactly how you do it. (And then—the most important part—following through during the actual job.)

Otherwise, what you’re saying is white noise… and your prospects will see through you faster than Judge Judy.

P.S. This page contains a ton of info about our Identity services. Read through it, and think about how YOUR marketing would benefit from a powerful, prospect-pulling Identity. Then reach out to us—we would LOVE to help you with your marketing needs.

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