Too often, an About Us page is viewed as just another box to check off the to-do list for a website. But it has the potential to be much more than that. When done well, an About Us page can help site visitors connect to your client’s business on a personal level, build customers’ trust and set your client’s business apart from their competition.
In this article, we’ll look at how to create a great About Us page, including:
The purpose of an About Us page
Why it matters for your client’s business
8 expert tips for creating an About Us page
11 inspiring examples of About Us pages, and what makes them stand out
What's the purpose of an About Us page?
An About Us page is the right place on your client’s website to tell their story and make a strong, positive impression.
What should an About Us page include?
Every About Us page should cover these basics:
The story behind your client’s business and why they started it
The customers or cause their business serves
Their business model or some insight into how their products are made
What sets an outstanding About Us page apart is how it delivers that information while capturing the business’ personality and values. The best ones truly bring a business’ brand story to life with engaging text, media and design.
Why are About Us pages important to your clients?
When it comes to connecting with customers, brick-and-mortar businesses have an advantage over their online counterparts: face-to-face contact. The good news is your clients’ sites can match the personal touch of even the best offline retailers by telling their stories in compelling ways.
Don’t underestimate the power of appealing to emotion. Brain scans show that when consumers evaluate brands, they’re influenced by personal feelings and experiences more than a company’s features and facts. Keep this in mind when considering how to write an About Us page for a client, and when you’re designing it. In the examples at the end of this article, you’ll see how great About Us pages use emotion to persuade.
Additionally, About Us pages often cater to a high-intent audience. When a site visitor navigates to an About Us page, it means they’re actively interested in learning more about a business. Make the most of that intent and get more conversions on your clients’ sites pages by following our guidelines.
8 tips for creating a great About Us page for your client
State what the business does and why it exists
Identify your client’s customers and what they get
Share your client’s brand story, from start to present
Introduce your client’s team
Let your client’s values shine through
Include positive press and other social proof
Use high-quality photos and videos
Include calls to action and contact info
As you’re considering each one of these guidelines, remember that 1 size doesn’t necessarily fit all. Every business is unique, so you don’t have to use every recommendation or give each of them equal weight. The goal of an About Us page is to give an engaging, personal introduction to your client and their business. Work together and apply these tips in a way that works best for them.
1. State what the business does and why it exists
This tip may seem obvious, but many brands fail to include some of the most basic information about their business up front. Or they do it poorly by describing themselves in a way that isn’t clear or is packed with jargon. On an About Us page, visitors shouldn’t have to work to figure out what a business does and its mission. Instead, give site visitors a quick overview of your client’s company and why they do what they do, in a way that matches their overall brand.
2. Identify your client’s customers and what they get
By clearly identifying your target customer up front, you’ll have a better chance of attracting and engaging the right viewers. Be sure to clearly describe the products or services your client is offering them and how customers can benefit. Many companies fall short by explaining their products or services too broadly, leaving out specifics that could convince viewers that your client is right for them.
Case studies and testimonials are also a great way to make your client’s About Us page more effective. When a prospective customer can picture what success with your client’s business looks like, they’re more likely to convert. In fact, 58% say they’re more likely to convert when a site includes customer case studies or testimonials.
3. Share your client’s brand story, from start to present
An About Us page is the perfect place to tell the story behind your client’s company: how it started, how it’s evolved and how it’s gotten where it is today. Include major milestones and what’s driven its success.
To add life to your client’s story and make it as engaging as possible, here are a couple angles to consider:
Your client’s "aha!" moment: Did the idea for your client’s business strike out of the blue? If your client woke up one day and had an epiphany, go ahead and share it. This kind of storytelling adds color to your client’s About Us and will help readers get to know and relate to them in a deeper way.
Your client’s brand evolution: Consider sharing how your client’s strategy, values or product offerings may have changed since the birth of the company. This can help show that their business is agile and able to evolve with the industry.
4. Introduce your client’s team
Including team member profiles can help potential customers put a face to your client’s team and feel a personal connection with them.
Great About Us pages:
Include short bios of key team members, including their roles, areas of expertise and outstanding accomplishments
Make those bios personal by mentioning things they like, hobbies or other interesting insights
Feature original, natural-looking photos that show team members either on or off the job, and don’t look cheesy or corporate
As an added benefit, team intros show site visitors that your client cares about their people, and that will stick in their minds when considering choosing your client’s business.
5. Let your client’s values shine through
Consumers want to know more about a company than just its products and features. They also want to know what kind of people they’re thinking of doing business with. Values help define the essence of a company, and About Us pages are the perfect place to talk about your client’s, or let their values shine through without stating them explicitly.
Recent studies show how important values are to consumers:
53% said they feel connected with a brand when they share common values
64% told the Harvard Business Review that shared values are the main reason they relate to a brand
Common values are a key component of trust between people. And when it comes to connecting with a brand, 66% of consumers say that trust is the most important feeling.
6. Use testimonials to build trust and credibility
Has your client gotten positive press? Great customer reviews? Industry awards? These kinds of testaments to your client’s excellence deserve attention. Consumers often rely on external validation when considering a business or purchasing a product or service, and giving them an easy way to see that can boost your client’s credibility—and their revenue.
7. Use high-quality photos and videos
The best About Us pages feature high-quality photos and videos. By quality, we mean large, crisp, original photos that match the look and feel of your client’s business and give site visitors an authentic picture of who they are. These can be photos of your client’s physical storefront, their team in action, a sampling of their products or services or other images that help site visitors visualize who your client is. Steer clear of stock photos. They’re essentially visual clichés and can detract from a business’ image.
Consider this: When one marketing agency tested a real photo of their client against their top-performing stock photo, visitors who saw an image of the actual client were 35% more likely to convert.
Videos are also a great addition to any About Us page because they’re engaging and memorable. According to some estimates, the average user spends 88% more time on a website with video and viewers retain 95% of a message when they watch it in a video compared to 10% when reading it in text.
If your client has a video that would help prospective customers get a better understanding of who they are, their business’ backstory or their products, include it. Videos can help your target audience know, like and trust your client.
8. Include calls to action and contact info
Every About Us page should have at least one call to action (CTA). Encourage visitors to do something that supports your client’s goals, like sign up for a mailing list, start a free trial, share about their business on social media or contact sales. Brainstorm with your client to see what makes sense for their user experience and strategize the CTAs accordingly.
If a visitor isn’t quite ready to convert, ideally your client’s About Us page is compelling enough to make them want to reach out. Leverage that micro-moment and make it easy for them to do so by having your client’s contact information easily accessible. Include their email address, phone number, social channels and physical address, if they have one.
Contact info is something visitors look for but it’s often overlooked by web designers. KoMarketing found that 51% of people think it’s the most important element missing from many company websites. It should be easy to find on your client’s About Us page.
11 inspiring examples of great About Us pages
These About Us pages come from companies ranging from a small design agency to tech industry giants. But they all share one thing in common: Each does a great job introducing their client in a way that’s personal and persuasive.
1. Eight Hour Day
On Eight Hour Day’s About Us page, it’s clear to see why they’re a successful and prestigious design and illustration studio. The page has a sleek design that matches the feel of the company and the rest of their website. Right away, visitors see a large photo of partners Nathan Strandberg and Katie Kirk smiling authentically. Right above that, they have a bold statement that tells you who they are, what they do and that they’re passionate about it: “...a creative studio that loves to learn, collaborate and create.” The rest of the page builds on that statement, and their credibility. Scroll and you’re given the options to learn more about their collaboration process or see their work mentioned in leading design publications. They also list their contact information twice: both in its own section of the page and the static footer. They also offer more detail about their work and what they believe in. They go on to tell site visitors: “We're excited to start a visual dialogue, learn about you, and make something beautiful together.” Between this compelling copy, the charming photo of their studio with a chocolate lab roaming around, and list of their major clients, most of which are household names like Target and Facebook, who wouldn’t want to give them a try?
2. Bulldog Skincare
Bulldog Skincare’s About Us page features a large photo of a bulldog, which helps tell their brand story. As the page shows you, he’s the mascot for this UK-based men’s skincare company created in 2005 after founder Simon Duffy had a realization while shopping. When he couldn’t find skincare products made for his own unique needs, he set about to change that. The About Us page lets shoppers know that they offer a wide range of eco-friendly products for all skin types in a way that’s clear and mission-oriented. The photos, text and overall design are engaging and true to their brand. Right in line with our fifth tip, their About Us page also highlights Bulldog’s commitment to environmental values, like recyclable packaging and carbon-neutral products.
3. Twitter
Hundreds of millions of people use Twitter every month. But you won’t see stats like that on Twitter’s About Us page. In fact, they don’t explain what their platform does, how it works or who uses it at all. Instead, Twitter showcases users’ tweets to show all of that. For example, as of the time of this writing, all of the tweets featured on their About Us page included resources for COVID-19. Using this approach, site visitors get to see the Twitter platform in action rather than reading about it. The design of their main About Us page is simple, with bars of bright, solid colors and minimal text. Their main header reads: “Twitter is what’s happening in the world and what people are talking about right now,” which stokes the reader’s fear of missing out. Further down, the page reads “Spark a global conversation,” which communicates the message that Twitter is an interactive, international platform, without saying it outright. The page ends with an “Explore Twitter” CTA, which links to login. This About Us page breaks rules in all the right ways.
4. Sara Dietschy
Sara Dietschy is a YouTube star and popular online content creator whose website promotes her many projects clearly and with her trademark energy. Instead of having a dedicated About Us page, she includes everything you’d need to know about her upfront on her website’s homepage, effectively making it an About Us page. The top of the page grabs your attention and gives you a sense of her work and personality with a lively video montage of her interviewing artists and celebrities, skateboarding through her hometown of NYC and even juggling. Beneath the montage, the page tells you about what she’s best known for: hosting a YouTube channel with vlogs, a docuseries and tech reviews. It also cites her more than 525,000 subscribers, which lets potential advertisers and collaborators know the level of exposure they’d get working with her. Next up on the page is a tally of some of the big brands she partners with, including Intel, AT&T, Visa and Adobe, followed by some text about her weekly podcast “That Creative Life,” where Dietschy interviews top artists and businesspeople. The photos are fun, the design simple and the text is informative and playful. It all comes together to portray Dietschy as your hip guide through the frontiers of technology and creativity.
5. Lonely Planet
Lonely Planet’s About Us page is a great example of effective marketing for its target customer base. Its design is bold and simple, telling the company’s story with large, eye-catching photos and short blocks of concise text that link to more information about the company’s books, mobile app, website and values. Their main headline, “Just Go,” motivates the reader and makes a strong statement right away. The next text you see tells you what drives the company: putting travellers at the heart of everything they do, informing and inspiring them with trusted content. The photo montage that follows shows travellers using the company’s products, which come in print, mobile and online versions. This page is engaging, informative and sure to inspire a visitor’s wanderlust.
6. Rent the Runway
Rent the Runway is a company with a revolutionary business model, which enables its 9 million customers to rent the latest fashions from more than 550 designers and ship them back when they’re done. The About Us section of their website is unique, too, spanning eight different pages dedicated to different aspects of their business, including the company’s vision, story, offerings and process. Between the lively photos, engaging copy and authentic commentary from customers, employees and the two co-founders, you don’t have to be a fashionista to feel inspired. The opening line describes their vision: “To make women feel empowered and self-confident every single day.” The second line hints at how hard they worked to make it happen: “We were told we were crazy. We’re glad we didn’t listen.” All of the above gives site visitors plenty of fuel to convert or learn more.
7. Eventbrite
Eventbrite’s technology platform helps event creators around the world plan, promote and produce live events from festivals to air-guitar contests. Their About Us page starts with a clear, inspiring statement of the company’s purpose: “Bringing the world together through live experiences.” The page also includes impressive stats, like the fact that they “powered 4.7M events in 2019,” along with three separate links for different segments of their target audience: event hosts, event attendees and job seekers. The simple, vibrant design is accompanied by quality photos and concise, exciting copy, making it strong overall About Us page.
8. Hungryroot
The headline on Hungryroot’s About Us page reads “Healthy is personal,” which captures the essence of this personalized meal subscription service. Customers fill out a food profile, and based on that, Hungryroot sends them healthy meals that require minimal preparation. The large photos look delicious, and the text is clear and fun. For example, Hungryroot lists three standards for its food: it has to be nutritious, easy to prepare and “taste damn good.” The clear brand voice and tone set this page apart. Among the funny bios and stop-action photos of its 4-person leadership team, there’s even a VP of Product and Personalization whose hobby is foraging for mushrooms. In a smart move, the page ends with a CTA inviting visitors to build their meal subscription plan, which takes them to the sign-up page.
9. Simple as Milk
Simple as Milk is a team of freelance designers, developers, illustrators and copywriters with an eclectic approach to their work that shines through in their About Us page. Its minimalist design starts with a thick red banner with the word “simple” in large white letters, which shift around as you scroll. The company’s tone is whimsical and consistent throughout the page. They also communicate their passion for their work by stating their mission: “to develop awesome brands, make lifelong connections, and build a bunch of heckin’ fun things.” The page lists the services they offer, samples of their work and clients, along with links to more info about their team and work. They also link to their Twitter, Instagram and Dribble accounts, as well as a spot where site visitors can message them on Slack, giving people an easy way to connect.
10. SpaceX
Rocket launches and space capsules make for spectacular photos and videos, and the SpaceX About Us page takes full advantage of them. Against a large, beautiful image of distant stars and galaxies, the first block of text states what the company does: design, manufacture and launch advanced rockets and spacecraft. This sentence is followed by its underlying mission: “to revolutionize space technology, with the ultimate goal of enabling people to live on other planets.” The rest of the page builds on that dramatic statement. For example, the page features a video of a launch of the company’s well-known Falcon Heavy rocket, and another of SpaceX founder Elon Musk making the case for space travel. Next on the page is an interactive timeline showing SpaceX milestones from 2002 to present, more info on the company’s plans for the future and contact information with a map showing company locations across the U.S. With all of these components, this page makes a strong impression and gives visitors a deep understanding of the company and its mission.
