About Me? It’s about them.
Your ‘about me’ page on your website is where people are coming to get to know you better. They want to know who you are and why you do what you do. It’s not about formalities, listing credentials, awards, achievements. It’s about your story. There are other sections on your site that you can detail your work, show off these credentials and explain why you are the best at what you do. But your about me page is a personal account of your journey. Consider it a casual conversation between you and another person.
Contrary to what you might think, Your ‘about me’ section is about you, but it’s not for you. It’s for your visitors and potential future clients. It’s for people who want to contact you to know what to expect from you, your personality, you mindset and how you’re passionate about what you do. Your work will speak for itself. There is no need to explain your best work and how this won an award and this pitch got accepted by this fortune 500 company. An ‘about me’ section is not for showboating, you’re not trying to convince people to work with you from there. You’re not going to attract new clients from your ‘about me’ section.
Let the your work showboat itself, and not just in your ‘about me’ section, this that goes for everywhere your work is located online.
At all times you have to consider what the reader is taking from your about me section, how is it helping them. They want to know what you can help them with and how you can solve their problems. You can show how you exactly solved problems with your case studies on a separate page. Use your ‘about me’ section to tell people what you do, and the challenges you overcame to arrive where you are and why you do what you do, no matter what it is. How can you help the people who are reading your ‘about’ page? Frame it to the reader that you can help them with something. Make it about the reader.
An ‘about me’ section is a good opportunity to show your social proof to people. How are you going to focus the section around the reader, what can they take from it. Your goal is to make people trust you after reading your ‘about me’ page. A good way to do this is to have testimonials. Have you got any testimonials from people in your industry? Have you worked with another credible, well-known person in your industry who can vouch for you.
Craft a story, you can have a short version of you about you section, wrapping up your key traits and a short story.
Link to your best content, the ‘about me’ page is a good place to direct people where you want them. If you write your page well, you can get the reader invested in the story. Make it relatable to them. If you do, people will be more likely to go through the ‘about me’ journey, clicking on the links as they go along with the story. Include your best work in these links. If you worked a day job for a number of years before starting this, link to the work that you used to create, even if you’re embarrassed by it now. People like to see where you have come from to where you are now. Further emphasising the importance of crafting a story in your ‘about me’ page.
The worst thing you can do is “I do this, I make that, I will be”. That only talks about yourself on the surface level. Make it about the people who are reading. How can you help them?
Read it through the eyes of a visitor. Ask a friend or relative to read it and see what they think about it. Tailor it around what they say. Because they aren’t the ones crafting it, there will be less emotional ties to it, but also a fresh pair of eyes that can scan through and pick up on something that you may have missed or could change to make it sound better to the reader.
Not only ask a friend to read your ‘about me’ section. Ask a friend to write your ‘about me’. This will clarify how you are seen to people on the outside. What I mean is, people who aren’t you. How does someone describe what you do. It’s easy to get wrapped up in a bubble where you get a clouded view of what you do because you have all these plans and you do all these little things on a daily basis. Ask yourself; How do others view me and my work?
It’s not formal, and it’s not entirely important, there isn’t a wrong way you can make an about me page, but there is an entertaining and embracing way you can do it that enthrals the user in your life story that made you arrive to where you are now.
How can you benefit the reader? Sell the benefits to them through your story. Plant the idea in the mind of the readers of how you can benefit them and their lives.
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