Something that I have wanted to do for a long time is take a look at the web’s best About Us pages.
Why? Because a good About Us page is very hard to come by.
Normally they are a boring, self-serving mix of me me me and us us us. But a they are so vital to your business. In fact, its usually the first place people look before they start to take you seriously. Get it wrong and you could be turning people off without even knowing it.
In this post I am going to show you what I consider to be 12 of the best About Us pages on the internet. I’m going to go through them all, one by one, and show you what makes them so good.
A good About Us page is nothing without…
It doesn’t matter how good your About Us page is if you don’t have your own domain name and web host.
If you are using a free blog like Tumblr or Blogger you are growing a brand that you don’t fully own or control. This is a huge shame.
I’m guessing that you are really trying to create something special (given that you are researching how to write about About page for your business) so please take the extra time to get your own distinctive domain and grow a brand that stands out.
The definition of a good About Us page
I need to start this article by qualifying what makes an amazing About Us page. The reason for this is that some About Us pages look amazing but have terrible content whilst others look terrible but grab your attention immediately. The list I have compiled here are based on the fact that they:
- Get the point across
First and foremost an About Us page has to get a point across. Everything else is completely useless unless the content and the layout is achieving a goal. That goal is to tell the user who you are by showing them what you can do for them or have done for others. - Give you the information you need
Some About Us pages spend the whole time talking about what it is that the company does and nothing about the staff members. Some do the opposite. Unless the page gives the information that you need based on the type of site you are on then it won’t make the list. - Give you social proof, testimonials and other authenticity statements
A good About Us page always needs to have some mention of past successes, achievements, social proof, etc. Giving concrete examples of why your site or blog is worth reading is extremely important for these pages. - Don’t let design elements negate the potency
Some of the About Us pages I am about to show you will make you weep because they are so beautiful. Some not so much. But it is important to note that I haven’t included any pages on here purely because they look nice. This last dot point is all about thatBlue-Shirt Trust; as long as the design doesn’t detract from the message I’m cool with however it looks.
I didn’t want to go in to too much detail here because I am going to talk about the advantages of each About Us page as we go through them. I’m hoping to use this post as a way of showing you what I believe you should be doing on your own page.
Special tip for About Page conversions
Since writing this post I have included an Aweber sign up formon my About page and have seen a hugely successful subscriber rate. It seems that people want to subscribe to you while they are reading about you!
12 of the best About Us pages on the internet
Let’s jump right in and start looking at these About pages. As always, if you have any other suggestions from sites that I have missed please leave a comment and let me know. Even more importantly, if you don’t like one of these pages I would love to hear why not. Oh, and these are in no particular order. I just couldn’t do it.
1. Copyblogger
“Want more traffic, links, subscribers, and a profit-generating website? Copyblogger gives you the solutions you need to succeed.”
How different and refreshing it is from the usual, “I am so and so and I am doing such and such”. The Copyblogger about page is all about you and what you will learn from his website. It isn’t until way down the page that he actually introduces who he is.
Most “experts” start their about pages talking about themselves. Here Clark gives reasons why his blog will help you. What this does is actually give his following credentials more weight because you are curious as to who is providing all this amazing value. Rather than talking about how good he is, he lets his examples talk for him.
2. Problogger
The thing about Darren is that he is his own brand. People love him and become very loyal to the Problogger brand not so much because of its excellent content, but because Darren is a constant voice of guidance and support. His About Us page echoes this personal branding with a story based introduction followed with paragraphs on how you can get the most out of the site and his content. Plus his green jumper is gangster!
If I could make one suggestion for Darren it would be to include more of his amazing press. He’s been mentioned in dozens of newspapers and even been featured on prime time news here in Australia. That is incredible credibility for all the newcomers finding his site.
3. Tim Ferriss
“Tim is Indiana Jones for the digital age. I’ve already used his advice to go spearfishing on remote islands and ski the best hidden slopes of Argentina. Simply put, do what he says and you can live like a millionaire.” -Albert Pope, Derivatives Trading, UBS World Headquarters
Tim’s About Us page is written in the third person and done to great effect. It is a good way of being able to list his myriad of achievements without sounding like a bragging private school kid. The focus of his page is references – social proof coming from some of the most popular news stations and magazines around the world. Read this page and you are certain to go on and check out the blog.
4. SEOmoz
As you can see from the screenshot, their About Us page is broken up into sections like “team”, “press”, “awards”, etc. At first you see a statement about what they do but delve deeper and you find a really cool timeline about how they got to be as good as they are as well as seeing all the people behind the scenes and all the awards they have won.
The key thing to take away from the SEOmoz About Us page is that sometimes more is more. If you have accomplishments and awards and other things that people will respond to then you should use them. If you can present it in a tasteful and non-cluttering way as they have done you will be all the better off.
5. Andrew Reifman
The cool thing about this page is that his facial expression and body language tells you so much about the kind of worker he is. Match that with the hilarious way of displaying his skill set (looks like he’s almost beaten a video game) and you get a wonderful picture in to the vibe of the business. To me this would be the perfect About Us page if it just included a little bit of social proof.
6. Mail Chimp
Mail Chimp’s About Us page is a mixture of humor and well written copy. Its one of the simplest of the pages were looking at today but don’t let that fool you. Its actually a clever little pre-sales page. They give you one paragraph about themselves and then say:
But enough about us—let’s talk about you. Whether you own a business or manage email newsletters for clients, you need an email–marketing service that takes care of the complicated stuff so you can focus on your job.
This is a very good About Us page for a company where, in all honesty, it doesn’t really matter who is behind it. Simplicity and focus.
7. Tumblr
Check out the page and you will see the first part devoted to mass social proof – stats of how many people are using the service. Then you get high definition photography of the people and the offices followed by 36 words that make up the sharpest concept copy you will ever read.
Scroll down further, however, and you see something interesting. They let other brands tell you what Tumblr is. They have sound bites from the New York Times, Forbes and Business Week telling you what Tumblr does and why it does it so well. The chosen quotes are short but they paint you a full picture of the service.
The last thing they show you is a growth chart. Need they say more?
8. Adidas
What you need to take away from this one is that super freaky graphics can be an incredible user experience or they can be a downfall. If you use them I suggest that you make it only a part of the page, not the whole page. That way you ensure that people still get something if the graphics fail to deliver.
9. Twitter
One of the best things about this page is that they spend a lot of time overcoming people’s objections. I’ll be talking about this a lot more here on Blog Tyrant but it is basically a sales technique where you sell your product by making sure people’s doubts and hesitations get quashed. Twitter is basically helping you get out of your own way because if you are on their About page you are obviously thinking about signing up.
10. National Geographic
Note: You can achieve a very similar effect by using the Red Shark theme that you see below on your own WordPress site.
11. Gummisig
You might have noticed that hip web savvy people are now creating a trend of using massively over sized text to present a shocking or interesting idea. Gummisig does it really well here by starting with a joke and progressively moving the text size down as it gets more serious. He ends with a bunch of testimonials. I’m not sure why he didn’t get a testimonial from IKEA though as he built their website!
If you want to use big text like this it is a good idea to consult a designer as it can come out looking really bad.
12. Bentley Motors
The About Us page does an excellent job of creating that magical and illustrious vibe. They use rich professional photographs and enticing copy like:
“The six-time success at Le Mans has made Bentley more than a car – it has come to stand for a way of doing things: with spirit, flair, courage, instinctive intelligence and teamwork.”
The whole point of this About Us page is to get you to feel part of the experience. To draw you in to their way of thinking and acting which is, in fact, their marketing plan and branding. Remember that your About Us page often serves as a point of consolidation – the place where people go to put your whole vision together.
Which ones do you like?
To close off this post I would really like to know a few things from our wonderful little community. Please drop a comment and let me know:
- which one is your favorite and why?
- which one is your least favorite and why?
- what other About Us pages do you know of and like?
I’m really interested to hear what everyone has to say on this matter. Please tell me what you think.
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