Writing an About page that actually sells

The About page is the second-most visited page on most small business websites and the worst written.

The standard version goes something like: "Founded with a vision of excellence, we are a customer-centric organisation committed to delivering quality services. Our dedicated team works tirelessly to ensure complete customer satisfaction."

Nothing in that paragraph is false. Nothing in it is useful either. Swap the business name and it fits any company in any industry.

What a customer is actually doing on that page

They are not there out of curiosity. They arrived because they are close to deciding and they want to feel safe.

Specifically they are checking:

• Are these people real, and how long have they been doing this?
• Do they know what they are doing? What are their qualifications?
• Is this a proper business or someone's side activity?
• Do they seem like people I would be comfortable dealing with?
• Is there any reason to pick them over the other place?

Note that none of these are answered by "committed to excellence".

A structure that works

1. One sentence that says exactly what you are.

"Verma Motors is a multi-brand car service garage in Sector 45, Gurgaon, run by the same family since 2004."

That single line does more than a page of adjectives. It says what, where, and how long — the three things being checked.

2. How it started, in three or four honest sentences.

Not a mission statement. What actually happened.

"Rajesh Verma trained as a mechanic at a Maruti dealership and opened a two-bay workshop in 2004 with one lift and a helper. His son Aman joined in 2016 after finishing his diploma, and brought in diagnostics equipment for the newer cars. We now have six bays and eleven people."

This is more persuasive than anything you could claim, because it is specific and checkable and nobody makes up a story with that little drama in it.

3. What you specialise in, and what you do not.

"We do a lot of Maruti and Hyundai work — that is what we know best. We do not do insurance claim work, and we do not do heavy accident repairs."

Saying what you do not do is one of the strongest trust signals available. It is the opposite of what a business trying to catch everybody would say, so a reader believes the rest of the page more.

4. The people, with photographs and names.

Faces, real ones, with names and roles. For clinics, salons, coaching centres and anything where a customer is trusting a person, this is the most important part of the page.

5. Credentials, plainly stated.

Registration numbers, qualifications, certifications, association memberships, authorised dealerships, years in business, number of customers served. Facts, not claims.

6. One thing that only you could say.

Something small, true and specific. "We still keep a parts register by hand, because it means we know what we put in your car three years ago." "Our tandoor is the same one from 1991." "We are closed on Tuesdays because that is when we do our own training."

These details are what a reader remembers, and they are the only part of the page a competitor cannot copy.

Words to delete

If any of these appear on your About page, they are occupying space and contributing nothing:

• excellence, quality service, customer satisfaction
• one-stop solution, best in class, world-class
• customer-centric, client-focused
• committed to, dedicated to, striving for
• state-of-the-art (unless you list the actual equipment)
• passion, journey, vision

Test each sentence: could my nearest competitor put this on their page unchanged? If yes, it is not doing any work.

Length

Three hundred to six hundred words. Long enough to be substantial, short enough to be read.

Break it with headings and photographs. A wall of text on a phone does not get read regardless of how good it is.

The photographs matter more than the words

One good photograph of the actual owner, in the actual premises, looking at the camera, does more for trust than the entire page of text.

Add: the team together, the workspace, and something that shows the work being done.

Not: stock photographs of people in suits shaking hands. Everyone recognises them and they subtract credibility rather than adding it.

The last line

End with what you want them to do, and make it easy.

"Come by any day between 9 and 7, or call Aman on 98xxx xxxxx. If you want an estimate first, send a photo on WhatsApp and we will tell you what it will cost."

Apna.live builds your pages and lets you edit every line on the page itself, in your own words. See yours.