What is About, about?
http://about.me/Robertabud
What is the about page on your website about?
About means many things – a story, an approximation or almost doing something
Your Website About Page
I was listening to David Risley describe the about page as a sales page. He said that your page should have 5 key areas:
- Your Elevator Pitch – or unique selling pitch
- The benefits of you and your blog or service
- An opt in for more info
- Your story written from the point of what is in it for your clients rather than you were born, went to school and worked with …”yadda, yadda”
- Your opt in again
BUT is It?
Your about page should be about you but from the clients point of view.
It is about WIIFM – what you can do for them.
It is about starting the relationship and giving them a reason to come back yet again to learn more.
What do you want to see when you look at an about page. I know that the last thing I want is a sales page. I want to know that the person has the attitude, the ability and the passion to help me. I want to know that the person has some experience that says that maybe they have the knowledge to help me. And if they are using energy or spiritual means, then I want to know that they are genuine people rather than con artists.
What are QUALIFICATIONS about?
Qualifications used to show that you studied the lore and wisdom of past people who studied and learned from their predecessors. You gained a qualification because you could demonstrate in an examination or practice that you had retained the information you were taught and could apply it in the exam environment.
Now we could discuss what has happened with qualifications or how many people just memorize massive information and regurgitate it without understanding but that is another topic for another blog. In this one I want you to consider that qualifications mean that the person went to some course somewhere, spent time learning the topic and then was assessed on that learning. How much they learned, how well they can apply it or how much they understand the subject is immaterial to the achievement of the qualification. They had a piece of paper given by some school or organization that says they know something about the topic. Some dues have been paid somehow.
What are Skills about?
A skill is the ability to do. The only proof that a skill exists is that there is evidence in terms of a tangible thing or an outcome. Skills have evidence of performance and can be verified by many different people rather than just the organization handing out a qualification.
What is experience?
Experience just proves that somewhere along the line, you convinced someone to employ you to do something and for a specific amount of time, you performed the tasks required by that job. Now sometimes that means doing the same job over and over again. Sometimes, the experience is constantly changing and the person could be seen as unfocused or unstable. But experience is about learning and applying what we learn. Experience shows that you got the qualification, applied the skills and someone else valued these and paid you money to do a job for them.
The value of the experience is always subjective but easily verified if the right questions are asked by others.
What’s It all about?
But your about page is about your experience, your skills and your qualifications but is also about reassuring your visitor that you are the person that they can deal with to help them. When a potential client reads your about page, they want to know WIIFM but more importantly they want some assurance that if they pay you money to help them they will get the help they want.
What are you about?
In the comment box, you have an opportunity to tell the readers what you are about and also to think about what you offer as evidence that you can help others.
And please share with others so that people think about the about page.
To your success
Roberta Budvietas
How Has the Web/Internet changed Business?
The biggest effect that the Web has on business is that it is almost impossible (without outside information) to tell a tiny one-man-
Transactions matter to business?
band from a multi-national conglomerate!
Think about it:
It takes only a few dollars to buy an URL for a business.
It takes a little bit of time to set up an account with an ISP to house your pages, and a few more hours to set up a web site.
If you use WordPress or Facebook, and it would only cost you a little bit of time to have a Web Presence that is every bit as impressive as that of many of the largest multinational company.
With a little bit of effort (and a couple of apps) you can add a ‘shopping cart’, have a PayPal or Google account to handle credit card and virtual cash transactions, and you are up and running as a business.
Do some browsing and ‘surfing’ on the Web.
What is there on the pages you see that tells you the size of the business?
The chances are: NOTHING!
A one-person business can look as professional as one put out by a huge company. It can have as many products, and as many bells and whistles.
The fact is, business is all about transactions – you provide a product or service, and someone pays for that product or service.
In a bricks and mortar environment, the costs of having a store or an office or a slew of stores and offices are indicators of how large the business is. It is an indication of how wide the service is rather than how well the business is doing. The number of “branches” tells you that your are no longer dealing with a tiny one-man operation.
While the larger business may deliver more variety and the one man business may tailor better to specifics; it always comes down to transactions and the level of satisfaction for both parties.
On the Web, transactions are a critical part of the business, but a business with one transaction a week looks identical to one that has a million transactions a day.
That’s what the Web/Internet has accomplished: it makes every business equal in ways that could never have happened in a bricks and mortar environment. It has refocused business on the one thing that really matters: the individual transactions.
The transaction orientation is changing the emphasis of how we do business. It means that transaction costs can now be kept to a bare minimum. It means that buyers have the ability to look at the packaging and handling and buy exactly what they want rather than told and sold. Transactions allow for higher trust and relationship building. Transaction based business have no physical boundaries, no size limitations, no restraints.
Are you managing transactions or are you worried about SEO and web presence? In the comments, tell me what is preventing your one man business from looking like a big business?
Roberta
Passionate Purposeful Performer
Transactions are a key part of the 10 Critical Criteria.
Have you looked at how your business matches those criteria yet? Find out more about the criteria today.
Websites are More than Glorified Brochures
Image via Wikipedia
Once upon a time, websites were glorified brochures.
The tools that were available and affordable to create websites basically limited what the business owner could do. So they asked their graphic and creative people to work on a marketing piece that they could put on line with their contact details and maybe some additional information.
But the on line world has changed.
Lets look at the challenges of creating a web site that is a brochure:
The first challenge is to keep it current, relevant and accurate
Next is that brochures tend to either leave out information or are too wordy. Part of what makes a good brochure is placement of pictures and white space. And while web pages need white space, it is not always easy to be creative with a web page the way one can be on paper, especially if you are using tools like WordPress or Joomla. They are not easy to add flairs and creativity. It is possible but challenging. You will need both a graphic person and a coder more than likely to get the special effect of brochures.
And finally, if you website is a brochure, how will you reach different target clients. A brochure is often tailored to specific target markets. A good web site will allow visitors to drop in from different markets to different pages and pick up the relevant information for them to make decisions with.
Your web site is more than a brochure and you need to keep that in mind when you think about your web site.
To start getting it right for your business, think of 5 things you think are most effective about your biggest competitors website.
How could you implement those elements in your web site? What content will you use? What graphics and what other ways will you make your website more user friendly.
Roberta
Simplifier, Presenter, Mentor
Maven Connect
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Guest Blogging with Jon Morrow
