As Jordan Belfort, the real Wolf of Wall Street, famously asserted, “People don’t buy on logic; they buy on emotion, and then justify their decision with logic.” Though Jordan Belfort might have come up with that excellent quote, the idea that emotions hold more weight than logic in purchasing decisions is, frankly, self-evident. You only need to be a casual observer of people to notice that we depend on emotions to guide very important decisions.
This is not something that many intelligent people want to hear. After all, if they admit that they are slaves to their emotions, it implies that they aren’t all that logical to begin with.
However, study after study after study confirms the central role human emotions and accompanying biases play in our decisions. This is exactly why your search engine optimization (SEO) and other digital marketing campaigns must account for this if you want to get the best possible results.
This is where your “About” Us page comes in. Before your e-commerce channel can earn followers or sales, potential customers must know who you are, what you do, and why you do it. If they don’t have that information or dislike what they see, they are likely to move on to a competitor that offers a stronger emotional pull.
Why Have an “About Us” Page?
About Us pages exist primarily to make emotional arguments for their respective websites. Search engines may prioritize sites that have fleshed-out About Us segments but that’s almost certainly because people who are new to a business want to visit them. In fact, About Us pages are typically among the most visited on e-commerce sites.
In any case, you won’t see many successful websites stuffing these pages with the technical details needed to make logical arguments. Instead, you’re most likely to find information on the business’s founders, its mission and vision, as well as the more general details that set it apart. In other words, successful website owners understand that visitors go to About Us pages for the business’s story, from which they can get clues about its trustworthiness.
If you’re leveraging any form of marketing that drives traffic to your website, forgoing an effective About Us page will degrade the trust you need to gain conversions. Visitors who find an uninspired page with boilerplate content or no page at all cannot be expected to trust your business or be emotionally invested in what you have to offer.
SEO Benefits of an Effective “About Us” Section
It’s clear that About Us pages can directly benefit your business’s credibility. However, they also help your website’s SEO. Indeed, it’s very likely that Google and other search engines look for About Us pages as an indicator of quality. Let’s examine some of the specific SEO benefits you can derive from building a strong About Us page:
- Direct Search Visibility: Direct searches for brands or websites will often pull up About Us pages, probably because search engine developers understand the intent value of these pages for brand and website keywords. If customers discover your brand through channels like TV or unlinked content and they look it up on Google Search, your About Us page may be one of the links they are served.
- Increased Engagement: An engaging About Us page keeps visitors on your site longer, reducing bounce rates. This positively feeds into the way search engine bots perceive your site’s overall quality, helping boost its search engine visibility.
- Better On-Page SEO: These pages are excellent places to organically incorporate relevant keywords and phrases. If these additions are properly executed, you can improve your search engine ranking, making it easier for potential customers to find you.
How to Create a Compelling “About Us” Page
Every business has a different story, so it’s difficult to prescribe a one-size-fits-all approach to building these pages. That said, start with these steps and readjust them as you get to know your key customers:
- Start with a Strong Opening: Using your business’s brand guidelines, write a headline that balances confidence and agreeableness. The goal should be to make your new visitors comfortable.
- Tell Your Story:In your story, highlight your mission and values, explaining why your business exists and what drives you. If your brand allows it, insert anecdotes that add a relatable human touch.
- Introduce Your Team: Include high-quality photos and short bios of key team members. When relevant, highlight their expertise so that visitors know your team means business.
- Showcase Your Achievements: Mention any awards, recognitions, or certifications your business has received to reinforce your credibility.
- Incorporate Customer Testimonials:These provide valuable social proof that bolsters your emotional appeal.
- Use Visuals: These help break up text and make your page more engaging. Make sure that the visuals don’t slow down your page’s loading speed.
- Incorporate SEO Best Practices: As mentioned, About Us pages are invaluable for SEO. Implement the usual best practices and make sure your page loads properly on mobile devices.
- Add a Call to Action (CTA): Don’t forget to encourage visitors to contact you, subscribe to your newsletter, or explore your offers.
- Keep It Updated: Keeping your information relevant avoids embarrassing disconnects with visitors that keep you from gaining their trust. Try to update your About Us page at least once a year or whenever your business undergoes significant changes.
- Proofread and Edit: A polished and professional page reflects well on your business, helping it gain trust.
Always Remember What’s Most Important
Your About Us page is not the only place customers can learn about you. They can learn about your business through ads, friends and family, and even through firsthand contact with you and your team. However, without a well-constructed About Us section, your business will struggle to establish trust with many of its potential customers—especially if it relies on organic search traffic.
Trust is really all it comes down to. Whether you’re constructing an About Us section or considering how you want to use emerging generative AI in your business processes, earning trust and keeping it should be the first things on your mind. Like all of your customer-facing assets, your About Us page must always build upon the wider emotional arguments that convince them to buy.
