#65: Selling Yourself--The Art of a Winning 'About Page' with Melissa Cassera

The Amy Porterfield Show

Amy Porterfield

Entrepreneurship, Business, Marketing

4.9 • 5K Ratings

🗓️ 29 June 2015

⏱️ 56 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

For busy entrepreneurs, the About page of a website is one of the easiest to put off. You might throw a few vital details up there, like your name (always a good place to start) and your credentials, and promise yourself to fill it out later. Maybe you even go back and try adding some details that paint a fuller picture of you as a person. But for many, no matter how hard they work on it, their About page just falls flat. It feels fake, like you’re pretending to be someone you’re not. And that makes sense—we’re all taught never to brag about ourselves…so it feels pretty strange to suddenly write a whole page about why your customers should think you’re so great! That’s why I’m so happy to introduce you to Melissa Cassera. She’s a publicity expert (as well as a screenwriter and an actress), and if you read her own About page, you can see that she is an expert on how to write about yourself in a way that comes out warm, genuine and authentically irresistible. Why Is An About Page Important? Melissa compares the About page to the gown a Hollywood actress wears on the “red carpet.” It’s the way to show off both your importance and your individuality at once, impressing people and engaging them at the same time. The About page is where you give people just enough information about you to want to know more. In other words, you don’t want to give away the whole story on your About page—it’s their intro to all the excitement that awaits if they choose to work with you. For the reader, it should feel like they’ve met you in person, looked you in the eye and shaken your hand. So how do you convey that feeling in words? Think About How You Serve the World Rather than begin by talking about what you do, begin your About page with a line or two about why you do it. This should be the element that guides you through the writing process for your About page. If you get stuck or are wondering if you are including the right kinds of details, ask yourself if what you’ve written paints a picture of the world/society/lifestyle/change that you are trying to build with what you do. Show Your Non-Professional Side Would it surprise you to learn that the part of your About page that really sells you is the part where you talk about something besides work? This, Melissa says, is what really seals the emotional connection with people and allows them to get to know you on a more personal level. Not only that, but this section is what sets you apart from your competition. Nobody else has the same story, the same style, the same lovable quirks and personal motivations that you have. As Melissa says in her "Better Bio Challenge" blog post, "Personal details aren’t 'frivolous' — they anchor you in the reader’s mind and showcase the 'person' behind the 'business.' Try to include at least ONE little detail about your passions, guilty pleasures + personal life, in your bio — and you’ll sparkle off the page, every time." Create an “Action Step” By now, your audience has fallen head over heels in love with you…so what’s the next step? Where does the relationship go from here? Melissa says this is the moment to offer them a concrete action step. Offer a free opt-in gift, list links to your five most popular blog posts, tell them to contact you to set up a consultation. Whatever your specific action step is, make it simple and immediate for them to make the next move. Get more of Melissa's suggestions for making your About page actionable. Click here to hear the full interview. The Bottom Line: What Is Fame For? Melissa has a stellar blog post called “Four Questions to Help You Identify What's Not Working in Your Biz...And Make It Better.” In it, she offers this really thought-provoking quotation:

Transcript

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0:00.0	You're listening to the online marketing made easy podcast episode number 65.
0:06.2	Welcome to the online marketing made easy podcast business advice so easy you'll feel like you're cheating and now your host Amy Porterfield.
0:16.3	Hey there Amy Porterfield here and welcome to another edition of the online marketing made easy podcast. I'm thrilled that you're here. So thanks for tuning in today's topic is one of my favorites.
0:36.0	We are talking about your about page and we're getting very specific. I'm going to help you break it down and hopefully by the end of this podcast, you are excited to dive into your
0:46.0	about page and make it even better. Now my guest today is a true modern Renaissance woman. Melissa Cacera is known in her hometown of Los Angeles as a screenwriter and actress and a publicity expert who can take anyone's book website or platform and get it on TV.
1:05.9	But if you don't live in Hollywood, you might know her through her website Melissa Cacera.com the world's most addictive site to get publicity and sales. Her blog is filled with not just marketing advice, but personality. This girl is so funny and once you start reading, you just cannot stop.
1:24.1	Now also Melissa is someone that truly practices what she preaches so you can tell she knows what she's talking about in regard to marketing because she's really fantastic at marketing herself, which is always a good tell tell sign.
1:38.8	Today I'm going to talk about a very important aspect of marketing with Melissa as I mentioned, you're about page on your website. Now it may seem like an afterthought sometimes maybe you've put down a few vital details like your name and your education.
1:52.6	Little information about what you do and maybe you thought I'll just fill it in later when I get more time or maybe you're dreading working on your about page because you just don't like writing and you sure as heck don't want to sit there and brag all about yourself.
2:05.8	I know how that feels but we've got to put some attention to that about page. Did you know that your about page is getting tons of visits when people visit your website.
2:14.7	Sometimes it's the most visited page on your website. You got to make it good and there's some tips and tricks to really optimize that space and that is what we're talking about today.
2:25.9	Now Melissa put together our free giveaway for today and like everything she does, it is really fabulous. You're going to love it. It's called craft a crazy impressive about page.
2:37.9	And not only is it going to help you a ton, it's super fun to use. It's like plain madlibs. Do you remember madlibs back in the day if you're super young you won't.
2:47.5	But basically it's a fun way to fill in the blanks of every section for your about page and once you do this, you actually have something of great value to put on your website.
3:00.0	So it's a template that you get to fill in. So you can get this at any porterfield.com forward slash 65 download.
3:07.7	Or you can text the phrase 65 download to the number 3 3 4 4 4. You're going to love this free giveaway on this episode.
3:16.7	And thank you Melissa so much for creating it for us. It is so well done. I cannot wait for you all to jump in.
3:23.1	Now before I bring Melissa on as always, this episode is brought to you by lead pages. My favorite tool of choice that helps me grow my email list every single day.
3:33.5	One of the features I'm loving the most right now is the pop up box that I can put inside my blog post. Now you can also use lead pages to put pop up boxes inside your about page so you can be getting leads when people are reading your about page.
3:48.6	I'll mention that when we get into the interview with Melissa. But if you want to learn more about my favorite tool of all time lead pages, I created a special workshop for you.
3:57.8	It's called the four steps you need to know to quickly grow your list without spending all of your time on marketing.
4:04.5	So you can go to Amy Porterfield.com forward slash new leads and get access to it right away. It's extremely valuable. I can't wait till you dive in.
	...

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