AI Prompts for Writing About Pages That Build Trust

Before: The Weak Prompt

What's the point of an About page? Most companies get this wrong — and it shows in how they prompt AI to write them.

The weak prompt looks like this:

Write an About page for my company. 
We're a digital marketing agency founded in 2018. 
We help businesses grow their online presence.

This is the prompt equivalent of a handshake with no eye contact. It produces copy that sounds like every other agency About page ever written: we're passionate, we're dedicated, we put clients first, we believe in results.

If you've read an About page in the last five years, you've read this page.

Why It Fails

The weak prompt fails because it treats an About page as a bio instead of a conversion tool. About pages are actually the second or third most-visited page on most websites, and they have a specific job: convert a curious visitor into a contact, lead, or buyer.

Three specific failures in the generic About page prompt:

1. No visitor intent. Who comes to your About page? Usually someone who's already interested but not yet convinced. They have a question — "can I trust these people?" — and they need an answer. A prompt that doesn't understand this writes copy that answers "who are you?" instead of "should I trust you?"

2. No story arc. The best About pages follow a narrative structure: here's the world before we existed, here's why we started, here's what we've learned, here's where we're going. A generic prompt produces a list of facts, not a story.

3. No specificity signal. "Help businesses grow" describes 80% of the business world. It means nothing. But "helped 43 e-commerce brands reduce return rates by focusing on product photography and description accuracy" means something very specific — and it immediately signals capability to the right buyer.

⚠️ Common mistake: Treating the About page as your company's origin story when visitors actually want to know if you can solve their problem. The story exists to build trust; it's not the point.

After: The Improved Prompt

You are a brand copywriter writing an About page for [company/personal brand].

Visitor context: This person is [describe who visits your About page — potential client, potential hire, press contact, or all three]. They're asking: "Can I trust this person/company to [specific outcome]?"

Company/Brand details:
- Founded: [year] by [founder context — not just name, but relevant background]
- The specific problem that caused the company to exist: [one concrete frustration or gap the founder saw]
- What you do that's specific (not "help businesses grow"): [one concrete deliverable with a result attached]
- Who you've done it for: [specific client types + one stat or result]
- What you believe that most in your industry don't: [one contrarian opinion that defines your approach]
- Team size and structure (if relevant): [brief]

Write the About page in these sections:

Opening paragraph (hook): Start with the market frustration or the moment that created the company — not "We are [Name]." Under 60 words.

Our story (150 words): Narrative arc. Problem → decision to start → first wins → what we learned → where we are now. First person (we/I). Include one specific number.

What we do differently (100 words): One opinion about your industry that most companies wouldn't say. Why your approach produces different results.

Who we work with (75 words): Be specific enough that the wrong client self-selects out. "We're not for everyone, and that's fine. We work best with [specific client profile]."

Social proof (placeholder): Note what type of proof to gather — client logos, press mentions, specific stats

CTA (25 words): One specific action — not "Contact Us." Something that feels like the natural next step.

Tone: [professional/warm/direct/conversational — pick one and describe what it sounds like]

What this does: Forces the AI to write to a specific visitor with a specific question rather than generating generic self-promotion.

⚡ Pro tip: The "what you believe that most in your industry don't" field is the most differentiating element in any About page. If you can't answer it in one sentence, you haven't defined your positioning clearly enough. The AI can't invent this for you — but once you write it, the AI can frame it compellingly.

Breaking Down Each Element

The opening hook earns its place by refusing the most common About page opening format: "[Company Name] is a [adjective] [type of company] that [generic claim]." A hook that starts with the problem — "Most [clients] spend [amount/time] on [activity] and still don't get [result]" — creates immediate resonance with the right reader.

The contrarian opinion section is what makes About pages memorable. The temptation is to avoid taking positions to appeal to everyone. But visitors who read About pages are evaluating whether they'd want to work with you. A clear point of view is actually more persuasive to the right client than non-committal professionalism.

"We're not for everyone" is actually the most trust-building thing you can say on an About page. It signals honesty and specificity. If your company works with anyone who'll pay, you have no positioning — and experienced buyers can feel that.

⚡ Pro tip: Run the About page prompt twice — once as the company writing about itself, once as a satisfied client describing why they chose you. The second output usually contains one or two phrases that ring truer than anything in the first. Incorporate those phrases into the final version.

Variations for Different Contexts

Personal brand About pages (freelancers, consultants, solo creators):

Write an About page for a [role] who works with [client type].

Personal brand context: Unlike company pages, this must convey personality, not just credentials.
Include: one specific story from your work that illustrates how you think, not just what you do
Avoid: resume-format (led, managed, delivered) — use present tense and first person
Show: what it's like to work with you, not just what you can do

Agency or team About pages:

Write an About page for a [size] team. 
Individual team sections: For each person, write 2 sentences: what they're brilliant at (specific), and one humanizing detail (not hobbies — something that connects to the work).
Team culture note: What do we believe about how work should be done that clients will actually notice?

Save and Reuse This

Once you've written an About page prompt that produces on-brand output, it's worth keeping. Your company's story, positioning, and client profile don't change often — but you'll refine the copy. Save the prompt in PromptABCD with a note on what variables produced the strongest sections so the next revision starts from a better place.

⚡ Pro tip: Add 'The About page will be read by someone who just Googled [company name] after hearing about us from a colleague — what's the first question they're trying to answer?' to any About page prompt. This reframes the visitor's intent and produces much more relevant opening copy.

⚡ Pro tip: For company About pages with multiple team members, run individual bios through a consistency prompt: 'Review these team member bios and ensure they follow the same format, similar length, and consistent tone. Flag any bio that reads significantly differently from the others.' Inconsistent team bios undermine the professional impression the rest of the page creates.

About Pages for Different Business Types

The core About page prompt works across most contexts, but three specific business types need modified approaches that aren't covered in standard About page guides.

Nonprofit and mission-driven organizations:

Write an About page for a nonprofit. The visitor is deciding whether to donate, volunteer, or partner with us.
Critical difference from commercial About pages: This is about the mission's impact on others, not the organization's achievements.
Structure: 
- The world we're working to change (specific, not abstract)
- Why we believe this approach works (evidence, not assertion)
- What we've achieved so far (specific outcomes for specific people)
- How the visitor can be part of this
Avoid: Organizational jargon, generic impact language ("changing lives," "making a difference")

Solo consultants and independent practitioners:

Write an About page for a solo consultant. The visitor is evaluating whether to hire this specific person.
Key tension: Personal credibility without sounding arrogant. Specific expertise without narrowing too much.
Must include: One story that shows how you think, not just what you've done. Clients hire consultants for their judgment — the About page needs to demonstrate judgment, not just credentials.
Length: 400–500 words. Solo practitioners often over-explain — brevity signals confidence.

Early-stage startups (no track record yet):

Write an About page for a pre-revenue startup. We have no case studies, no major clients, and no press coverage yet.
Alternative credibility signals to use: Founder expertise and experience, the specific insight that led to starting the company, the problem's scale and why existing solutions fail it.
Tone: Honest about where we are. Confident about where we're going. Avoid future-tense promises that can't be backed up.

Save your About page prompt variations in PromptABCD organized by business type — you'll use them again.

Personal Brand About Pages: The Authenticity Problem

Personal brand About pages have a problem that company pages don't: they have to sound human while being written by AI. The gap between "this sounds like a real person" and "this sounds like AI writing a person" is detectable to most readers within two sentences.

The fix is a specific prompting technique:

Before writing this About page, ask me 5 questions about my background and work that will give you enough specific detail to write something that couldn't have been written about anyone else.

After I answer, incorporate those specific details naturally into the About page copy — not as bullet points, but woven into the narrative.

What this does: Pulls the specific anecdotes, opinions, and experiences that make a personal brand distinctive before generating copy — instead of generating generic copy and trying to personalize it after.

The result reads differently than AI-generated About pages because it is different: the raw material is genuinely personal, and the AI's job is to structure it, not invent it.

⚡ Pro tip: Run the "ask me 5 questions" prompt, answer the questions as you would in a conversation (not in polished sentences), then pass both the questions and your conversational answers back to the AI as the source material. The unpolished, casual tone of your answers often produces the most authentic-sounding About page content — because it's the closest the AI gets to your actual voice.

Save your personal brand About page prompt and your answered source questions in PromptABCD. When you update your positioning or add new credentials, you can regenerate the copy from the same source material with the new additions incorporated.