WordPress School: About Page

Now that we’ve covered the basics of posts and Pages, it’s time to cull from the information in your Site Master Plan to create your first page: About.

By default, WordPress automatically generates an About Page called “About.” Some web hosting services have chosen to rename this “Sample Page” or “Example Page” for their one-click installations. For our purposes, this needs to be titled About. If you have a WordPress installation without an About, we will add it.

To edit your site’s Page called “About:”

1. On the Administration Screens (interface), go to Pages > All Pages
2. Find the Page titled About and hover your mouse over it
3. Click the EDIT link
4. You are now at the Edit Page screen where you will make changes

If your site does not have an About Page:

1. Go to Pages > Add New
2. In the title of the Page, type About
3. You are ready to edit your site’s About

Why is it called About?

The Changing WordPress Interface

Beep, Beep, Poop Interface. This is what several of my students called the new interface currently in development and testing on WordPress.com. Two classes of students have not been impressed, and my clients can’t stand it, switching to what is called the “Classic Interface.”

If you get lost and confused between the two interfaces, calm down. Deep breathe. Remember that WordPress is in a constant state of change and evolution, especially WordPress.com. It is cutting edge WordPress.

• Go to the black Admin bar at the top of the web page and look for My Sites
• Hover over it and choose WP-ADMIN to get back to the Administration Screens

The purpose of the About Page is to answer the question, “What gives you the right to tell me?” There are many ways to say this, and answer this question, so let’s make it a gentle request to create trust. “I have the right to tell you these things because I’ve been there, done that, got the t-shirt, and have the callouses and scars to prove it.”

There are two basic purposes to an About on your site.

1. What is this site about? Describe the purpose, mission, and goals of the site. Why is it here, how will it help, what does it have to offer.
2. Who is behind this site? Who is the author? Who is the owner? Contributors? Who are the people behind the curtain of this site and what gives them the expertise to share and publish this information. In other words, who do you think you are that you can tell me this?

We’ve discussed web standards before, practices that are typically used within an industry and expected by those within that industry. It is becoming a standard to call this Page “About” not “About us,” “About the Company,” “About me,” and other variations. More and more people are typing in about at the end of a site address that they think is good to find out who is behind the site, and if it turns up a page-not-found, that’s not a good first introduction.

Some sites call the About “Bio.” While this works on some author and personal/professional individual sites, many are switching away from it as that highlights only the person not the purpose of the site in general. All websites serve a purpose, and people want to know what that is.

If you have an About Page called something other than About, to change the Page Title:

1. Edit the Page
2. Change the Page Title in the Page Title field
3. Edit the Page Slug, the address of the Page under the Page Title field, to be “about”
4. Update the Page.
5. If you have links or menu items for that Page, these will need to be updated

What is Found on an About Page?

What you put on the About Page must support the answers to the two questions of what the site is about and who is behind it, justifying its existence. Typically this includes:

1. Images of the author
2. Logos and branding
3. Images of products and services
4. Links to related content such as other sites by the same author/company, or to related resources

Information on how to contact the author is not needed here, but a link to the Contact Page will be later. That’s a future assignment.

Assignment

Your assignment for the About Page is to edit it and add your information.

To edit the About Page:

1. From the Administration Screens, go to Pages > All Pages
2. Hover your mouse over the Page titled About
3. Click the Edit link
4. The resulting screen is called Edit Page
5. Edit the content within the Page content area
6. To preview, click Update, when the page reloads, click Preview
7. A new tab with the front end view of your Page will appear in the browser tab row. Click the tab to view it.
8. If there are changes to be made, leave that tab open and switch back to the edit tab in your browser and make the changes. Update the page and switch back to the other tab and reload the web page to see the changes.
9. When you are finished, click Update and leave the Edit Page screen

We will explore how to add content in a future lesson, but for now, see how far you can go on your own. The WordPress Page toolbar is very similar to a word processor. Experiment and see what happens.

To help you create your About Page, the following articles may help:

• Put You Inside Your Blog Where We Can See You – Blog Your Passion
• Who The Hell Are You? – Lorelle on WordPress
• Business of Blogging: Purpose, Customers, and Content – Lorelle on WordPress
• Prove It Campaign
  • Prove It: It’s Starts With Defining Who You Are
  • Prove It: Kym Huynh Exposed – Lorelle on WordPress
  • Prove It: What Makes You Trust a Website?
  • Prove it! Kym Huynh Bio Reloaded
  • Prove It: Defining Your Avenues of Communication and Marketing
• From Blog Exercises Series:
  • What Do You Do?
  • What Are You Talking About?
  • What Are You Talking About Revisited
  • What Are Your Reasons For Blogging

This is a tutorial from Lorelle’s WordPress School. For more information, and to join this free, year-long, online WordPress School, see:

• Lorelle’s WordPress School Introduction
• Lorelle’s WordPress School Description
• WordPress School Tutorials List
• WordPress Publishing Checklist
• How to Give Feedback and Criticism

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