Nobody (I hope) is making things up when writing their About page. That’s not the problem.
The problem is what’s missing.
Most surf camp and surf brand About pages read like a highlight reel. Founder fell in love with the ocean as a kid. Quit the corporate grind. Built something from nothing. Pardon the facetiousness. Cue the sunset photo.
The issue is that it’s all completely beside the point.
Because the person reading your About page isn’t there to learn about you. They’re there to answer one question: can I trust this person, brand or place with my money, my week off and possibly my safety?
If you want to understand exactly where that reader sits in their decision, this breakdown of the stages of customer awareness is worth a read.
And that question doesn’t get answered by a nice story. It gets answered by the stuff most owners leave out because it feels too boring, too practical or too much like admitting a weakness.
Guys, this is where all the juice is. Let me explain.
What “lying by omission” actually looks like
You’re not fabricating anything. You’re just filling the page with the parts that feel good to write and skipping the parts your guest actually needs.
A couple of examples I see constantly:
The camp that talks about its “Passionate, experienced team” but never says how experienced. Five years? 15? Are your instructors locals or seasonal hires who rotate every few months? These details matter. Imagine you’re a nervous beginner trying to figure out whether you can trust the team you’re booking with.
There’s a pretty big difference between five years and 15, right?
The e-commerce brand that leads with “We’re a family surf business” but never shows you the family. No names. No faces. No mention of who actually makes or ships the product. Which family? Doing what exactly?
None of this is dishonest in the legal sense.
Where I see a problem is that it’s optimised for how you, as the founder, feel about the brand, not for what your customers or guests need to feel when booking or buying from you.
Your customer is the hero, not you
This is the part that trips people up, especially if you’ve built the business yourself and it genuinely is your story.
Of course it is! Nobody’s saying leave your story out entirely. I’ve written before about why your customer is the hero and not your brand, and an About page is where that idea gets tested the hardest.
In saying that, your About page story only earns its place if it answers a customer or guest’s unspoken question. Not “Who are you” in the abstract, but “Why should I trust you specifically with this worry I have?”.
So instead of “I fell in love with surfing at sixteen and never looked back”, it’s worth asking what that sentence is actually doing for a stranger deciding whether to hand over a deposit?
Probably not much on its own.
But “I fell in love with surfing at sixteen. And one thing that love taught me fast is that you can’t fake knowing a break. That’s why every instructor here has to surf it themselves before they’re allowed to teach on it” does something completely different.
Can you feel it?
You’re leveraging part of your story to create a connection with the reader.
How to fix it without oversharing
Let me be crystal clear here: You don’t need a confession booth.
You need specificity in the places that matter and restraint everywhere else.
A decent way to test your current About page: read it as if you’re a first-time site visitor with a real, specific worry.
Not a strong swimmer. Travelling solo. Needs a board that floats well. Whatever applies to your business. Your past reviews and testimonials are usually the fastest way to find that specificity if you’re stuck on where to start.
Does the page address that worry anywhere? Do you answer the question every reader has: what’s in it for me?
Some places worth getting specific instead of vague:
Group ratios and batch sizes matter too, whether that’s how many guests share an instructor or how long the wait list is for a custom board. Say the number if it’s a strength.
Then there’s the stuff nobody wants to write. What happens when a swell goes flat, a board doesn’t turn out right or a garment doesn’t fit like it should? One honest sentence here beats a hundred sunset photos or product shots.
And don’t be afraid to say who you’re not for…
Feels counterintuitive, but naming who won’t have a great time or experience makes everything else you say more believable. Vague inclusivity reads as sales talk.
Gentle, empathetic exclusion reads as honesty.
How to write an About page that actually meets your reader where they are
Here’s the order that tends to work, and it’s more or less the reverse of how most people write it.
1. Start with their worry, not your origin story
Write down two or three things a first-time customer is genuinely unsure about, whether that’s a guest, a shaper’s client or an apparel buyer. Not what you assume they care about. What they’d actually search or ask a mate who’s already bought from you. That’s your outline.
2. Lead with the boring facts
Experience, how long you’ve been running, what actually happens once someone books, orders or buys. Least fun to write, most useful to read. Get it done early. And if finding the time for this kind of upkeep is the real obstacle, here’s how to divide marketing tasks between you, your team and a pro so it doesn’t eat your week.
3. Say what happens when it doesn’t go to plan
One honest sentence on how you handle things going sideways. A flat swell, a warranty claim, a garment that doesn’t fit. This does more trust-building than the rest of the page combined.
4. Name who it’s not for
Doesn’t need to be harsh. “Not built for someone chasing the cheapest option” does more for your credibility than another paragraph of “for everyone.” You can’t name who you’re not for until you’re clear on who you are for, which is really a brand messaging question.
5. Now tell your story, but only the part that proves something
Your history earns its place once it’s tied to a standard you hold yourself to, not just a nice memory. If it doesn’t change how someone reads the rest of the page, it’s a caption, not a paragraph.
6. Write it to be skimmed
Short paragraphs, real headers, no walls of text. People are scanning for the one line that answers their worry. Make it easy to find.
The line you don’t need to cross
This isn’t a call to overshare. You don’t owe strangers your business’s financial history or a list of everything that’s ever gone wrong. Oversharing is its own kind of self-indulgence, just dressed up as transparency.
The line is simple enough. Include what changes a customer or guest’s decision. Leave out what only satisfies your own need to be understood. Your About page was never really about you. It’s the one page on your site where a stranger is actively looking for a reason to trust you before they’ve met you.
Might as well give them one.