What makes a good "hire me" page?

We had a great chat today in the !& community where we did a group crit of each other’s “hire me” consulting pages. The conversation was vibrant and engaging and I’d love to draw out some common themes of what works for these pages. Five areas kept coming up:

Design, Personality & Style

Yes design is important, but perhaps more so is personality and style. Patricks’ page doesn’t show his face and yet his personality and style comes through clearly. The cafe image (while too large we agreed) really shows some sensibility that clients can relate to and engage with. I think clients often look for a consultant that they can resonate with and form a working partnership with - this requires a shared sensibility and “way of looking at the world”.

Jorge’s page has a lovely evocative image that shows energy and enthusiasm. Things that likely come with a consulting engagement.

Provocation: how can you make this page show off your personality, not just who you are.

Describe what you do for the client

As someone said on the call “don’t describe what you do, describe what you do for the client” - i.e. don’t talk about the work, talk about the impact for the client. This doesn’t have to be in terms of actual business metrics but should be in the terms the client will use.

Steve’s page does this pretty well - focusing on specific things that the client might want “develop your team’s research superpowers.”

Provocation: how can you channel some client empathy to understand their ultimate objectives

Demonstrate Trust & Expertise

This can be as simple as a list of client names that people recognize - or could be as detailed as linking to conference presentations you’ve given. Anything that reassures clients that you are trusted, an expert and looked up to by your peers.

Provocation: what are the signals your client looks for, not what are the things you’re proudest of

Show your thinking

Good clients for indie consultants often look like sparring partners and thought partners (to steal Patrick’s phrase) - so how can you expose the way you think?

Linking to your writing is a great way to do this - Toby’s page has links to blog posts that really demonstrate his thinking and perspective which is great.

Provocation: what piece of writing shows off your distinctive point of view to a client

Executive readiness

A common refrain for these “hire me” pages is using a little too much domain-specific language - which can get you stuck working with managers and VPs. How might you get to the c-suite? It’s ok to use some to describe the work but executives in particular look for business outcomes - independent of specific skillsets. Can you position yourself as executive-ready?

Provocation: How would you re-write your page if you knew someone from the c-suite was reading it?

What else is important for these pages? Things the jury is still out on:

• How detailed and long should these pages be?
• Does embedding a video work here?
• What call to action is most effective - form, email, calendly?
• How personal should you make it? Company or individual?

What else is important?

And, of course if you’re looking to work with me take a peek at my “hire me” page.