We believe that representation with a minimum of other obligations required (friend requests, constant content creation, etc.) is the basic foundation of a personal page on the web.

In the past few years, we got away from our unique brand of simplicity, adding lots of “engagement” features, as we chased metrics. While we generated millions and millions of compliments & collections, we cannot honestly say that either of those features created enough meaningful value for our users.

In addition, the world has changed. A lot.

1. First impressions now happen online and increasingly on mobile devices;
2. The workforce is shifting from full-time employees to independent, “part-time” contractors, also known as 1099 contractors (1 in 3 of all professionals in the Bay Area & New York are 1099’ers 40% of all professionals nationwide will be 1099’ers in the next 4 years); and
3. The next generation desires to turn their hobbies into businesses, 76% of college students today think they’ll turn their hobby into a source of income.

These trends underscore how everyone will increasingly need a personal page with a purpose. It’s even more important for people working for themselves and anyone who has a passion based side project. As a result, we’ve reimagined about.me and we’re betting the company on this thesis.

The new about.me personal page combines simplicity (beautiful pages, easy to make, easy to understand, easy to use) with a new feature called “Spotlight” that creates tangible value by enabling you to communicate what’s singularly important to you. Said another way, what’s your call to action? Everyone has an objective, and Spotlight enables you to communicate that in a clear, effective way.

We’ve done extensive user testing and research around personal page creation to make it drop dead simple for everyone to make an about.me page in less than 2 minutes from any device. Once you make your about.me personal page, we give you a set of tools so you can easily add a link to your Email Signature, Social Profiles; or use as a Digital Business Card.

We love the results: users are showcasing a specific Spotlight on their page to get jobs or consulting gigs; drive people to their website, blog, articles or social media pages; sell their products; support their charities; download their apps/ videos/ music; support their college application; get speaking gigs; support their Kickstarter crowd funding campaign; sign up people to their newsletters, etc.

Here are a few examples of people getting value from their about.me page.

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Tony Conrad is the co-founder of about.me.