"About Us" Pages

What It Is

Having an "About Us" page is a best practice for managing your agency's website. The page should provide basic information about your agency and any other agency that sponsors your site. The public expects to see this link on every page of your website. If that’s not feasible, at least provide a link from your homepage and every major entry point. The page should be called "About Us" or "About (Your Organization’s Name)."

Why It's Important

The public, including students and researchers, often wants to know something about the organization that sponsors a public website.
An "About Us" page tells the public who’s accountable for the website's content.
The E–Government Act requires specific information that must be included on all federal public websites, and several of these requirements are most appropriately included on an "About Us" page. (See details below under "How to Implement.")
Having consistent content and terminology across government websites—such as having "About Us" pages—helps the public find what they need. Users of government websites will know what labels to look for, and will be confident they’ll get the same basic content when they get there.

Specific Policy, Legal, or Other Requirements for Doing This

There are two sections of the OMB Policies for Federal Agency Public Websites that refer to having organizational information on your website:

Section 3F: "identify mandatory links and post (or link to) the following information on their principal website and any known major entry points to their sites: 1) the agency's strategic plan and annual performance plans; 2) descriptions of agency organizational structure, mission and statutory authority"
Section 6A: "clear and unambiguous public notification of the agency's involvement in or sponsorship of its information dissemination products, including public websites"

How to Implement

What To Include: At a minimum, include – or link to – the following pieces of information on your "About Us" or "About (Organization Name)" page:
- Full name of your agency
- Name of your agency head and other key staff, as appropriate
- Contact information
- Basic information about your parent and subsidiary organizations and regional and field offices, as appropriate
- Information required by Section 207 (f)(1) of the E–Government Act of 2002:
  - A description of your organization's mission, including statutory authority
  - Strategic plan
  - Organizational structure (such as an organizational chart)
Where To Put It: The public expects to see a link to your "About Us" page from every page of your website. If that's not feasible, at least provide a link from your homepage and every major entry point. Usability testing and research has shown that most people look for the "About Us" link in the top navigation bar or banner area of your site. You can also repeat the link in the bottom navigation bar or footer area of your site if you find that’s helpful to your users.
Smaller Organizations: If you're a small organization that doesn't have a specific mission or strategic plan, you can link to your parent organization's mission and plan.
Org Charts: If possible, make your organizational chart interactive and clickable, to help visitors find additional details about different units of your organization.
Use Plain Language: Write and explain your agency's mission and strategic plans in terms the public can understand.
Other Languages: Consider providing a version of your "About Us" page in Spanish and other languages, as needed, depending on your audience. Speakers of other languages are often looking for basic information about U.S. government agencies and what they do. The Websites in other languages page explains more about your agency’s obligation to provide information in other languages.
Kids' Pages in the .Gov Domain: The "About Us" link can go to:
- Your parent organization's "About Us" page, or
- An "About Us" page written for kids. If you choose this option, include a link to your parent organization's "About Us" page on the "About Us" page written for kids. This will help parents who may want to know more about your agency.
Kids' Pages Using the Kids.us Domain: You can publish the URL of your parent organization's "About Us" page.

Examples

Resources

"About Us" Page Sample Template – You can use this template to see an example of how to organize and write the different content pieces that should be on your "About Us" page.

Many federal public websites follow this best practice. This practice is part of the guidelines and best practices published by the Interagency Committee on Government Information to aid agencies' implementation of OMB Policies for Public Websites.

Page Updated or Reviewed: August 7, 2008