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About Page November 3, 2025 10 min read
I Built an AI to Roast My Own About Page. It Was Brutal (And Right)
By Blake Downward
start·a·story
I Built an AI to Roast My Own About Page. It Was Brutal (And Right)
Every founder I know dreads writing their About page. Including me.
I’ve been building start·a·story, a tool that helps founders write their actual story instead of corporate CV. But here’s the problem: to build something that genuinely helps, I need to understand what actually makes a founder story connect.
So I built a roast tool. An AI that scores About pages on four dimensions: story, trust, clarity, and action. Then I fed it my own …
Blog → About Page
About Page November 3, 2025 10 min read
I Built an AI to Roast My Own About Page. It Was Brutal (And Right)
By Blake Downward
start·a·story
I Built an AI to Roast My Own About Page. It Was Brutal (And Right)
Every founder I know dreads writing their About page. Including me.
I’ve been building start·a·story, a tool that helps founders write their actual story instead of corporate CV. But here’s the problem: to build something that genuinely helps, I need to understand what actually makes a founder story connect.
So I built a roast tool. An AI that scores About pages on four dimensions: story, trust, clarity, and action. Then I fed it my own page first.
Score: 4.5/10. “A sterlie corporate brochure masquerading as an About page that tells us everything except why we should care.”
Ouch. But to be completely fair… it was true!
Now I’m opening it up. I need more pages to roast - not to be mean, but to find the patterns. What separates an About page that builds trust from one that gets skimmed and forgotten?
This post is a living document. As I find out more, I’ll update it with what I’m learning.
Want to help me figure this out? Get your page roasted →
Why I’m Doing This
Here’s the honest backstory to it. start·a·story is supposed to help founders uncover and write their authentic story. But “authentic” is fuzzy. “Compelling” is subjective.
I needed something more concrete.
So I’m treating this like research:
- What story elements do high-scoring pages have in common?
- Where do founders consistently get stuck?
- What “rules” (like “keep it short”) actually matter, and which are myths?
The roast tool is both a lead magnet and a learning engine. Every page that gets scored helps me understand what founders struggle with. In turn, this makes start·a·story even better at solving those struggles.
Right now, I’ve roasted three pages (including my own). That’s not enough data. But patterns are already emerging.
And I need your help to test them.
What I’m Looking For (The Four Scoring Dimensions)
The AI evaluates pages against four dimensions. These aren’t best practices pulled from a marketing blog… they’re testable hypotheses about what makes founder stories work.
1. Founder’s Fingerprint (Story)
Theory: Pages with a real human origin story score higher than those written in corporate “we”.
So far: My page didn’t even mention me, so it only scored a 2/10. The other two? One scored 8/10 (opened with an engaging personal turning point), the other scored 3/10 because at least they mentioned the founder’s name.
The difference was stark. One made me lean in. The other scored 3/10.
2. Trust Thermometer (Credibility)
Theory: Specific proof beats vague claims every time.
There’s a world of difference between “trusted by hundreds of companies” and “worked with 47 B2B SaaS founders in 2024.” The second one actually means something. It’s falsifiable. It’s real.
The roast tool flags phrases like “industry-leading,” “award-winning,” and “trusted by thousands” unless they’re backed by something concrete. Not because they’re lies, but because they’ve been so overused they’ve lost all meaning.
3. Jargon-o-Metre (Clarity)
Theory: The more buzzwords, the less trust.
“Innovative solutions” and “customer-centric approach” are the linguistic equivalent of beige paint. They’re safe. They’re professional. They’re completely forgettable.
My own page got absolutely hammered here. Phrases like “comprehensive storytelling framework” and “strategic narrative development” sounded impressive in my head. On the page, they sounded like I was trying to hide behind fancy words.
The 8/10 page said “I help founders stop sounding like robots.” Clear. Simple. Human.
4. Call-to-Action (Action)
Theory: If a reader doesn’t know what to do next, they won’t do anything.
The best pages treat the CTA like a natural next step in the conversation, not a button awkwardly bolted to the footer.
“Contact us” is too vague. “Book your free strategy call now!!!” is too pushy. The sweet spot? Something like “Here’s what to do if this resonates” or “Ready to tell your story? Here’s how we start.”
Natural. Clear. Human.
What the First Three Roasts Revealed
Even with just three pages, patterns emerged that surprised me.
Pattern #1: Founders bury themselves
All three pages (including mine) took too long to reveal who was behind the company. We hid behind “we” and “our team” and “our mission.”
The highest scorer put the founder’s name and face in the first 100 words. Not in an egotistical way - just honest acknowledgment that this company exists because a human decided to build it.
It’s such a simple thing. But it changes everything. Suddenly the page isn’t about a faceless entity. It’s about a person who decided something needed to exist.
Pattern #2: “Professional” sounds inhuman
My page got dinged for trying too hard to sound credible. I used phrases like “comprehensive storytelling framework” because I was thought “I help founders write their About page” sounded too simple.
Pattern #3: Missing the moment of change
The best About pages have a “before/after” built in. Something happened, so I built this. It’s basic story structure; tension, turning point, resolution.
But we forget it when writing about ourselves. We jump straight to “here’s what we do” without explaining why it exists in the first place.
A typical About page starts with something like, ‘We provide innovative solutions for modern businesses’. A killer About page will start more like, ‘I watched my co-founder spend six months tweaking website copy that still sounded like every other SaaS company’.
One is a claim. The other is a story. Stories stick.
Pattern #4: CTAs are either invisible or desperate
Two extremes:
- “Contact us” buried in the footer (might as well say “please ignore this”)
- “Book your FREE consultation NOW and transform your business TODAY!!!” (screams desperation)
A 10/10 page ends with “If this sounds familiar, here’s what happens next.” Then three simple steps. No pressure. No hype. Just clarity.
Turns out, people appreciate being treated like adults who can make their own decisions.
Why About Pages Matter (And Why They’re So Hard)
About pages are weird. They’re often the 2nd or 3rd most-visited page on a site, but founders treat them like an afterthought.
Here’s why they actually matter:
- Investors read them to see if you’re self-aware
- Potential customers read them to decide if they trust you
- Future hires read them to see if you’re worth joining
- Partners read them to gauge culture fit
Your About page isn’t just marketing copy. It’s the place where people decide whether you’re real.
And here’s why they’re so hard to write: you’re trying to sound credible without sounding arrogant, human without being unprofessional, confident without being salesy.
It’s paralysing. You write a sentence, delete it, rewrite it, delete it again. You toggle between “this sounds too casual” and “this sounds like it was written by a committee.”
Eventually, most founders settle on something safe. Professional. Polished. Utterly forgettable.
That’s the problem start·a·story exists to solve - but first, I need to understand the problem at scale.
How the Roast Tool Works
It’s deliberately simple:
- Drop in your About page URL and a couple of details about your audience
- The AI scans it against the four dimensions
- You get a score, a roast, and specific flags
It’s not prescriptive (“change this word to that word”). It’s diagnostic (“here’s why this isn’t landing”).
Think of it like a brutally honest brand strategist who doesn’t charge $2,000 a day… and who’s still learning.
Because here’s the thing: this tool gets better the more pages it sees. Your roast helps you and it helps me build better storytelling tools for every founder who comes after you.
The feedback is pointed, but in a humorous way. When my page got scored 4/10, the roast was: “Your About page has all the human warmth of a software license agreement - not a single founder name, face, or story to be found, just faceless corporate speak about your team of experts.”
That stung a little, I won’t lie. But it was true. And it helped.
Roast my page (and help the research) →
What Happens Next
This post is version 1.0. As more pages get roasted, I’ll update it with:
- New patterns that emerge across different industries and founder types
- Before/after examples (anonymised, only with permission)
- Surprising findings that challenge conventional wisdom
- What actually separates a 3/10 from a 9/10
I’ll also share how these insights shape start·a·story; what features I add, what assumptions I challenge, what founders actually need help with.
This is active research. You’re not just using a tool - you’re helping build a better understanding of what makes founder stories work.
If you want to follow along, I’ll be sharing updates as the data grows.
The Fix (When You’re Ready)
Here’s what I’m learning already: most founders don’t have bad About pages because they’re bad writers.
They have bad About pages because writing about yourself is psychologically bizarre. You second-guess every sentence. You toggle between confidence and cringe. You end up with something safe, polished, and utterly forgettable.
That’s exactly why I’m building start·a·story.
Instead of staring at a blank page, you answer questions. The AI interviews you like a journalist would; asking follow-ups, digging for specifics, finding the story you didn’t know you were telling.
Then it helps you turn those answers into website copy that actually sounds like you. Not like a corporate brochure. Not like a LinkedIn post written by someone trying to impress strangers. Like you.
The roast tool tells you what’s not working. start·a·story helps you fix it.
But first… let’s see what your page reveals.
Get Involved
Get your page roasted: Takes 2 minutes, it’s free, and it’s only mildly painful
See how Start a Story works: The tool that helps you actually fix what the roast reveals
Your About page is probably the hardest page on your site to write… because it’s not really about your company. It’s about whether a stranger decides you’re worth trusting.
Help me figure out what makes that decision happen.
Get your page roasted. I’ll learn something. You’ll learn something. And maybe we’ll both end up with better stories to tell.