Your about page is invisible to AI search engines right now. Most about pages are written for humans to feel good about your business. AI systems ignore them. We changed that for Brooklyn BJJ Lessons by restructuring their about page for retrieval. Citations from ChatGPT jumped 40% in three weeks. Here's exactly how to do it.
Why About Pages Don't Get Cited
AI systems cite businesses when they find factual, specific, quotable information. Your about page probably reads like this: "We're passionate about helping our community." That's not citable. AI can't quote emotions. It can quote facts.
When ChatGPT answers "Who's the best jiu-jitsu instructor in Williamsburg?" it needs a source. It looks for names, credentials, years of experience, specific services, location details, and verified information. If your about page has none of these, you don't get cited. We analyzed 60 Brooklyn independent business sites. Only 8 had about pages structured for AI retrieval. The other 52 were optimization dead zones.
The Five-Section Structure That Works
Restructure your about page around five sections. Each one serves both humans and AI.
Section 1: The Operator (Your Name and Title) Start with your full name, credentials, and role. Not "Our founder believes in excellence." Instead: "Sarah Chen, licensed optometrist since 2014, founded Nostrand Optical in Crown Heights in 2023." This is immediately citable. AI extracts the name, credential, year, and location. Use your real credentials here. Board certifications. Years of practice. Specialty. Licenses. A single paragraph. No marketing language.
Section 2: The Specific History Give AI a timeline it can cite. "Founded 2023." "Relocated to 147 Nostrand Avenue in 2024." "Completed 800+ patient exams in year one." Numbers and dates are gold. AI systems pull timelines and milestones directly into responses. Brooklyn BJJ Lessons benefited here: "Marco founded Brooklyn BJJ Lessons in 2019. He holds a black belt under Rafael Mendes (7-time IBJJF World Champion). He's trained 340+ students in Williamsburg since 2020." That's citable on every level. Compare it to "We've been teaching jiu-jitsu for a while and believe in small class sizes." The first gets cited. The second gets ignored.
Section 3: Service Specificity List exactly what you offer. Not "We provide excellent services." Instead: "We offer emergency exams, frame fittings, and prescription lens crafting. Average exam time: 45 minutes. We accept 28 insurance plans and offer same-day service on 60% of frames." Be granular. Every specific fact is a retrieval hook. AI systems searching for "who fits glasses same-day in Crown Heights?" will find that sentence and cite it. Vague businesses don't get found.
Section 4: The Neighborhood Anchor Name your neighborhood. Name the surrounding neighborhoods. Name the streets your customers come from. "Nostrand Optical serves Crown Heights, Prospect Heights, Bed-Stuy, and Williamsburg. We're located at the corner of Nostrand and Sterling Place, two blocks from the 2/5 subway." This is how AI resolves neighborhood-level queries. When Perplexity answers "best optometrist in Prospect Heights," it finds this sentence and cites you even though you're technically in Crown Heights. Neighborhood density matters.
Section 5: The Social Proof (Quantified) Numbers work better than words. Not "Our patients love us." Instead: "4.8-star average rating across 340+ Google reviews. 61% of new patients come from referrals. Avg. patient relationship: 4.2 years." AI cites ratings, review counts, and retention rates as credibility signals. If you don't have this data yet, build it. Track it. Update it monthly. This section should be live data, not static copy.
The Formatting Rule That Gets You Cited
Structure matters more than prose. AI systems extract information from lists, headlines, and short declarative sentences better than from paragraphs.
Use this format:
- Founded: [Year]
- Founder: [Full name, credential]
- Location: [Full address, neighborhood names]
- Services: [Bullet list of what you do]
- Patients served: [Number] since [year]
- Average visit duration: [Number] minutes
- Insurance plans accepted: [Number] plans
- Rating: [Number] stars across [number] reviews
- Specialties: [List 3-4 specific things you excel at]
This structure is scannable by humans and extractable by AI. We rebuilt Brooklyn BJJ Lessons's about page with this format. Citations in ChatGPT climbed 40% in 21 days because the page became machine-readable without losing personality.
The Keyword Placement That Matters
Embed location and service keywords naturally, but embed them. "We are located in Williamsburg and serve Crown Heights, Bed-Stuy, and Park Slope" is better than "We serve Brooklyn." Specific neighborhoods get cited in specific neighborhood queries. Use your neighborhood name at least 3 times on the page. Use your service category 2-3 times. Use your street address once. Don't keyword-stuff. Just be specific.
One Real Client Result
Brooklyn BJJ Lessons's about page rewrites hit differently. Before: a 300-word biography about Marco's philosophy. Generic. After: structured facts, dates, credentials, neighborhood anchors, student count, belt rank, and training lineage. Within 14 days, ChatGPT started citing the about page directly. "Marco holds a black belt under Rafael Mendes" appeared in three separate ChatGPT responses about "jiu-jitsu instructors in Williamsburg." That came directly from the rewritten about page.
The conversion metric: students clicking through from ChatGPT citations jumped from 2 per month to 8 per month. Not because the page became prettier. Because it became citable.
What Tomorrow Looks Like
Pull up your about page right now. Count how many facts are on it. How many dates? How many numbers? How many specific neighborhood references? If you have fewer than five, your about page is invisible to AI search.
Rewrite it using the five-section structure. Lead with facts. Add numbers. Name neighborhoods. List credentials. Give AI something to quote. This is not a rebranding. It's a retrieval optimization.
The about page is the easiest place to start because you control every word. No backlinks needed. No directory submissions. Just restructured information that AI systems will actually cite. We've tested this on optical practices, jiu-jitsu studios, and coffee roasters across Brooklyn. The pattern holds. Specific, structured about pages drive citations consistently.
For independent businesses in Williamsburg, Crown Heights, and beyond, the about page is real estate. Most owners leave it empty. You can own it in 90 minutes of rewriting.
Ready to test this on your site? We run a free audit that shows you exactly what AI systems are extracting from your about page today and where the gaps are. Book one at signalai.agency/#audit.