About.me, the service that lets you create a one-page website all about you and your interests, has announced a new WordPress widget available for both the hosted .com and non-hosted .org WordPress platforms.
So, what does this widget do? Well, it shows off your About.me background, bio and services within your blog sidebar…a little like this:
This is a pretty neat tool for personal blogs, as you’ll have a ready-made ‘About me’ section on your site, with an overview of who you are and a link to all your social profiles. It also removes the need for a separate ‘About me’ page in the main menu, and it will update automatically whenever you update your About.me profile.
How to get the About.me WordPress widget
To add the widget to your hosted WordPress.com site, simply go to the Widgets section of your Appearance settings and drag the About.me widget to your preferred Widget area. Insert your About.me username, configure your widget…and voila!
It’s a slightly different process for adding it to your self-hosted WordPress.org blog – you have to upload the widget archive to your /wp-content/plugins/ directory, then activate the plugin through the ‘Plugins’ menu. Then, go to Appearance/Widgets to move the widget into your theme and configure it.
While there have been unofficial widgets in the past, this is the first time an official About.me plug-in has been made available for the omnipresent blogging platform.
About.me launched to the public in December 2010, and was swiftly acquired by AOL for what was thought to be around $1.3 million.
About.me launched a new Favorites feature earlier this year, followed by Compliment which lets you tell someone that you love their About.me page, the way it’s written or you love the background. It can also be used to let them know you’d like to collaborate.
So, for what is essentially a one-page landing page for individuals, the AOL-owned company is certainly working to build its presence on the Web.
Image Credit – Thinkstock
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