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How to Write a Personal Bio

via How to of the Day on 5/13/12

Writing a personal bio can serve many purposes. It might be required information for a job or school application. It could be an effective way to convey important information on your personal website. Or you might just want to write one for fun. Here are some tips on how to go about writing your personal bio.

Edit Steps

Brainstorm

Identify your purpose and audience. Before you get started writing, you need to know who you're writing for. The bio you would write for a personal web page might be very different than the bio you would write for a college application.
Narrow down your information. Be ruthless here—–even the most interesting of anecdotes may not be appropriate. For example, an author's bio on a book jacket often mentions past writing accomplishments, whereas an athlete's bio on a team website often mentions the person's height and weight. While it's often okay to add a few extraneous details, they should not make up the majority of your bio.

Begin writing

Make an outline. Beyond what you jotted down in the previous section, be sure you include the following information:^[1]
- Your name. This should be the first thing you write. Assume that the people reading the bio know nothing about you
- State your claim to fame. What do you do? Don't leave this to the end or make your readers guess—they won't and they may well lose interest quickly if it's not up front. This should be explicitly stated in the first or second sentence.
- Mention your most important accomplishments, if applicable. This is a tricky one, and might not be applicable in all situations. Remember that a bio is not a resume. Do not list your accomplishments, and only include them if they are relevant and you have space.
- Include contact information. This is usually done in the last sentence. If it's to be published online, be careful with the email address in order to avoid spam. Many people write email addresses online as something like: greg (at) fizzlemail.com.
Start writing. Once you have a clear idea of what you want to say, begin writing your bio.
- Always use the third person. Your bio is something that other people can use to describe you, therefore you should write in the third person. In addition, writing in the third person will make your bio sound more objective.
- Aim to write about 250 words. When you are done, go back and highlight the most important information. Your goal is to be able to write a one sentence and a 100 word bio in addition to the 250 word one. That way, you'll be prepared if you end up needing to cut or expand the bio.
Proofread and revise. Rarely is writing perfect the first time it hits the pages. And because personal bios are only a small snapshot of a person's life, upon rereading your bio, you might realize there was information you forgot to include.
- Have a friend read your bio and give you their feedback. This is important because they can tell you if all the information you want to get though is coming across clearly.
Keep your bio up to date. Every once in a while, go back and update your bio. By putting in a little work frequently to keep it up to date, you'll save yourself a lot of work when you need to use it again.