Company Description: How to Write Yours, 12 Examples, and a Free Generator

What is a company description?

A company description is a short text that says who your company is, what it sells, who it sells to and why a customer should pick it. In a business plan, it is the section that comes right after the executive summary: the reader has seen the headline numbers and now wants to understand the business behind them. Outside the plan, the same text lives on your website's About page, in the About section of your LinkedIn company page, in directory listings and in the two sentences you say when someone asks what you do.

You will also see it called a business description or a company overview. The words are interchangeable. A description is not the same as your industry, which is a fixed category: our company industry lookup guide explains the difference between the two fields.

What changes from one place to another is the length and the reader. A lender reading your plan wants the legal structure and the location. A visitor on your website wants to know quickly if you are for them. Here is how the formats compare.

The lengths above are common practice, not rules. When a platform caps a field, its own form shows the limit: check it there before you paste.

What to include in a company description

A complete company description answers the classic questions: who, what, for whom, where, since when, why you. In practice, that gives ten elements. The format decides which ones you keep.

• Company name (legal name in a business plan). Every format.
• What you do, starting with a verb: makes, sells, helps, repairs. Every format.
• Who it is for: your target customer, as precisely as you can say it. Every format. Do not skip this one: it matters most.
• The result your customer gets: the problem solved or the outcome. Pitch, plan, About.
• What makes you different, ideally with a proof the reader can check. Pitch, plan, About, listing.
• Location and the area you serve: the headquarters city is often the first thing people check. Plan, About, listing (essential for a local business).
• Year founded and a line of history (buyers often check a company's founding year before they talk to you). Plan, sometimes About.
• Legal structure: sole proprietorship, partnership, LLC, corporation, cooperative. Business plan only.
• Mission, in one line. Plan, About.
• Team and growth plans: the founders' background and where the company is going. Plan only, and briefly: the details belong in other sections of the plan.

A short business description for a listing keeps only four or five of these; a business plan keeps all ten. The first three are non-negotiable. A description that says what you do but not for whom reads as if it was written for everyone, which means it convinces no one in particular.

Fill these elements in once and get all five formats at the same time with our free generator. It runs in your browser, uses no AI and shows which elements each format is still missing.

How to write a company description in 6 steps

The same method works whether you are writing a business description for a plan, a website or a LinkedIn page. The trick is to start short and widen, not to write a long text and cut it down. Here is how to write a business description, or company description, in six steps.

1. Write the one-liner first. Name, what you do, who it is for, in one sentence: "Northwind Books (a fictional company) makes bookkeeping software for independent accounting firms." If you cannot write this sentence, the longer versions will not fix it.
2. Name the customer and the problem. Replace "businesses" with the real buyer: "independent accounting firms", "dental clinics in Ohio", "SaaS companies selling to HR teams". Then say what changes for them: they close the month faster, they stop losing patients to no-shows. Keep this line: it comes back at the end of this guide, to build your first prospect list.
3. Add one proof. A number you can stand behind, a customer type, a certification, a process. "Every report is checked by a certified accountant" beats "high-quality service".
4. Widen for the business plan. Add the legal structure, the location, the year founded, the mission and a sentence on where the company is going. Keep it high level: the market analysis, the team and the financials have their own sections.
5. Cut per channel. From that full version, cut down to the About section (drop the legal details, add a call to action) and to the listing (drop everything but the essentials and the difference).
6. Read it out loud, then date it. If you run out of breath on the pitch, cut a clause. And put a reminder to reread every description when your offer, your customer or your size changes: an outdated description is worse than a short one.

One company, five formats

Here is the same fictional company, Northwind Books, with its business description written for each channel. Notice what stays (name, what, for whom) and what comes and goes.

• One-liner: "Northwind Books makes bookkeeping software for independent accounting firms."
• Elevator pitch: "We're Northwind Books. We make bookkeeping software for independent accounting firms, so they close the month in less time. What sets us apart: every report is checked by a certified accountant before it goes out."
• Business plan section: "Northwind Books is a limited liability company based in Austin, Texas, founded in 2021. The company makes bookkeeping software for independent accounting firms, which use it to close the month in less time. What sets Northwind Books apart is that every report is checked by a certified accountant before it goes out. Its mission is to make bookkeeping the easy part of running a firm. Over the next three years, it plans to expand from Texas to the rest of the southern United States."
• About section: "Northwind Books makes bookkeeping software for independent accounting firms. Our customers come to us to close the month in less time, and every report is checked by a certified accountant before it goes out. Based in Austin, Texas, since 2021. Book a demo on our website."
• Listing description: "Bookkeeping software for independent accounting firms, with every report checked by a certified accountant. Austin, Texas."

The business plan version is the only one with the legal structure and the growth plan. The listing is the only one that drops the company name from the sentence, because the directory already shows it above the text.

12 company description examples (by format, audience and industry)

All companies below are fictional, except the last one. These examples cover small businesses, startups, services and B2B. Each company description example is labeled with its format and audience, followed by the element that makes it work.

1. Local bakery (small business, listing). "Family bakery in Portland's Sellwood neighborhood baking sourdough and pastries every morning since 2015. Orders for events taken two days ahead." Works because: place, product and a practical detail a buyer needs.
2. Plumbing company (small business, About). "Rivera Plumbing repairs and replaces water heaters for homeowners in Phoenix. We answer emergency calls seven days a week and give a fixed price before we start." Works because: the fixed price is the difference, said plainly.
3. B2B software (one-liner). "Ledgerway automates expense approvals for finance teams at companies with 50 to 500 employees." Works because: the company size range makes the target unmistakable.
4. Startup (business plan, investors). "Cobalt Route is a Delaware corporation founded in 2025. It builds route planning software for regional food distributors, who use it to cut empty miles. Its edge is a model trained on delivery windows rather than distance alone." Works because: structure, market and edge in three sentences.
5. Marketing agency (About, clients). "Fieldnote is a content agency for B2B software companies. We write the case studies and product pages your sales team actually sends." Works because: the result is described from the customer's side.
6. Consulting firm (elevator pitch). "I run Harbor Ops. We help mid-size manufacturers shorten their order-to-delivery time. Last year, the average client project took eight weeks." Works because: one checkable fact replaces three adjectives.
7. Ecommerce brand (listing). "Plastic-free cleaning refills for households, shipped monthly. Refill pouches are compostable." Works because: the product and the difference fit in two short lines.
8. Nonprofit (About, donors). "Open Shelf runs free reading programs for children in rural Kansas libraries. Every dollar raised funds books and volunteer training." Works because: donors see exactly where their money goes.
9. Staffing firm (About, job seekers). "Northline Staffing places licensed nurses in short-term contracts across Ohio hospitals. We handle licensing paperwork so you can start faster." Works because: it speaks to the candidate, not to the hospital.
10. Restaurant (local, listing). "Neighborhood Thai kitchen in Austin serving lunch and dinner, with gluten-free options marked on every dish." Works because: the detail that settles a choice is in the first two lines.
11. Manufacturer (business plan, lenders). "Ridgeway Metal is a family-owned LLC founded in 1998 in Grand Rapids, Michigan. It machines precision parts for agricultural equipment makers in the Midwest and plans to add a second production line in 2027." Works because: a lender gets age, ownership, market and the use of funds.
12. Derrick (our own, one-liner and About). "Derrick helps sales and marketing teams build and enrich B2B lists of companies and contacts. You use it in its web app, in Google Sheets, in Claude or ChatGPT through MCP, or through its REST API, and the free plan includes 100 credits a month." Works because: it names the customer, the job and where it runs.

Fill-in-the-blank templates (one per format)

A business description template saves you the blank page. One template per format, using the same fields as the generator above. Replace the brackets and read the result out loud.

• One-liner: "[Company] [does what] for [target customer]."
• Elevator pitch: "We're [Company]. We [do what] for [target customer], so they can [result]. What sets us apart: [difference or proof]."
• Business plan: "[Company] is a [legal structure] based in [location], founded in [year]. The company [does what] for [target customer], who use it to [result]. Its advantage is [difference]. Its mission is to [mission]. [One sentence on growth plans.]"
• About section: "[Company] [does what] for [target customer]. Our customers come to us to [result]. What makes us different: [difference]. Based in [location] since [year]. [Call to action]."
• Listing: "[What you do] for [target customer], [difference]. [Location]."

Mission statement vs elevator pitch vs tagline vs description

These four texts are often confused because they describe the same company. They answer different questions.

The mission can sit inside the description; the reverse is not true. The elevator pitch is the spoken cut of the description, and the unique value proposition is the "why you" part, isolated. A company's LinkedIn tagline is the shortest of all.

6 mistakes that make a business description generic

Most weak business descriptions fail for the same handful of reasons. Each one below comes with a fix.

• No target customer. Before: "We provide innovative software solutions for businesses." After: "We make bookkeeping software for independent accounting firms."
• Adjectives instead of proof. Before: "World-class, customer-centric service." After: "We answer within one business day, and every report is checked by a certified accountant."
• Jargon. Before: "We leverage synergies to optimize financial workflows." After: "We help accountants close the month faster."
• Too long for the format. A five-sentence one-liner is a paragraph. Cut to name, what, for whom.
• History first. Before: "Founded in 2021 after years of experience in..." After: start with what you do today; the founding year goes at the end.
• Out of date. A description that still lists a product you dropped two years ago. Reread it each time your offer or your customer changes.

Your "who we serve" line is also your prospect list

Look again at the line you wrote for step 2: "independent accounting firms", "dental clinics in Ohio", "SaaS companies selling to HR teams". That sentence is more than a piece of your About page. Written precisely, it is the description of your ideal customer profile, and it is exactly what you need to find your first customers. Our guide to using an ICP in sales shows how to sharpen it.

In the Derrick web app, you describe that customer in one sentence and the app returns the matching list of companies or people (see import companies from a prompt). From one good customer, Find Similar Companies finds the companies that look like it. And Enrich Companies fills in each prospect's own company description, industry and size from its LinkedIn page, so you can read who they are before you write to them. Our guide to company data enrichment covers the other fields you can add. That step needs your LinkedIn account connected to Derrick. Already have a list? The same features work in Google Sheets, in Claude or ChatGPT through MCP, and through the REST API.

Reading the other side of the table? To find a prospect's description rather than write yours, see how to find a company's description on LinkedIn, how to read a prospect's description from their website, and how to research a company before a sales call.