New York — Twitter has just unveiled a completely revamped homepage, intending to give first-time visitors a glimpse of what the micro-blogging and social-networking site offers and the real-time benefits it can provide, beyond being just a repository of status updates, including adding something called “Twitter 101.”
Nevertheless, Twitter’s popularity has skyrocketed in the past few years, but many people are still unable to grasp how the service works or how it can be useful for them.
Somehow, Twitter has since long had difficulty with its homepage design. The site originally possessed a sparse and static homepage, which contained only a quick blurb describing the service and pushed new users to sign up.
But the latest redesign will now feature more “dynamic content” on the front page, including a set of algorithmically-selected column of recent “tweets,” which is sorted by importance and quality and refreshed after every few seconds. The site will also offer up a list of suggested users, which you can hover over for profile information and recent tweets.
“All of our recent changes adopt the notion that Twitter is not just for status updates anymore,” Twitter designer Doug Bowman wrote in a blog post. “It is a network where information is exchanged and consumed at a rapid clip every second of the day.”
“People who internalize the value of Twitter understand the power of this simple medium,” he continued. “But it has not been easy to make that value transparent or obvious for curious folks coming to Twitter for the first time.”
Also, the new display includes a new “See who’s here” section, which presents notable personalities, celebrities, businesses, and brands that are currently using Twitter. Trending topics, meanwhile, will now scroll across the page, which will allow Twitter to display more trending topics in a small space, the feature is now a small ribbon that moves from right to left presenting the stories that are trending at the moment. If you hover over a particular keyword, Twitter will provide a description explaining why that word is popular.
Another addition includes “Twitter 101,” for businesses. “Using Twitter for a business? Check out Twitter 101.”
Two of the most important things any business, marketer or advertiser can reap from Twitter 101 are:
“As a business, you can utilize ‘Twitter‘ to promptly share information with people interested in your company, accumulate real-time market news and feedback, and build relationships with customers, partners and other people who care about your company.”
“Twitter can be “innovating” for businesses — a big claim. We truly believe it because we have seen lots of examples, many of which we share here. But if you are new to Twitter and still wondering what all the fuss is about, hang around the site for a week or two and give it a few minutes a day. Twitter almost always delivers “Aha!” moments for people, but it can take some getting used to before you have your moment of enlightenment.”
This latest revision looks like it may have finally fixed all of Twitter’s past homepage issues. The search is still featured prominently, but now the page also features a random selection of Twitter users to follow. In addition, there is a live feed of interesting tweets that are algorithmically selected by the @Toptweets account.
If you are already a Twitter member and would like to glance at the new homepage, be sure to sign out of the website. Finally, the new homepage quickly gives new users a taste of Twitter’s ecosystem and may do a better job of convincing them to join.
Twitter said it will keep a close watch on users reaction to the new homepage and promised to “continually try to new ideas that help users more easily discover who and what they can find on Twitter.”
Check out the new and old homepages below.
New Twitter homepage [Click to enlarge]
Old Twitter homepage [click to enlarge]