Twitter targets new users with complete site redesign

Tech analysts say Twitter’s complete redesign of its main website will be good for businesses which aren’t yet members of the popular social network, saying it will be easier for them to digest information and become involved.

The complete redesign is all about usability, chief executive Evan Williams said yesterday, noting that with over 90 million tweets per day and 25% of those containing links, some users will become easily swamped if they can’t digest new information quickly.

“When they first join and start following users, they’ll get more suggestions on who else to follow, and they’ll get a better sense of features like lists, favourites and retweets,” Jared Newman at PCWorld says.

“Maybe they won’t just throw up their hands and say “I don’t get it,” like so many of my friends and family have.”

MG Siegler points out on TechCrunch that businesses should pay attention, saying these new updates are also aimed at potential business users who may have found the service too confusing at first.

“It’s important to note that nothing has changed about Twitter’s UI and functionality for those who are logged in. This is simply part of Twitter’s goal to make the service more accessible and obvious to new users, as well as increase engagement, and the use of search/trends. The bigger goal is to make it easier for businesses to use Twitter, which will allow the service to finally make some money.”

Mitch Wagner from Computerworld also says the redesign will make it easy for new users, and will drag users back from third-party apps.

“In addition to stepping up the competition with Facebook and Google, the new Twitter.com potentially puts Twitter in competition with some of its own partners, the companies that make dedicated Twitter clients like TweetDeck.”

Speaking to assorted tech press at the company’s California headquarters, Williams unveiled updates to the main site which include a two-panel system, the ability to include media in tweets and a slightly different user interface.

Some of the bigger changes include:

• A two panel system. Tweets appear on the left, with information on the right regarding latest tweet, friend’s lists, follower suggestions and a list of trends.
• The ability to embed media within tweets. A number of content providers including Justin.TV and YouTube have signed content deals to allow their media to be embedded. Google Maps links also appear as embedded content, and show up on the right-hand panel.
• When Google Maps links appear as embedded content, tweets from that location also appear below the map itself.
• Real names of users appear next to their Twitter profiles.
• Tweets can be made in an overlay box instead of an embedded text box.
• Support for Flickr is now included.
• A number of keyboard shortcuts have also been included, such as pressing “f” to add a tweet to a favourites list, “r” for reply, “t” for retweet and “n” for new tweet.

Williams said the changes were designed to completely revamp the way users access content on the site, making it more of a web-app experience. He pointed to stats showing more people log on to Twitter.com on a monthly basis than all other Twitter clients combed, including popular apps like TweetDeck.

He says Twitter is all about being a “real-time information network”, and that users need to access simple methods of receiving that information, or they’ll become swamped and won’t want to use the service anymore.

“This is probably the biggest launch that we’ve ever done,” Williams said. “This is one of the best web apps that you’ve ever seen.”

“The profile page is now supposed to be more about identity. The picture is bigger, the bio is more prominent… It’s about getting a lot more out of Twitter in less time.”

But the update is about more than just making it easier for existing users to manage their tweets. Williams wants to separate Twitter from existing social networks, saying the site is all about news and information on current events. In fact, he says users shouldn’t even have to make tweets themselves to get value from the site.

“You don’t need to tweet to get value from Twitter any more than you need to make a web page to use the web,” he said on his Twitter account yesterday.

The update also puts the service in direct competition with third-party clients. With the company’s sponsored tweets feature coming soon, the move is likely an attempt to bring users back on to the site where they will see more advertisements.

The updates will be rolled out to all users over the next few days.