New AOL: More Social, Better Design, Bad Ad Choice

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AOL has redesigned its house page. You may possibly not see it yet, mainly because it’s being gradually rolled out, but it’s accessible at this link (kill the cookies if you’re from outside in the US and it keeps redirecting you to the UK model from the site). You possibly can see a comparison between the new model (above) as well as the old model of AOL below.

The most significant functions, besides the slightly improved layout and a blueish scheme that replaces the earthy tones about the old model in the web site, are the social integration tools. Very first of all, under the “My Stuff” menu in the top proper location on the page, AOL now provides a lot more than email, weather, pictures as well as the AOL toolbar. Now, it is possible to slide it for much more alternatives, which contain movies, horoscope, music and social news from Propeller.

Furthermore, an excellent emphasis is put on social networks. The “My Networks” location located around the right is essentially a built-in widget from which you'll be able to access your Facebook (Facebook), MySpace (MySpace), AIM (aim), Bebo (Bebo) and Twitter (Twitter) accounts. Nifty, and a fantastic way to maintain the site visitors on your page rather than having them run off directly to these sites.

As far as blunders go, I can’t help but notice that the largest image for the new web page, when I opened it, was an unbelievably ugly wrinkle-remover ad. Call me old fashioned, but when you have a slick new design up, you most likely don’t want your site visitors to puke because of a scary ad. Other than that, AOL has done well with the makeover; it is not a radically distinct layout, but the new social features are absolutely a very good move which will keep some traffic about the web site.

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