In Facebook Redesign, a Hope for Other Big Websites

By Douglas A. McIntyre Published Mar 8, 6:31AM EST

Follow 24/7 Wall St. on Google

This post may contain links from our sponsors and affiliates, and Flywheel Publishing may receive compensation for actions taken through them.

If Facebook Inc.’s (NASDAQ: FB) redesign succeeds at improving user engagement and marketing dollars, it will provide an benchmark for other large websites, even if they are not social media destinations. The Facebook changes are simple and fundamental. They could be copied, at least for the most part, if Facebook’s work succeeds.

As it released the new program, Facebook’s management wrote:

Today we’re announcing a new version of Facebook designed to reduce clutter and focus more on stories from the people you care about. You see all the stories you saw in your News Feed before, but with a fresh new look. We’ve completely rebuilt each story to be much more vibrant and colorful and highlight the content that your friends are sharing. Photos, news articles, maps and events all look brighter and more beautiful.

Aside from that broad description, Facebook management noted that the site would appear the same way on mobile, tablet and Web platforms, which is not something many large websites can claim. Generally, developers set different designs and features meant to exploit the environment for each platform. Perhaps that improves the users’ experience in some ways, but it also shows a certain schism in how the Web properties are presented by their owners and creators. What is familiar on one platform is not on all others.

The results of the Facebook initiative may take several months to access. However, it is certain that Facebook did a great deal of research among its members before the initiative was launched to gain as positive a reaction as possible.

Most of the features of the new Facebook pages, and new News Feed, could be replicated by portals and news and information sites. That is the beauty of benchmarking. Sites from Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) to CNN to The New York Times Co. (NYSE: NYT) could latch on to the industry leader’s success and share in the benefits. That is, of course, if Facebook’s gamble works.

About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.