That Rediff.com will sport a minimalist look much like its India Abroad website, which had gone minimalistic in January this year, was known; CEO Ajit Balakrishnan had mentioned that they’re keen to do so in the Q4 earnings call. Earlier this afternoon, we received an anonymous tip-off, suggesting that we track the Rediff.com homepage. Bit by bit, we saw sections of Rediff – Shopping, iShare etc, become minimalist. Yet, we missed the momentary switch to the minimalist design for the homepage that WATblog captured.
A screenshot of the new-look Rediff, now live:
Some sections – Astrology, Matchmaker, Connexions and iLand (blogs) still retain their old look, but we won’t be surprised if they are eventually transitioned to the new design. Last month, we’d reported on the launch of the new, minimalist, Rediffmail.
Our Take
While on the homepage and browsing through the content on the site, you’ll notice one thing: despite the clean, user and mobile friendly, and relatively advertisement-free design, users now have to view more pages, and browse through more content to find what they’re looking for. That may mean more pageviews, and hence more impressions for the large 300×250 pixel advertisements that the new Rediff design sports, but it also means that the discovery of content through browsing has become a lot more difficult than before.
Secondly, you’ll notice that on every page, the search bar is now more prominent and has more page-real-estate (in percentage terms) than before. The natural propensity for a user will now be to search for that content. So Rediff’s redesign may not just be about being minimalist and mobile friendly – it could be about giving an impetus to the search piece that we had written about last year, and perhaps making search the key element of the new Rediff.
An increase in search usage offers Rediff greater insight into user intent, as well as allowing them to deliver keyword related advertising to users. At the same time, as content discovery becomes more difficult, Rediff could also lose users to other portals. We think it’s a gamble – it’s one thing to launch a minimalist, iPhone friendly site for International users, but the Rediff homepage is its cash-cow; why risk that?
Update: As Salil rightly points out in the comments, the search functionality isn’t present in all the inside pages. I thought I noticed it there, though, but maybe not. In any case, we do think that now that this redesign has been launched, it would be a good idea for Rediff to better leverage their search capabilities across their content pages. It may not be about search right now, but why shouldn’t it be?
We’ll try and get inputs on the companys plans from its management tomorrow. In the meantime, do tell us what you think of Rediffs redesign, and also what you think of our take.
Related
- Rediff’s Minimalist India Abroad Is Live; Social Bookmarking, Facebook, Orkut, Hi5 Updates
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21 Comments until now.
Nive point of view, Preethi. Let's see if the gamble works.
heh….sorry about that. Preethi had started the draft in the evening while we were trying to get a screencap of the new page…I wrote it up as an opinion piece late at night. :P
Very nice insight and well explained for a interested layman like me. Thanks
Its a good design actually and its really very clean. About home page ad, I think its good news for users if ad is removed cause page loads more faster.
Rediff is changing a lot these days.. First search, international site, then mail, then shopping , ishare and now home page with news and all those things.
Rediff really needs to work on search results delivered. See the results delivered by google and rediff. Compare them, only UI doesn't matter. We need content.
The design goes two ways: if a regular/old user now looks at rediff he/she will get a clean type look but if we talk about a newcomer at this site he might stuck into the impression of emptyness and the same perception about content too. Lets see if this incarnation works for rediff or not.
Hey did some one saw rediff ad on TV ? I saw rediff ad on Aaj-tak yesterday night. Its really good ad with some cool english song.
Can some one post that ad? I searched you tube and ishare too, but no results.
Its brand ad of rediff not an advertise of mail or some other service.
For the first 5 seconds I actually waited for the site to load…when it had actually loaded! From what it used to be…the new look suddenly felt as if it was missing a lot of content and a LOT of ads…!
Honestly Nikhil, my experience suggests that people visit portals such as rediff (or IT, or ToI or HT or sify) because they want to capture the most news in one glance. The new look fails in that aspect, while it retains a highly aesthetic feel to the site. I will be very keen to see what the response of the users is.
Though it seems insightful, I don't agree wid the analysis. If search was supposed to be content-discovery tool # 1, they would have placed it in the inside pages too. But there's no search bar anywhere inside. Wonder why.
In terms of usability, i think there's less predictability (read: more irritability) . The "Home" button or the rediff logo takes you to the section homepage, not rediff.com . I think they are looking at a multiple-homepg approach. Not sure if that works.
Another disaster. If you enter any section (Cricket, Sports, News etc), you are horribly stuck. No cross-navigation. Can't jump sections. Your only hope is the tiny rediff.com link on the top-right. Bad idea! One wud think that after building up such a strong content pool, rediff would strive to expose as much of it. But that's clearly not happening. Essentially means, if I enter the cricket section and don't find any interesting update, I will exit. Pronto.
Also, no justification for the new design from the Editors, nor any active soliticitation of feedback. Are we sure it's even intentional?
Overall, I am confused about the intent as also about the UI. I hope that the team @ rediff is not.
@sa_lil on twitter
Salil, you're right. I hadn't quite noticed that they don't have the search function in the inside content pages, only in
Then again, maybe it *should* be about search.
Btw the news box is of same size as it was before..lol.
only the links to services were redced. i mean previously books had some sub section, mobile has some sub section. Now only one big logo for one service.
Al tough yesterday the page first came again old was back, then again new one is up. These means it under test yet.
Hope so they may improve more from feedback.
I'm ambivalent about the design itself. It seems ok but theres a huge hit in functionality for me, especially in the shopping section. While search is great for content its really not for shopping as the basic behavioral pattern is to browse rather than to zero on one on focused search. I definitely think the shopping business will take a hit.
http://www.rediff.com/ishare/video/Entertainment/...
Rediff did a poor imitation to Google homepage. Google is basically a search site and provides easy route to other's contest. Rediff is a content provider and try to expose as much content as possible in a simple manner like New York times. In stead of using intrusive ads, Rediff can use 3 column design with ads and place all the important content with easily follow links. It is impossible to move between different sections in Rediff. Rediff messedup everything. Visit international website. Thank God for removing that old intrusive ad on home page.
The news box remains the same…but the surrounding meat is gone…! Videos, sub-sections, links…the above all…the 'feeling' of content…due to the clutter.
The minimalist philosophy is all right the way in which it is implemented in Rediff.com is bad though. Hmm, Mr Balakrishnan has a lot of things riding on this. Many product managers, directors and vicepresidents who could not agree with this redesign quit the company.Check Linked In for details. Mr:Balakrishnan himself desgined lot of these pages. Rediff is losing all those good people they had and the no of people who are leaving this company will only increase if he goes minimalistic through a “forcefit” approach. All the best to the grand old man of Indian internet with his latest experiment.
i've been using the site for almost a decade now…but its still such a pain to navigate with this new interface.They've killed the site at one go.
Not a good idea. As any good internet editor (and there are very few in this country. Less than a dozen, maybe even less than five) will tell you. The only way to make people consume more content is to showcase more content.
If you choose not to, then someone has misguided your thinking or you have taken an altogether different direction for your site.
Nobody for e.g. debates why NYT has too much content on it's homepage. Or WSJ or any other site of any import.
Rediff should have tried simple A/B testing for this page, to see offtake before making it live . Maybe they have tried it. Who knows. For us to sit and pontificate is rather pointless.
I'd like to congratulate Mr. Balakrishnan to take such a bold step and make rediff cleaner.. I think it was very much needed, though, what I feel is that the makeover is still incomplete. A couple of things which could have been there:
1. previews of sections available, which could let a user a peek into the contents. It could have been done in 2 ways:
i) a preview appearing when mouse is taken over the link ( slideshare). It would have maintained the ease of use for existing visitors as well as new comers.
ii) Small content sections for all these main links ( cricket, movies, etc.). Though this would have changed the definition of redesigning.
2. cross linkages from each & every section. For this navigation system should have been there on the top.
3. Going back to rediff.com should have been easier and more "searchable" :-) . Again, a simple navigation system could have made it easy.
Thanks,
Saurabh
Clearly good inspired, not sure if it was because the premium ads on home page was not being brought. I think rediff did have a unique distinction of clean home page with just 1 or 2 ads and yet show smart thumbnails and page was less than 100 KB to ensure loading time is always less than 3 seconds.
this though it loads equally faster, seems hollow.
I hope the new site gets better CTR's for ads to aid them go with it.
Clearly one ad on home page is not deterring the user @ cost of making additional monies for website. Since its a free content website, isn't ad revenue the most dominant revenue stream ? OR is rediff throwing their arms to the Google / Yahoo and maybe the websites which have entereed in last 2-3 yrs.
i still feel that the rediff search we see now is a big improvement over last year…i am comparing it with google leaves a lot to be desired, but it definitely works better than yahoo! i agree that they need a lot more content…
do they have the search technology or is it borrowed?
Showing more content is better if your search is bad (as it wont deliver the reqiured content). This looks like a costly gamble which will not work for rediff