Welcome to the new-look Head for Points

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OK, we’re back after a couple of hours of downtime.

Things look a little different as you can tell ……

After eight years of using a layout which was, to be honest, already dated when we started using it in 2012, we have pulled the site into the 21st century.

I know that our core readers didn’t really care how we looked but the old theme was starting to take its toll. HfP should hit 20 million page views this year (we are around the 450th biggest UK website) with a further 9 million articles read via email. However, the old look was starting to impact our ability to attract new readers and secure large advertising contracts. We hope you like what we’ve done.

I don’t want to say any more at this point because my prime consideration today is making sure that everything is working as expected.

If you see a technical issue – a broken link, a formatting issue, something which simply looks wrong on your device – then please tell us. Do NOT comment in this thread. There is a separate ‘noise free’ thread for technical issues which is here. Post your problem and we’ll get onto it.

If it’s a formatting issue, please say what device you are using. We expect some issues with some mobile devices.

If you simply want to say that you like or hate the new look, then feel free to say that in this thread! If you have any requests for new features we could add in the medium term, please also put your ideas in this thread. The other one is exclusively for short-term problems requiring a quick fix.

You will see some minor differences around the site in terms of menus and layout. However, there are no fundamental changes and all of the old content remains. There are no changes to the usual ‘three articles, all posted by 6am’ scheduling.

Tomorrow I will run an article explaining exactly what has changed in terms of site functionality.

In a couple of days I’ll write a longer piece on what we’ve done, why we did it, who did it and what we learnt whilst doing it. Given that we started approaching design agencies back in November, it has been a long process.

Thank you for your continued support, especially in the current climate. Our revenue may be down but our page views have been consistently higher than the same period in 2019 which keeps us motivated.

Rob

PS. If you made a comment on the ‘old’ site this morning then you might find it has disappeared. Apologies. Please feel free to post it again.

Category

General

This article is closed to new posts. Discussion continues in the HfP Forums.

Jill (Kinkell) says:

18 Aug18 August 13:44

I’ll go against the grain and say my first impressions are ‘Oh No..its horrible’. Checked on ipad and desktop and hoped it might be different…but No. However, I’m probably a bit older and less ‘geeky’ as regards IT and liked the familiarity of the old site and easily spotting posters and their gravatars . Shame to lose the HfP travel banner along the top, but understand the need to entice and generate income from adverts etc.. No doubt I’ll get used to it…no option. You could always be like BA and offer the option of ‘try the new layout or stick with the old’!
Osagie says:

18 Aug18 August 13:49

Still getting used to the new look, and I understand the need to increase advertising revenue. However, the new layout on desktops looks very “the pointsguy” and requires a lot more scrolling
- Anna says:
  
  18 Aug18 August 14:33
  
  That was my exact thought, but we’ll get used to it!
- Rhys says:
  
  18 Aug18 August 14:44
  
  There are roughly the same advertising units as before!
  - Rob says:
    
    18 Aug18 August 15:10
    
    Advertising (commercial advertising) is reduced.
    
    The boxes are not advertising, they are just pointing first time visitors towards stuff they may find interesting. None of the Avios ones makes us any money, and indeed not all the credit card ones are about cards that pay us.
- Rhys says:
  
  18 Aug18 August 17:34
  
  Those similarities extend to most websites these days – our old look was just stuck in the dark ages!
Nick says:

18 Aug18 August 13:51

Generally speaking I like the new design. But I’m not as keen on the comments part, there’s too much white space and not as much text on the page as there used to be (Apple/safari)
- Rob says:
  
  18 Aug18 August 15:19
  
  There is already a plan to shrink or move the REPLY button which will help.
Dan says:

18 Aug18 August 13:53

Looks nice. Very fresh!
Colin JE says:

18 Aug18 August 13:55

A clean look and good use of the full width of the page on a big screen. One thing I initially missed was the article category links which used to run down the right hand side of the page. After a bit of looking around I realised there is a pull down category list now. So, keep up the good work guys!
Crafty says:

18 Aug18 August 13:56

Wow, that’s a lot of ad / dead space.

This will take some acclimatising.
- Rhys says:
  
  18 Aug18 August 13:59
  
  There’s a massive increase in usable space as a whole. We also wanted to keep quite a lot of white space to prevent it from feeling too cluttered – giving everything a bit more room to breath. Ads are about the same in number as before!
Crafty says:

18 Aug18 August 13:58

For those of us who use this mainly as a forum, having to scroll past an entire page of “today’s top stories” (not relevant to me) each time is not something I’m likely to enjoy!
- Rhys says:
  
  18 Aug18 August 14:00
  
  What do you mean by an entire page of top stories?
  - Crafty says:
    
    18 Aug18 August 14:02
    
    I’m viewing on mobile. To get to the comments requires scrolling past not only two large ads (and the story), but also something that didn’t exist before which is your “top stories” table, which takes up almost an entire phone screen worth of space.
    - Rhys says:
      
      18 Aug18 August 14:04
      
      If you click the comment number link that scrolls you straight to the comments!
      - BJ says:
        
        18 Aug18 August 17:34
        
        Thanks, didn’t know that. What Crafty described is an issue I’ve had with LL for some time. I thought we were going to have to just accept it here too. Perhaps a page of navigation tips etc might be useful somewhere on the site?
    - Rob says:
      
      18 Aug18 August 15:17
      
      Before we had 2 ads AND the Amazon link between the article and comments. Not much difference to now. We could potentially reduce spacing around the ‘Share’ box and we may switch to lower case on ‘Top Stories’ which might cut it by a couple of lines. We could also reduce the font size on the email subscription box.
      
      It is less of an issue on bigger phones. I have a rubbish old iPhone 8 so I’m on your side!
      
      There are things about mobile we are not yet fully happy with and they will be address over the next 10 days.
      - Crafty says:
        
        18 Aug18 August 23:07
        
        Just to reassure you, I’ve done a before and after, because I had the old design loaded in another tab. I appreciate the specific ads might be different which may skew the result. However for me (on a Xiaomi Mi 9, i.e. a fairly modern Android phone), we have gone from one full screen of “stuff” between article and comments, to two.
- Rob says:
  
  18 Aug18 August 15:18
  
  But very soon there might be a proper forum …..!
Michael C says:

18 Aug18 August 13:58

All fine, but I’m also a “most recent comments” fan – usually my go-to link!
- Lee says:
  
  18 Aug18 August 14:16
  
  +1
- Rob says:
  
  18 Aug18 August 15:18
  
  To be honest I never understood who used that 🙂
  - Crafty says:
    
    18 Aug18 August 23:09
    
    Anyone who’s come from a “forums” background is likely to favour it. If you frequent a forum, your likely default first click is “view new posts”.