Yahoo! takes on a new look

Yahoo! launched its new site design during May, initially on Yahoo.com but with a preview tab on the UK domain as well. The new look site offers more access opportunities from the home page, which you would expect from a market leading portal service, and whereas search takes a prime position on the site, the original Yahoo! directory service has been further relegated from view.

Yahoo! remains one of the most popular websites in the US and the third most popular search tool in the UK but, ever mindful of competing with MSN and other similar sites, Yahoo! has now updated its home page layout to provide fast access to a wide range of services to users. The design also makes use of the full screen width for 800 pixels, which is now becoming the norm for many computer users, but gives you the option to switch to a narrow layout or to change the colour scheme of the page.

Search is a prominent part of the new design, with the main search panel and a range of search options across the top of the page ‘ including image, video, audio, local, and shopping searches. Yahoo! has also introduced the Yahoo! Answers option where users can ask questions in a discussion forum format for other users to post responses.

Yahoo!’s wide range of services are listed on the left of the screen, enabling quick links into these options and this section will eventually offer personalisation options. The Personal Assistant panel at the top right offers registered users access to their own services, such as Yahoo! Mail (where you can view a preview of unread messages), or Yahoo! Messenger (which indicates when ‘friends’ are also logged in). News stories and tabbed sections in the main body of the page make for a good clear design offering lots of services and content.

Most notable in this relaunch, however, has been a further demotion of the Yahoo! Directory. This was the cornerstone of Yahoo!’s original creation and growth and became the yardstick for all other hierarchical directories on the web. Links to the browsable categories have now completely disappeared from the home page and there is simply an option within the search panel to use the directory for results.

So how important is the Yahoo! directory now? We believe it is now a minor player in the search market, with fewer visitors to the category sections and the main benefits of a listing here will just be from the link value from the site ‘ in just the same way as the Open Directory. However, Yahoo!’s main search results will sometimes show the directory title and description for a listed website, which can reduce the ranking opportunities for an optimised site. So it’s debatable whether a submission here is still worthwhile and although Yahoo.com still charges the $299 annual listing fee for a fast track guaranteed listing, the UK version of Yahoo! offers a free option but no guarantee of review or a listing, which is again much like the Open Directory model.

These changes on Yahoo! illustrate how the web has changed over recent years, with the rapid growth in the number of websites – and the demand for search tools to provide the widest range of options – meaning that directory-based sites are no longer sustainable as a general source of web information. Yahoo! has now fully adapted to this demand.

If you’d like to know more about the new Yahoo! design, or about getting your site listed on the Yahoo! Directory, please contact us for more information.

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