By bbr

by Kelly Googe Lucas, marketing and social media manager

First Twitter gets a new ‘do, then Twitter dumps LinkedIn, so of course LinkedIn has to one-up the bird and get a completely new look. In the next few weeks, LinkedIn will begin rolling out a fresh new look for their homepage. In the latest LinkedIn blog post, author Caroline Gaffney, Product Management with LinkedIn, gives us a quick look at the new LinkedIn feed redesign. The idea behind the new look is to create a “simpler and easier way to navigate Homepage experience that offers quick access to the relevant information and updates that help you be great at your job.”

The key changes Gaffney details are:

A newer, simpler and more modern design. The new design is streamlined so that your news feed is the first thing you see when you login, with everything else off to the side, somewhat resembling the designs of Twitter and Facebook.

More relevant updates on top. Based on your industry and what your connections are discussing, LinkedIn will move what it deems the most important updates to the top of your news feed. Facebook does this and I find it annoying. The theory is that you will spend less time sifting through the feed. It doesn’t stop me from sifting on Facebook, so I doubt it will stop the sifting on LinkedIn.

A richer, cleaner update stream. Instead of being content-heavy, your newsfeed will now have a bigger emphasis on graphics that are associated with the content. Given image-driven Pinterest’s sudden explosion onto the scene, it doesn’t surprise me that LinkedIn would make imagery a focus. What can we say, we’re a very visual society. Give me a LOLcat anyday!

A couple more changes that I’ve noticed in the screenshot:

Updated menu bar. It appears the menu bar will be static while you scroll through the page. This means that as you navigate through whatever it is you are doing, you will always have direct access to the menu items. The previous menu bar wasn’t horrible, but anything that makes it slightly easier to navigate is always a bonus.

LinkedIn Today blends into your news feed. Before, LinkedIn Today items were segregated at the top of your homepage. These news items will now be formatted to look like the rest of your newsfeed and blend in to the overall look. They’re still at the top, still suggested by LinkedIn rather than by one your contacts, but at least now it looks prettier and fits in with the grand scheme.

Overall, it’s not bad. I think it looks more modern and definitely better than the previous text-heavy homepage. What do you think? Do you like the new look LinkedIn is rolling out or do you even care? We’d love to hear your thoughts.