Six years stale (design wise), and nearly a year after being taken over by News Corp, the Wall Street Journal online is undergoing a major redesign.
The changes, which go live on Tuesday, bring a much-needed modern feel to the site that has been gradually expanding with more free general and lifestyle news but standing firm with its paid business services. The number of subscribers is up 26 percent in two years to around 1 million.
Paid areas more clearly marked with a key symbol and an elite "champagne" colored background. Notable new additions include a WSJ social network (similar to the new BusinessWeek Exchange), a Management section, and an expanded Heard on the Street.
The navigation is now horizontal with a scrolling news reel, and the layout (identical to the new WSJ. Magazine design) is much cleaner with tabbed story pages that include more photos, videos and a comments section. Previously comments were only allowed in select forums and blogs. Now only paid subscribers can participate in the discussions, and unlike most other sites, they must used their real name, which WSJ says will help keep the discussion on point.
The free content is amped up in that there are more stories being produced in what has always been free – non-core business news. But the paper is making everything free (at least for the time being) if accessed through other sites, like its new Blackberry application and links on social networks.
“We’re growing not only in terms of technology but in terms of different audiences who don’t traditionally come to the journal,” said WSJ President Gordon McLeod. “Three years ago this was a paid site. 800,000 people could see it and that was it.”
The subscriber-only articles, however, have always been readable through a back door for free if you cut and paste the headline and view the story in Google News. But McLeod says this process ignores an important quality of the site. “The editorial presentation of what we think are the most important stories and what’s news are completely out of context,” he said.
The number of WSJ readers on social networks is surprisingly high, with 39 percent on Facebook and 48 percent on fellow News Corp subsidiary MySpace. The article pages will included both a MySpace and Facebook sharing widget.
