Twitter Inspired by Facebook in Latest Redesign

Twitter and Facebook have both been major influences on the social networking world. Facebook, which has been becoming a household name, made major changes to it’s platform earlier this year. With the introduction of the Facebook timeline, users are able to add more personal information and customize their profiles like never before. Since the timeline was well received, Twitter has adapted a similar format to their user’s profiles.

In the past, Twitter has adapted many successful Facebook features to its interface. The very concept of tweets is similar to that of the Facebook status. One of the most well-known features for Facebook is the ability to “like” statuses. Similar to the “like” ability, Twitter has the ability to “Re-Tweet” tweets that users enjoy or agree with.

Earlier this week, Twitter unveiled its new profile design, which features more personal user information and is very focused on larger photos. The layout still contains many of the Twitter exclusive necessities such as followers, lists, and a history of sent tweets.

The largest change to the layout is the “header” – a large picture surrounding the user’s picture. The concept is similar to the “cover” image introduced in Facebook’s timeline interface. The only difference is in the placing of the user image. On Facebook, the user image is placed in the left hand corner, slightly below the “cover” image, while the redesigned Twitter will feature the user image centered in the large background image.

The Twitter redesign will also have a heavier focus on image sharing. Posting pictures to Facebook is immensely popular, and the Facebook interface allows for photos to divided into sharable albums. While Twitter’s image sharing is not as common, the redesign will be showing recent photos slightly larger than the previous design. Services such as Twitpic will still be needed to upload new images, but many have speculated that Twitter will continue its emphasis on photos in a similar fashion.

The redesign also focuses on bringing a similar look to mobile devices. Facebook apps on most mobile devices look nearly the same as they do on the computer browser. The uniform design is proven to be user friendly, and a uniform look is important for Twitter to adopt. Previously, Twitter apps ranged in functionality, and the designs placed important links in unrecognizable spots. Being consistent across all four of the major platforms, iPhones, Androids, tablets, and web will all start to see the new design roll out.

The redesign will be an overall improvement from the previous Twitter design, and will no doubt follow the success of the Facebook timeline.

Why Google+ Is Still Crucial to Marketing Efforts

In today’s competitive intelligence arena, marketing has higher stakes to not only gain clients and maintain interest, but create a lasting impression on the market. Social media has known to help improve search rankings, consumer engagement, and audience analytics. So what are the benefits to building a solid Google+ presence?

Google+ has become a competitor to the largely popular Facebook. It differentiates itself from Facebook with it’s more streamlined interface and business-friendly environment. Google’s visualization tools are embedded into the site, allowing any business to receive accurate traffic estimates as well as a map of it’s typical user. Google+ was introduced as being a “social layer” instead of just a site. In other words a ‘layer’ that reaches out to other online properties as part of Google itself. The result is a site that is highly linked to user accounts and settings.

Real-life Interaction With the User

Google+ “Circles” allow users to organize groups. This replaces the friends list known on Facebook. The result is a function that can be used to market a product or service with specific features targeted to specific audiences. By using “Hangouts”, the company or product can create an on-air broadcast, simplifying updates to be recorded later for users to watch at a specific time. This “real-life” interaction allows for more authentic marketing and a better understanding of the audience.

Points versus Likes

Facebook has always functioned with a “Like” feature. Google+, however, functions with a +1 button. Although similar to Facebook, Google’s version of ‘liking’ material is embedded into it’s search engine. Although it doesn’t improve SEO rankings directly, it can indirectly by Google+’s internal rankings and search options. The +1 feature operates much like a ranking of points. By using the “ripples” tool in Google, you can find out just how high the ranking features are for your marketing campaign.

Marketing Design Impact

Although social media is starting to hone in on its features in marketing tools, Google+ has allowed several features in design that have impacted marketing profoundly:

1.) Google Reader Interface
Introducing a white letter or pertinent source information for a company has never been easier.

2.) Google+ Events
A revamp of events allows more streamlined analytics of audience participation.

3.) Improved Mobile Support
Mobile support is crucial in any modern marketing campaign. This includes strong SMS support and the ability to organize notifications sent to the user.

While we believe Google+ is still in diapers, it is a powerful marketing tool that is tightly integrated to the marketing giant itself. It would be ill-advised to overlook the powerful effects that Google+ can have on any marketing campaign.