Opinion: Financial Times launches to a mixed response

Posted by Lauren Drablier on November 19, 2008 at 2:31 PM

Last week the Financial Times relaunched its website with a new homepage, along with five other resdesigned pages and a new Middle East section. This is the first stage of its redesign and more changes will be rolled out over 2009. Reviews about the new design have been mixed; some call it a success, some say it's a failure. The FT has been applauded for finally redesigning and "clearing up the clutter" but the criticisms go further than the redesign, some critics have called their entire business model into question.

The new design aims to make the site look more like the print version through colour and layout. The homepage is now pink, just like the newspaper, and the design of the masthead reflects the print version as well. The website has also been renamed Financial Times, no longer FT.com.

The new design has been hailed has a "big improvement" which makes it "much more readable," according to E-consultancy. Brand Republic believes the layout is "much improved" and "a good step forward." However, even though the homepage has a cleaner look, the Guardian believes that by removing the clutter, they have lost most of the content.

There are many critiques of the new design, including the drop down menus which is "usability problem, and having to click on the arrow to see the sub sections may be an irritation to some users," according to both E-consultancy and Brand Republic.

The biggest criticism comes from the fact that the online version was only a surface redesign, meaning that once you navigate away from the homepages, it reverts back to the old design. For a big name like the Financial Times, it comes as a bit of a surprise. The Guardian acknowledges the fact that further changes are coming, saying, "obviously, no newspaper changes its whole site overnight, but it should go beyond the front page."

In a review of the redesign in Portfolio, the author agreed with the Guardian's point of view, saying, "the most depressing part of the relaunch, though, is that the FT hasn't taken advantage of the opportunity to throw out its idiotic business model. Indeed, it's been tightened up, and you now need to ration yourself to just 20 articles per month if you don't want to subscribe - guaranteeing that no non-subscribers will be able to explore what the site has to offer."

Portfolio also believes that after five years of no changes to the site, "if the FT was serious about its website, the home page -- and the rest of the site -- would be a constant work in progress, instead of being stuck in aspic for five years and then undergoing a major rehaul. But that's probably too much to hope for. Instead, I'll just be happy if they manage to fix their RSS feeds. Not that I'm holding my breath."

According to The Guardian, the Financial Times had a unique opportunity to attract a lot of new readers given the current financial situation, however, they believe that "it may not be making the best of it."

Lionel Barber, Editor of the Financial Times, says that the new design and improvements to FT.com are designed to further strengthen their position as a modern news organization. The FT is a uniquely positioned newspaper in the market, its readership are attracted to the site purely for the quality of its business content, its insight and the quality of its business writers. In that sense, the design of its website is not so important as for any other newspaper in the UK market who are battling with a jostling field for the general news reader. The FT is the dominant player in the business news field, but, how long will this last if it acts complacently, such as with this new redesign?

Sources: The Guardian, Portfolio, Netimperative, e-consultancy, BrandRepublic