New Network Site Design

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   Christy Kirwanposted 7 years ago

   Awesome news! Our Network Sites are getting a fantastic makeover. Please check out the blog post to read up on the details.

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      NateB11posted 7 years agoin reply to this

      Very cool! Love how you folks keep improving things around here, look forward to seeing how it all turns out.

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         NateB11posted 7 years agoin reply to this

         Just checked out an article on Tatring, looks awesome!

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      kenneth averyposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      @Christy, does your post include me?

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      sallybeaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      :Love the new design but a shame about no twitter feed as this is something I use every day.  It never worked as it should though as it would have been better if you could add an image.  I remember asking for a Flipboard button so am glad to see that.

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         L.M. Hoslerposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         Can you explain what the Flipboard is, what it does and how to use it. I had never heard of it before.

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            sallybeaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

            I don't think I could explain it better than Glen Stok https://letterpile.com/writing/content-sharing-magazine

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               SakinaNasir53posted 7 years agoin reply to this

               Thank you sallybea for posting this article here...I never heard of Flipboard before...but now I know what it is about...☺

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               Glenn Stokposted 7 years agoin reply to this

               Thanks for sharing this Sally, much appreciated.  I put a lot of effort into writing this about Flipboard to help other Hubbers.

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                  sallybeaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                  You are very welcome Glen.

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      SakinaNasir53posted 7 years agoin reply to this

      Love the new designs!

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      Margaret Schindelposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      I like the clean, modern design a lot, Christy, as well as the prominent social sharing buttons!
      
      Is there a reason you chose not to include Twitter among those?
      
      Thanks and well done, HubPages Team!

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         NateB11posted 7 years agoin reply to this

         I was wondering about Twitter too. I sometimes get significant traffic from Twitter.

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            Glenn Stokposted 7 years agoin reply to this

            The one thing I found with Twitter is that the traffic dies down quickly for any particular tweets, but Flips on Flipboard seem to bring periods of improved traffic. Some old flips randomly (and all of a sudden) bring new life to hubs. I never saw that happen with old Tweets.

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               sallybeaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

               Glen, I just wondered if you are deleting hub flips which you flipped a while back and then re-flipping them today as if they were a fresh hub flip?
               Would there be any benefit or any negative outcome from doing this?

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                  Glenn Stokposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                  I only deleted and re-flip when my hubs are moved to niche sites. Even though the URL redirects anyway, it's still better to re-fliip because it gets tagged better once it's in a niche site.
                  
                  As for re-flipping the same URL just for the sake of being fresh, I found that we still have that old problem we all talked about when it first started–Flipboard caches the information on their server and they reuse the old data when you re-flip the same URL. So it serves no purpose.

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                     sallybeaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                     That is useful to know that Glen, thanks.  I tried it once or twice but these days I just wait for a Hub to move to the niche site before I bother to flip it.

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               NateB11posted 7 years agoin reply to this

               I've been neglecting my Flipboard account. I'll have to visit it again.
               
               Edit: Although I will say that I'm getting traffic from Twitter from other people. I hardly ever post my own work on social media.

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         Christy Kirwanposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         Good question. We chose not to include Twitter because it has historically resulted in the least traffic and shares across all articles out of all the sharing options. We were already getting a lot more traffic from Flipboard than Twitter and wanted to capitalize on that to encourage readers to Flip articles more often.

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            sallybeaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

            As I understand it, there is no point in flipping articles which have not yet been moved as they won't be indexed, is that correct Christy?

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               Christy Kirwanposted 7 years agoin reply to this

               I believe there was some issue where Flipboard marked HubPages as spam in the past due to the wide range of content and the fact that the site's overall quality used to be considerably lower than it is today. You are welcome to try sharing articles from HubPages, but I'm not certain it will work.

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                  sallybeaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                  Most of us have been delaying posting new hubs to Flipboard because of this issue.  We tend to only post once the hub has been selected and moved to a Niche Site.

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                  CatherineGiordanoposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                  Christy Kirwin: Maybe HubPages could work something out with FllpBoard to get them to accept hubs with high hub scores even if they are not moved to a niche site. I have dozens of hubs with scores in the 90's and high 80's that have not been moved.  Or maybe they could accept hubs from writers with high hubber scores.
                  
                  My new hubs usually get moved to a niche site right away or within 3 weeks. As for my older hubs, they can only be submitted once every 2 months. so it's a long wait. Some of my older hubs have been found by HP and moved. In other cases, a hub only gets moved when I submit it. I also think some of my good hubs that might do well on FlipBoard might not be a good fit with any of the niche sites.
                  
                  Some of my hubs have done great when I posted them to FlipBoard. Others got only a views. But I would very much like to have the opportunity to get a shot at having a hub "catch fire" on FlipBoard.
                  
                  I can flip hubs (my non-niche hubs) to FlipBoard, but they don't get indexed (only niche hubs get indexed) and if they are not indexed they don't get views.
                  
                  It seems a simple program could separate the wheat from the chaff.

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            Margaret Schindelposted 7 years agoin reply to this

            Thanks very much for the explanation, Christy!

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      SakinaNasir53posted 7 years agoin reply to this

      Where is the author's bio placed on PetHelpful.com? I am not able to see that...

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         Glenn Stokposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         It's still on the right side as it's always been. PetHelpful is not completely updated yet. It will eventually be on top.

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            SakinaNasir53posted 7 years agoin reply to this

            Thanks a lot Glenn! I saw the drop down ⬇ arrow which showed the author's bio.

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               Glenn Stokposted 7 years agoin reply to this

               Oh, I did't realize you were talking about using a mobile phone. That ⬇ is only on mobile. And yes, it was implemented already. But on desktop view the bio is still on the right side on all sites except TatRing. When Christy mentioned that it will take a few weeks, I imagine that means the bio will be moved to the top on desktop view for all sites eventually. Maybe if Christy sees this she can confirm that.

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                  Christy Kirwanposted 7 years agoin reply to this

                  Yes, that is correct, Glenn. It will take another couple weeks for all the sites to get the fully-responsive article design including the social sharing options on mobile, the new author bio, etc.

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      Ashish Dadgaaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      @Christy Kirwan,
      
      Thank you so much for informing us regarding new design of network sites.
      
      It is looking elegant and friendly. Text, design, and color selection is soothing to eyes.
      
      Thank you for making HubPages better
      
      Regards,
      Ashish

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      Araazposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      Thats a very good thing

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      simplehappylifeposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      Awesome work!  Thank you!   Where did the twitter share buttons go?

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   Jayne Lancerposted 7 years ago

   TatRing is looking very good. A great improvement, especially the menu.

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   Nell Roseposted 7 years ago

   Love it! and love the colors!

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   Sue Adamsposted 7 years ago

   I love it and feel lucky. The sites that feature my hubs
   
   Caloriebee
   Owlcation
   Healdove
   
   feature the new design already.
   
   Lookup your vertical hubs, are many other sites ready?

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      sallybeaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      feltMagnet is ready too

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         Glenn Stokposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         It's not compete yet. The author bio is still on the right side. Only TatRing has the bio on top already.
         
         Christy said in her blog that it will be completed within the next  few weeks.

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            sallybeaposted 7 years agoin reply to this

            Oops, I missed that, apologies.

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      lobobrandonposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      Dengarden too

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   EricDockettposted 7 years ago

   I guess I'm alone here, but I'm not liking it at all. All of that white and those soft grays look weak, especially for the sub-headers, and the red accents make it look like a bad free WordPress theme.
   
   The sharp contrast of the black and white, as before with the stripe on top and the font of the H2s, looks strong and suggests authority. In fact, I'd like to see the call-out boxes black instead of gray. All of the white and grays has a washed-out look and seems weak and wimpy.
   
   I don't mean to complain but I assume you are looking for constructive feedback, so there it is.
   
   I guess I'll get used to it.
   
   Edit: I guess the H2s are more like a soft blue (?). Hard for me to tell, apparently. Still prefer black, but when I zoom in it looks a little better.

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   Glenn Stokposted 7 years ago

   I love the new design and layout. I think it will help a great deal once it's implemented on all the niche sites. I especially like how the author bio is at the top now, since I believe many readers missed it when it was on the right. Unfortunately, I see many Hubbers are still not creating bios.
   
   The addition of the share button for Flipboard is great, and I'm not going to miss Twitter. I have found Flipboard to bring an awful lot more traffic than Twitter ever did anyway. Lately I've been focusing more on sharing in Flipboard anyway–not only my own hubs, but others as well. I even made a separate magazine to flip other Hubber's hubs. 
   
   For what it's worth, I've found that Flipboard works best for niche sites. It seems that hubs on the main site don't get tagged properly and don't get much traffic. But for niche sites, Hubbers should really consider using Flipboard.

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   jansharesposted 7 years ago

   Okay, up to date now. Thanks. I guess I need to get with the Flipboard program. One more thing . . .

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   calculus-geometryposted 7 years ago

   Can I report a design bug? On Pethelpful and Exemplore the top horizontal menu bar has category choices that are cut off.  I can only see the full horizontal menu if I zoom out a lot.  I am using Chrome on a Macbook and PC laptop. This might be happening on other sites, I only checked these two.  However, I can access the full menu of subtopics by clicking the "more" option on the left.
   
   Otherwise, I also like the new designs.

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      Christy Kirwanposted 7 years agoin reply to this

      This is intentional. Many of the sites have more categories than can be displayed there, which is why we added the More button with the full browsing options.

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         calculus-geometryposted 7 years agoin reply to this

         Thank you for clarifying that.

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   melbelposted 7 years ago

   Just a personal preference really, but I had to look a really long time for a search bar. I use search a lot, so I was disappointed that it was so hard to find. However, perhaps not a lot of people use search, so maybe not a bad thing... Just a thought.

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    kenneth averyposted 7 years ago

    Oops. I did not realize that this was a closed discussion. But before
    I vanish, "Merry CHRISTmas to Everyone and families here on HP"

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       SakinaNasir53posted 7 years agoin reply to this

       Merry Christmas

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          kenneth averyposted 7 years agoin reply to this

          @Sakina, "Thank you sincerely, sweet friend."

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    ChristinSposted 7 years ago

    It looks great except for one issue, the orange underlines on the links look awful. sorry.  I'd switch to a different color to highlight links and don't use an underline, at least not a bold orange one.

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    alexadryposted 7 years ago

    I just noticed it, I really love it. It looks much better and the layout looks well organized.

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    kenneth averyposted 7 years ago

    Dec. 14,
    I am so, so sorry, Hubbers. This makes the second stupid blunder I have made concerning this forum. I received a notice of a comment left on it, but had forgotten that this was the same forum that I stumbled into not so long ago--and with scrolling, I found my first accidental entrance.
    Again, pro-hubbers, I am so sorry.
    But everyone have a Very Merry CHRISTmas anyway 

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