It's hard to know the exact drop in traffic. It's probably more than Nick Denton's claimed 7% but probably also less than the ~85% drop this article claims. The truth is probably somewhere in the middle. In any case, even 7% is a pretty massive drop following a redesign.
It's interesting because the content is the same, only the packaging and user experience has changed. It seems that reader-loyalty on news sites like the Gawker sites, Techcrunch etc, and community sites like Digg, is actually very low. Probably much lower than the sites themselves believe.
I dropped Gizmodo before the redesign, partly due to the stolen iPhone incident, but mostly due to every other article being Apple related, with the ensuing mindless and juvenile MS / Apple bashing in the comments.
Lifehacker I dropped after the redesign, as it just didn't work very well any longer.
Lucky for me, and everyone else except the blog networks, is that other content more suited for my tastes, is only a URL away. I have no commitment, no subscription or any other reason to ever look back.
Thus I think the point to take home, is that you should listen to your users / readers, no matter how obnoxious or "trollish" they might chose to express themselves. It's easy to just dismiss and ignore a point of view, if it's expressed with profanity. But below the profanity, there is usually a reason or argument, which you must find and listen to. At least if it's a recurring theme (i.e. "the new design sucks").
If you don't listen, you risk loosing your "loyal" users, probably much faster than you ever thought possible.
It's interesting because the content is the same, only the packaging and user experience has changed. It seems that reader-loyalty on news sites like the Gawker sites, Techcrunch etc, and community sites like Digg, is actually very low. Probably much lower than the sites themselves believe.
I dropped Gizmodo before the redesign, partly due to the stolen iPhone incident, but mostly due to every other article being Apple related, with the ensuing mindless and juvenile MS / Apple bashing in the comments.
Lifehacker I dropped after the redesign, as it just didn't work very well any longer.
Lucky for me, and everyone else except the blog networks, is that other content more suited for my tastes, is only a URL away. I have no commitment, no subscription or any other reason to ever look back.
Thus I think the point to take home, is that you should listen to your users / readers, no matter how obnoxious or "trollish" they might chose to express themselves. It's easy to just dismiss and ignore a point of view, if it's expressed with profanity. But below the profanity, there is usually a reason or argument, which you must find and listen to. At least if it's a recurring theme (i.e. "the new design sucks").
If you don't listen, you risk loosing your "loyal" users, probably much faster than you ever thought possible.