Welcome our New Layout for 2010!

(This was posted last week, prior to Thanksgiving, but we’ve bumped it up for regular readers returning from the holidays.)

Long-time readers will know that we change-up our layout on a yearly basis, and this year is no different!  (Well, a little different–we’re a smidgen early!)  We took a lot of your feedback into consideration and tried to implement certain design elements and features that would best answer your needs!

We do have some additional tweaking of certain features and areas of the site, but it should be functioning fairly normally — so if you encounter any bugs (like, “OMG, where’d the page go?  The sidebar is missing!”), please, please let us know!  There’s one major feature that we’re still working on that’s not quite ready for launch and that’s an advanced search function.  Bear with us

Definitely let us know what you think of the new site, but let me walk you through some of the major changes…

The NAVIGATION got a major revamp with an entirely different look and feel, plus the placement is different.  You’ll find the navigation at the very top of every page, and when you roll your cursor over one of the menus (e.g. Looks), it will drop down a menu with all of the sub-categories within that menu.  No more “view more”!

The POST is very similar to the way it was structured before, but it just was styled to fit the new layout.  You’ll find the list of categories the post is in just under the title (e.g. Posted in:  Survey Says).  You’ll see the actual content and whatnot from there on.  At the bottom of every post is a wide pink box that lists the number of comments the post has, a link for you to add your own comment, and another to add it to your favorites (aka bookmark it).  Beneath this pink box is a list of tags for the post.

The SOCIAL NETWORKS can now all be found at the right-hand side of the top of the page.  You can access our Twitter, YouTube, RSS, or Facebook right next to the navigation.

The SEARCH BAR can be found at the top of the right-hand sidebar.  Eventually, you’ll be able to choose from Search and Advanced Search.

The POPULAR/MAC LAUNCHES/FEATURED POSTS can now all be found in a tabbed box in the sidebar (on the right).  We used to have this beneath the logo, towards the top of the page, but now we’ve moved it to the side.  Popular posts are based on all sorts of criteria like how many views, comments, etc. for the month.  MAC Launches showcase all the latest information we have on upcoming MAC collections.  Featured posts are must-read posts hand-picked by us!

COMMENT easier with the comment form found below the post’s content and no longer at the bottom of the page.

EXTRAS can all be found in a smaller tabbed box in the sidebar (on the right).  It contains links to our projects, like the Product Gallery and MAC Database.  It also lists what networks we belong to and a list of our favorite sites and affiliates.