Recently while browsing some of my favorite news sites I came across the redesigned Reuters.com and noticed an interesting feature: the “Now View”. It allows the user to toggle how the news is presented based on preset options. For example, if the site visitor is interested in viewing headlines based on location, there’s the “Newsmap View”.  If he is more interested in photography he can choose to view the same headlines, but with photography serving as the lead content. Same concept can be applied to the “Video View” and “Headline View”.  This isn’t revolutionary functionality by any means, but the underlying concept -- presenting a website differently based upon a user’s mindset and preference -- can be extended further and offers several intriguing possibilities.

Imagine visiting ESPN.com and being able to choose a “Team View” from a header-based toggle, where you’ve already set your favorite teams in your account profile. Suddenly, the entire website shifts to be about your teams. The site structure remains the same in this instance, but the content, and maybe even navigation, changes to only cover topics and teams you wish to read about. Or if you visit a news website and you’re really only interested in the Middle East at that very moment, you could choose “Middle East” as an “experience toggle” which would shift the content of the entire site to meet that mindset and content need. The site visitor in turn feels engaged and fully in control of the experience, leading to increased overall satisfaction (in theory). In a way, the site visitor is creating a customized magazine just for himself.

“Uh, why not just click on ‘Middle East’ in the navigation in that last example?”, you ask. I’m not a fan of your tone, but excellent question.  The value here, at least in my view, is that this would eliminate a lot of informational and visual noise. The website becomes laser-focussed, completely subservient to the user’s mindset and goals, and hides any content not related to the user’s current aim. It’s not dissimilar to a news website’s mobile experience versus its desktop counterpart -- you get just the facts on the mobile platform, clear of distraction. With the desktop version you get the facts, but you also get a ton of other content that you may or may not find interesting. The content switch could be handled dynamically, and switching back to a standard view for passive exploration would be as simple as a click.

There are obviously a lot of holes in this idea, and it’s not something I’ve put a ton of thought into just yet, but any way to provide the site visitor more control over the on-site experience and increase engagement is worth further discussion. Would love to hear your thoughts!