Hey everyone, did you know that PhoneArena recently turned 20? Yes, it’s actually been that long, and if you think about it, so much has changed since our humble beginnings. Mobile technology has evolved tremendously, playing a key part in shaping the world of today, which in turn has become a very different place from the world of 20 years ago, no matter if you look at it from a technological or lifestyle perspective.
Things have changed, that’s for sure, but you know what? They’re bound to continue changing and evolving. And we’re immensely excited about the future, the impressive innovations that are no doubt right around the corner. And, we know we have to be ready for that awesome world of tomorrow, which is why we’re reimagining PhoneArena and taking it to a whole new level – one where it’ll be in a strong position to anticipate the next big things to come our way.
We’re launching a complete rebranding of PhoneArena, which evolves our role in the mobile technology publishing space, so that it can better answer the needs and habits of tech enthusiasts today.
At the core of the new PhoneArena brand identity is the concept of a mobile technology playground. That is because we see PhoneArena as a place where tech enthusiasts come to explore the latest innovations, enjoy this time as almost a sacred daily ritual, and connect with like-minded people. We all share an intense passion, and PhoneArena is the venue where we get together to discover and revel in the cutting edge of mobile technology.What further differentiates the new PhoneArena brand is that it’ll create a space filled with positive energy that makes it a pleasure for all to consume content, as well as to interact with fellow enthusiasts. Our belief is that mobile technology aids us in living richer, more connected and productive lives, which is why we are optimistic about what comes next. We’re always looking forward to the products of the future – the gadgets and services that are going to enhance our lives tomorrow.
With all of that context in mind, we’ve distilled three key pillars to guide the current and future development of PhoneArena: Exploration, Indulgence and Connection. All the changes you’ll see today are in accordance with these pillars.
New PhoneArena logo
Let’s begin with the brand new PhoneArena logo. The one thing it has in common with the old one is that it’s extremely memorable and recognizable. Aside from that, it signifies PhoneArena’s bold position in the current mobile tech publishing landscape – we’re expansively creating space for mobile tech enthusiasts to inhabit, while keeping the basic shape of the phone, as this is in our DNA.
Vibrant color palette
Our redesign comes with a whole new color palette. We’re retaining blue as our primary color. We think this element of continuity helps connect PhoneArena’s past to its future; however, the new primary blue is richer and more vibrant.The new secondary colors work to bring our playground concept to life, and to establish a nice contrast with the primary color. This way, they serve to mark points of interest across the site’s interface.
Clean and modern typography
Typography is extremely important for any written content product, which is why we carefully selected new heading and text body fonts too, instantly making our articles look cleaner and more modern.
Our new fonts, Poppins for headings and Inter for body text, come with great scalability, making them look amazing across all types of screen sizes.
Redesigned homepage
The completely new homepage unites all three brand pillars (exploration, indulgence and connection). Headed by our new featured section, it ensures that users get quick access to a variety of topics and content products, right from the get-go.
Sprinkled with visual treats as you scroll through it, the new home contains new Author Spotlight and Community Highlights sections to bring forth the voices of both our writers and members of the community. And to further drive home our focus on indulgence, we’re also launching a new ‘Wallpaper of the Day’ widget, in collaboration with Hampus Ollson, the artist behind wallpapers from OnePlus phones.
Purposeful Tone of Voice
So, we reimagined all our visual assets, but what about the actual content? Can it, too, both benefit from and help manifest our new brand concept? What we’re working on here is a refined version of the PhoneArena tone of voice. While we’ve always enjoyed great freedom of expression, we’ve also always adhered to certain standards with regard to our writing and the way we communicate with the audience.Now, we’ve created some additional guiding principles to help us be better at presenting our ideas in a way that expresses our brand values, including expertise & insight, accessibility, warmth and enthusiasm. We’ve already laid the foundations of this enhanced brand voice, and you can expect further improvement as we go.
Vastly improved comments experience
The more active part of our community has probably already noticed some major improvements that we recently rolled out to our comments section.
You now have a much richer ability to express yourself with new formatting options, as well as to interact with the comments of others through the new Reactions feature. A considerably optimized layout to comment and reply threads is also coming, allowing for an easier and more comfortable viewing of threads. What’s more, we’re now pushing personalized notifications in our Notification Center whenever an event specific to you has happened, such as a new reply or reaction to a comment of yours.
Because the connection element is so central to our new brand identity, one of our major new initiatives aims to dramatically enhance the interaction between our writers and members of the community. You’ve already seen it happen, and you can definitely expect our writers to join the discussions below articles way more often.
Advanced user profiles
User profiles are incredibly important, which is why we’ve given them a much needed overhaul. The initial batch of improvements includes richer data and statistics about the user’s experience on PhoneArena (such as the number and type of reactions they’ve received, the number of articles they’ve read, or the user reviews they’ve posted), as well as advanced settings for more granular control.
New content formats
Finally for today, we want to share that some of the formats you’ve already started seeing on PhoneArena pages are not the product of random ideas, but a deliberate effort based on our brand strategy. For example, our growing section of original editorial content is meant to provide quick, almost daily opportunities for immersing yourself in the most current happenings in the industry. The regular polls that we’re running are a great opportunity for our audience to sound off on a variety of topics throughout the year, and the new quiz format allows us to spend some fun time gauging our knowledge of the industry. And you can expect more content experiments as we go!We hope you like all the improvements we’re releasing today. We believe these changes will not simply make PhoneArena current with the times, but position it strategically so it can better anticipate and call forth the future.
We’re so happy to have you here, because it is you, our readers, who make PhoneArena both possible and useful. We welcome you today, to a brand new PhoneArena, and we’re just getting started.
