Mar 3, 2011 12:47 GMT  ·  By

Google has revealed that Profile pages have been revamped and now sport a brand new design as well as introduce several changes and new features. The new design fits in well with the Google aesthetic, it's minimalistic but elegant. There's a greater emphasis on photos, simple editing and some new sections.

"Two years ago, we launched Google Profiles to help you manage your online identity. Since then, we’ve enhanced profiles to help you connect to other public online services and improve your search results," Greg Marra, Product Manager at Google, wrote.

"Today, we’re starting to give Google Profiles a new look and feel, making it even easier for you to control and enrich your public profile," he announced.

A social web profile is not the first thing that comes to mind when you think about Google, but it has one of those as well and it's fairly used.

And since Google's ambitions for the social web have not gone away, Google Profiles may play a big role in any venture in this area, be it a social 'layer' or a full blown social network.

The profile photo is emphasized in the new redesign and there is also a 'Scrapbook' to showcase photos you like, right at the top of the profile page, very similar to Facebook.

The new design is rolling out to everyone that maintains a public Google Profile and all pages will be automatically upgraded eventually. This would probably be a good time to update the info in your Google profile as well.

You can now add "10 words that describe you best," bragging rights - aka a short bio or things you're just proud of, as well as info about your education, places you've lived and worked.

Google also plans to unveil something similar to Profiles designed for businesses and brands it seems. "While profiles work well for individuals, we’ll continue to work on new ways for businesses to engage with their customers, so stay tuned for updates," Marra wrote.