Flash, with all of its fancy animation and eye-catching features, is a popular method to build a website these days. Because of this flexibility and aesthetic flair, many web users are tempted to put together a fully Flash based website in order to make their mark, but really, who can blame them? Having the best looking and most interesting website possible should be key aspirations for anyone building a web presence. Before doing so, however, we recommend you fully weigh the advantages and disadvantages of this option so you can avoid a possible website DISASTER in the future.
Advantages
Flash websites are visually appealing. Yes, they are pretty, to say the least. So, by creating an effective Flash website, you can leave an immediate and lasting impression on a web visitor. This will hopefully make them more inclined to continue on with the site, refer a friend or return again in the future, which is the perfect defense against website failure.
Flash websites allow for animations. The true benefit of Flash animations is the way they can be delivered in an effective and pleasing manner. Flash animations can look crisper than standard video files, and, in some cases, they make up smaller files because the graphics within are vector-based. These points create faster load times and better visual appeal that will further help optimise website success.
Flash websites allow for interactivity. Everything from basic applications, such as contact forms and navigation bars, to advanced features, such as web based games, can be offered to web visitors through Flash at a much more interactive level. Static text is easily taken to the next level with this platform.
Flash websites can integrate presentations. With its crisp motion capabilities, Flash provides a professional appearance to a business or organisation by clearly portraying goals and business purposes to visitors through presentations. As opposed to plain, boring text, a visitor is probably more likely to remember the words, and overall feeling, of the visual presentation.
Disadvantages
Flash is a search engine killer. Chances are that if you are starting a website online, you are expecting some visitors. That being said, a full Flash based website will cripple your chances in the search engines before you even begin. Flash websites are embedded into adobe’s flash player and, up until quite recently, could not be crawled at all by search engines. Luckily, some search engines have announced they are now indexing Flash websites, yet webmasters worldwide are continually battling to get their full flash sites indexed, and indexed correctly.
Until the ability for all search engines to crawl a completely Flash based website the same as an html document is reached, we strongly recommend using only portions of flash in addition to links and main text that is located in the html document portion (not in the flash portions). Many questions remained unanswered on this topic, but for those wanting to know more, please refer to Flash N’Seo, a website dedicated to reporting SEO based experiments for Flash files.
Visitors MUST have the Flash player installed. If you have ever been to a website that has prompted you to install the Flash player, you probably understand why this can be a complete disadvantage for website owners. Unfortunately, without the player installed, there is no way to view Flash animations or websites. While the software is free, these extra steps to visit the adobe website to install it may keep many visitors from sticking around.
Editing a Flash website may be more complex. Since it is generally a more difficult platform to work with, as opposed to HTML and CSS techniques for example, making simple changes may not seem so simple. Ultimately, this may result in a more time consuming task at hand. In addition, if the website was built by an outside party with a hefty price tag, you might find yourself forking out more money for editing.
Load times will be impacted. As mentioned before, flash is a better option for integrating certain types of animation, but for overall website design, load times will be much slower. Depending on the patience levels of those visiting, people may simply decide to leave and explore one of the other thousands of websites available on the internet rather than wait. So, it is wise to think about the purpose of your website, and the type of visitors it will attract, before building your website. If the majority of visitors will be looking to it for a quick answer, then sure enough making them wade through slow load times and animations will push them on to the next.
We know it is easy to get lost in the possibility of having the flashiest Flash based website out there, but we urge you to hold back and weigh all the advantages and disadvantages before proceeding. Overall, Flash is a great platform to work with for website design, but only when used in the proper situation. While we do not recommend our customers to build websites entirely in Flash, we definitely encourage them to use it in portions, mainly for images or to create a desired effect. Most importantly, those creating with Flash should make sure to use text on the page in order to effectively be indexed by the search engines. Failure in this area alone could result in a true website DISASTER.
What do you think? Are there any advantages or disadvantages we missed? Leave us a comment to contribute to this debatable topic.
