Flash can create an interactive world on your website, but just how interactive is it from a usability standpoint? More over, does it hurt your site’s chances at being found online?
The Good
One thing that is especially nice about Flash is that you don’t have to worry about your site looking the same across multiple operating systems and browsers. This is one of the problems with using conventional HTML and CSS. Certain browsers don’t support the standards set forth by the W3C (World Wide Web Consortium). IE 6 anyone? This can cause nightmares for the web designers that are aware of the issue – and nightmares for you if your designer doesn’t happen to test your site in all of the popular browsers – and their previous versions. While there are easy fixes to this solution – it’s not even a concern when using Flash – unless you’re on a mobile device. Flash isn’t available on a lot of smartphone browsers which is an increasingly common way of browsing.
Fonts are also an issue. If you want to use certain font that is not available on all systems – you can’t with HTML. Your text will simply render as that not-so-attractive Times New Roman on computers that do not have your font installed. However, with Flash, you can simply embed that font right into the Flash file – thus ensuring that it will display properly across all of your visitors’ computers, even if they don’t have that font installed on their own system.
Animation and movement are usually the reasons most companies want to use Flash on their sites. They want it to be interactive and to grab the visitor’s attention. Flash does provide a wonderful set of features for being able to create interactive and dynamic applications that can incorporate animation.
The Bad
Unfortunately, there’s a lot more bad to talk about than good. There is a significant loss of functionality for your site when it comes to Flash.
Here’s a brief list of things you can’t do with a site made entirely in Flash.
- Users can’t view your site on their mobile phones. (It’s coming later this year – but it’s not here yet)
- Users cannot (in most cases) right-click on a link to launch it in a new window.
- Users cannot hit their back button while browsing your site to return to the page they were just on. They’ll have to re-navigate back to that page they want to revisit in your own navigational system.
- Users cannot save images that are embedded in Flash files.
- If a user wants to bookmark a certain interior page of your site – they can only bookmark your main url (or the url that contains the flash file)
- Users cannot increase or decrease the font size of your site for easier reading.
- Users that don’t have the Flash plugin installed on their computers will have to download it before they can view your site.
- SEO – Doing too much of your site in Flash will make your site less SEO friendly.
- Flash crashes on a number of platforms. Linux users especially have problems with this.
Now there are tips and tricks around some of these things we’ve listed above. However, it’s simply not as effective.
The Ugly
The way a lot of sites use Flash can just really turn visitors off – and make designers cringe. Just because you can make something 3D doesn’t mean that you should. Flash needs to serve a distinct purpose that helps in the overall experience of your site, or it shouldn’t be used. This goes for everything on your site – all elements of your site need to work together to promote your company and your company’s products/services – otherwise you’re wasting space that could be used more effectively.
The Final Conclusion
The final conclusion is what we tell all of our business clients. Flash isn’t all bad – but you shouldn’t create an entire site in it. Consider your clients on slower connections or those that aren’t as internet savvy. They’re not going to wait around for your site to load, and they will become aggravated if they can’t use that back button.
Flash is wonderful for animated headers – or certain portions of your site that you want to be interactive or have some degree of movement to it. Take for example our homepage, we have our client list in Flash – but that is the only element of that page that is in Flash.
There are exceptions for this – movie websites are a great example. Movie sites need to have a great deal of multimedia and interactivity. With that being said – most of us have been to movie sites that we couldn’t exactly figure out how to navigate. Experimental designs are groundbreaking and inspirational for the world of design – but we still have to make sure we provide a high level of usability for the visitors.
Bottom line – when you want to use Flash, ask yourself are you really trying to accomplish things that plan HTML can’t? If you are – then you need Flash. Just be careful with how much Flash you use.
Have questions about web design? Use Flash currently on your site and want to make sure you’re still search engine friendly? Contact us for a free report on how optimized your site is.
Article Written By: Emma Loggins
