Google recently shook the Web design and SEO worlds when it announced it is now spidering and indexing Adobe Flash text files. Heretofore, Flash was frowned on widely in Web design world and universally in SEO. It will be interesting to see if there will now be a surge in Flash infested Web sites. I hope not.
First off, Google's new indexing will not have a major impact on SEO (see links below). But even if it did, there are even more important reasons to use Flash with care.
Flash is excellent seasoning for a Web site, but unappetizing as the main course. There are two assumptions it's very safe to make for a business Web site. First, visitors come for information, not entertainment. Second, visitors are in a hurry. If the site's home page is a clutter of animation, it will frustrate the visitor's attempt to find information and find it quickly. The best way to dazzle today's online audience is to provide easily searchable and easily digestible information.
Employing Flash to provide visitors with a multi-media experience is sensible, but even here, a company has more engaging options at its disposal, such as videocasts, screencasts, and podcasts. The time for Flash may yet come, but not today.
