Why you should not have a flash video opening page…

I’ve had clients ask me to create a flash or video opening page that will play prior to the user entering their website.  The problem is, using this technique you will most certainly lose visitors who could have become clients.  Here’s why…

The majority of people find web intros annoying, they don’t serve a specific purpose or function other than allowing the website owner to believe that he has something eye catching on his website.  It’s commonly known that the “Skip Intro” button is the most commonly used button on the web.

Read more about this:  http://www.infoworld.com/archives/emailPrint.jsp?R=printThis&A=/article/06/06/14/79274_HNhateaboutwebsites_1.html

Flash intros detract visitors to your site...I always ask my clients, “Have you gone to a page, saw a flash intro was loading and then clicked back to go visit a different page?” If you have, that site just lost you as a visitor and potential customer.  It works the other way, you don’t want to lose potential visitors to your site because you have a barrier preventing them from reaching it.

Furthermore, full flash websites and flash intros will hurt your website search engine optimization and page ranking..topics that I am constantly trying to explain to my customers.  According to the official google blog:

“As many of you already know, Flash is inherently a visual medium, and Googlebot doesn’t have eyes. Googlebot can typically read Flash files and extract the text and links in them, but the structure and context are missing. Moreover, textual contents are sometimes stored in Flash as graphics, and since Googlebot doesn’t currently have the algorithmic eyes needed to read these graphics, these important keywords can be missed entirely. All of this means that even if your Flash content is in our index, it might be missing some text, content, or links. Worse, while Googlebot can understand some Flash files, not all Internet spiders can.”
Read more about this at:  http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2007/07/best-uses-of-flash.html

Google further states: “Avoid “doorway” pages created just for search engines, or other “cookie cutter” approaches such as affiliate programs with little or no original content.”
Read more: http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2007/06/more-details-about-our-webmaster.html

In closing, flash content should always be used to enhance your site.  For example, a flash video included as part of your site content that shows a process that better serves your customer by allowing them to see what you are talking about.  Doing something like this is obvious to the user that there is a specific and beneficial purpose to your flash video. Your number one goal of having a website should be to quickly and efficiently provide your customers and visitors with the information they are looking for.