The pros and cons of having a flash website

Flash is a very powerful tool if used correctly. We use it every day for a variety of different projects, from simple web banners to full deployment of desktop applications. With the new version of Flash CS5 due to be released with even more powerful tools such as iphone application deployment; the possibilities are endless.

When it comes to using flash in a website, it’s most commonly used in the following ways:

Individual Element – flash can be used as a secondary object such as a banner, image gallery or animation. For seo purposes it is important that when you add flash that you use the correct code to embed the files to ensure your web page complies with w3c standards.

100% Flash Website – with the possibilities and potential of flash it is widely used for entire websites. Using flash in such away allows designers to create stunning media rich websites that engage visitors. When using flash in this way websites are usually text limited and not so easy to seo optimise. Different seo methods are used to make these kinds of websites popular.

An example of a 100% flash website

So are there really any pros and cons from using flash? Well it all depends on how you use it and what you business does and how you want to market your website. I would recommend not using flash as your entire website unless you really know what you are doing. There is no reason why you cannot have your main website as html and create a sub domain or even separate website using flash which will provide you with the best of both worlds.

If you still ensure or undecided about using flash on your next project, just search Google and you will find many other opinions and discussions on this topic.

This article was written by Jack Millard a web designer and developer based in Bath, UK. Jack runs Cloud Web Solutions who provide web design and SEO services, for more information take a look at web design bath.