In the past, the search engines (Google, Yahoo, Microsoft Live, et all) couldn’t really search Flash files that well. Well Adobe has been working with the search engines to allow them to search the Flash sites, widgets, buttons, and more.

This is good news on the surface, but still requires one digging a little deeper before trying to get a nifty Flash site. Here are three quick take aways to know about, before

The first thing to know, is you still have to use text, as text, to be searchable. Many Flash developers convert the text into something known as shapes so that they can manipulate it easier to look nice on your screen. While your site will look nicer overall, it will cause the search engine to fail to read that part of you Flash site.

Second, most search engines cannot run JavaScript. Because of a software patent issue, Internet Explorer needs JavaScript to write the Flash file to the webpage. So now, in many cases, your Flash site is no longer searchable.

Flash screens, are not the same as web pages, and that means it will be harder to isolate a topic and rank for it, when looking at the overall site with all of the other text working along with it. Add upon that, that most Flash developers are inexperienced at Search Engine Optimization, and lack good tools to build a search optimized site (links, individual pages, helpful page elements, etc) they will most likely not be able to help you rank like a good HTML based website could.

Overall, I would hold off on developing your all Flash based sites if you are interested in long term Search Engine rankings. (Besides, most developers charge more for Flash sites - use that money to make more content which can rank in the search engines, it will be money better spent.)

SEOmoz has more information on his views on why Flash and Search Engines still don’t mix.

Occasionally I have found sites that on their home page you would have to select a company or product from a drop down box, and then enter the site from that information. Until now, Google could not access those pages without being provided direct links. Sites with these types of pages were often called the “Deep Web” or the “Invisible Web”, because search engines could not access them. Google has said in the past that they believe that 80% or more of web pages are “hidden” to them because they require a form to fill out to find them.

Now, if you had hired a good Search Engine Optimizer, this would not be an issue as they would know how to provide links to those pages so all search engines could access them appropriately. However, sometimes the advice of your SEO expert is ignored, or you didn’t include one on your team, and thus search engines can’t access those pages.

In April Google announced that it could begin search pages which required a user to fill out a form. This has all types of interesting applications, both good and bad. You need to understand what this means, as well as what this can do. So without further ado, I present The Good, The Bad, and The Truth.

• The Good:
  • Now more pages will be accessible.
  • Simple “categorical” search forms will no longer cause Google to stumble. For example I recently built a simple movie web application. In it people could search by genre. I had to devise ways to not use a drop down when possible so Search Engines could find the reviews.
• The Bad:
  • If you tried to “hide” pages, you need to rethink your method. Consider the use of the robot.txt file or robots meta tag to properly ask search engines to not process certain files.
  • Some people fear that this means Google will explore or try to hack restricted access sections of your site. (Remember your robots.txt file in these instances.)
• Some Truth:
  • Only Google has announced this feature. While other search engines will probably have to follow suite, as this time they don’t and they still account for 35-45% of all search traffic.
  • Only simple forms are filled out. Google is not (currently) entering information into text boxes, so many forms cannot be processed.

Image via WikipediaBlogs work great in some circumstances.  For example, they work well with a singular person pushing out information and getting feedback. However, the person leaving feed back cannot change the original posting.  And there are times when parts of a page need to be edited, and/or new content pages added. Wiki’s are a good Web 2.0 method of solving this problem.

Wiki - Hawaiian for Quick, although I know not how that relates allows anyone (within reason) to modify, add, and update pages to the system.

Wikipedia is the best know wiki with millions of articles in dozens of languages. It allows anyone to make changes, or even add pages and categories.

Wikis are based off of the idea of the wisdom of the crowd. The Wisdom of Crowds: Why the Many Are Smarter Than the Few and How Collective Wisdom Shapes Business, Economies, Societies and Nations, first published in 2004, states that “the aggregation of information in groups, resulting in decisions that, he argues, are often better than could have been made by any single member of the group.” - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Wisdom_of_Crowds

Instead of seeing an inaccuracy and reporting it, letting people continue to see it, possibly missing a comment, the person who sees the inaccuracy can go right in and change it.

Wikis are becoming increasing popular for project management and tracking.  In it everything from meeting notes, specifications, documentation, and even library files can be stored in the wiki.  IBM has become one of the best know companies to use wikis to track meetings minutes, events, projects and more.  However other companies from law offices, to consumer stores, have implemented wikis to promote communication and knowledge transfer among their workers.

To make them easier to use by non technical people, many wikis allow standard features like Rich Text Editing (Word like editing), and allowing people to search within the Wiki, without requiring anyone to know anything about HTML, or Wiki markup.

Image via WikipediaWhat makes blogs interesting and the most often used form of Web 2.0?

Because they are self contained, and allow for existing pages to be edited without knowing (X)HTML, once a theme is created and applied, it can be easy for a non-technical small business owner to work with.

You wouldn’t buy a new work vehicle without know how it was going to be used!  Likewise, it is important to know how you will use your blog.  Will it be as a traditional blog, for internal use, for working with a new project, or as a site?  Knowing this will increase the chances of you successfully implementing the blog.

For example, a blog might be created to:

• promote new product line being developed,
• inform people about new things happening in your company,
• to allow those outside the core team to stay informed about a project, or
• as a complete web site.

All of these are ways to use a blog, you just need to know how to use it, and work within its strengths and weaknesses.
For example, one common mistake is that people expect and think that to have a successful blog, one has to post every day, or sometimes more often. This is simply not true.  This is a misnomer from common news media which references many successful blogs, thinking you have to do it “their way”.  In reality, you can add a blog to an existing site, or use it strictly as a site.  You might even see blog authors telling you about it.  As a small business owner, I doubt you would have the time to do something like that.

Regular posting is often touted, but rarely defined. What is most important is having some thing worth saying, but much inline with Occam’s Razor however, it should be updated only as often as required.

If you have questions about using implementing a blog on your site, feel free to contact us. We have experience in implementing blogs into existing web sites, setting up new sites to run as blogs, as well as traditional website design and development experience.