Flash Clickable Map

Should I use flash or clickable map

[lostdog]

Hi,

I currently use a (22k).gif clickablemap of the US on my website. I thinking of switching over to a flash clickable map so the page will load faster.

1. Will all browsers show the flash map?
2. Is one better than the othe as fas as SEO?

Thanks,

Go Giants ; )

[Major_Payne]

1) Browsers require their own version of the flash plug-in and you have to take this into account and warn those viewers, who do not have a flash plug-in, or one that is working correctly with the browser they are using.

2) Flash, as a rule, is not very SEO friendly. Other work arounds must be used to make the page rank better.

Go Saints :P

[flashusamap]

Hi,
Only browsers that have Flash installed will be able to see the map. However, there are probably more computers using Flash than using JavaScript. So, you're only leaving out a few people.

I'm not sure that the Flash map will reduce load time. The flash us maps that I have seen are at least 25K in size. I think the advantage of the Flash map is that it looks nicer and allows you to add extra info on hover.

Actually, Google can now see content in SWF files. However, it won't give your site the same SEO juice. If you want to pass page rank, you'll need to you traditional links.

Chris

[edited by: eelixduppy at 3:10 pm (utc) on Apr 25, 2011]
[edit reason] removed specifics [/edit]

[rocknbil]

The flash map would be overhead, you'd still need to render the map somehow. The only good argument for using it would be to add features not available via strict html or html + Javascript.

But it's not necessary to restrict the map only to uses that can access Flash. What you do is keep the image map in a div,

<div id="flash-map"><img src="us.map.gif" width="[whatever]" height="[whatever]" usemap=#us-map" alt="map if the U.S."></div>

Then using SWFObject [code.google.com], you load the flash map into the flash-map div (i.e., it replaces the content.) In this way, it serves the content whether Flash is enabled or not.

In your case the point is moot, as you'd wind up keeping the map.