Google Gets Friendly with Flash Content
Posted by keirsun on July 01, 2008 at 10:25 AM
Flash website developers can breathe a sigh of relief this morning - a collaboration between Adobe, Google and Yahoo! will make it easier for the two search engines to index Flash files (SWF).
Until now, search engine web crawlers have had lots of trouble accurately indexing text and links that appear in Flash files. For years this roadblock has been the cause of many headaches for web designers, website owners and online marketers alike. (Not to mention searchers who may be missing out on valuable content.) But the bottle of ibuprofen may be going back in the medicine cabinet.
Last night Google announced that it has launched its new Flash indexing algorithm. The new algorithm is a result of the Adobe collaboration.
Can Google now index every item in a Flash file? No. But it can index the useful parts.
According to Google software engineers Ron Adler and Janis Stipins:
Google can index text content within Flash
1) This Flash text can be used for the snippet that appears beneath your link in Google search results.
2) Flash text will be used to compare with keywords used in Google searches.
3) Indexable Flash content includes text within Flash buttons and menus.
Google can index links with Flash
1) Links within Flash files can be followed by Google's web crawler.
Google cannot index non-textual Flash content
1) Google can't index images within Flash files.
2) Google can't index text that appears in Flash-based images.
3) Google will not generate anchor text for non-text, Flash-based links.
This is all good news for content developers and web searchers. But as Vanessa Fox at Search Engine Land points out, Flash developers should still spend time on search engine optimization:
As Danny Sullivan noted last year when word of Google's work in this area first came up, most Flash content isn't made up of primarily words. It's made up of images, video, and animation, and none of that will be surfaced in search results with this advancement. Google's new Flash algorithms extract text and links only. Everything else is still a black box.
At the time of this posting, there has been no information released from Yahoo! in regards to when (or if) it will implement a similar Flash indexing algorithm.
More Information:
SWF searchability FAQ - Adobe Developer Connection
Improved Flash indexing - Google Webmaster Central Blog
Category
Search Engines
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Comments (22)
Posted on July 2, 2008 08:48 AM
We don't use too much flash on our site - but this is just amazing!
Posted on July 2, 2008 10:50 AM
That's really interesting.
It'll open many doors to us, webdesigners / coders, to do what exactly we want (or something next to that).
I had many headaches with some flash sites and animated banners, 'cause Google didn't index links insite it. So, I had to deal with GIF's ...
God almighty, it's good to see that :D ...
Posted on July 2, 2008 11:08 AM
Finally, i was so discouraged that i would never make my homepage indexed because of having so much Flash content. Partially great news...
Posted on July 2, 2008 03:37 PM
anyone know for sure if swfobject is one of the ok-to-use javascripts for embedding flash?
Posted on July 2, 2008 03:55 PM
Thanks for the comments everyone. Steve - According to Google Code: "SWFObject is an easy-to-use and standards-friendly method to embed Flash content" so you should be fine using this script. But it would be worth testing out to make sure. http://code.google.com/p/swfobject/
Posted on July 3, 2008 09:59 AM
Much awaited update, the flash designers aspiring SEO should jump at their desk now.
Posted on July 3, 2008 12:38 PM
Awesome news to hear. As we do website in flash too.
Posted on July 3, 2008 03:51 PM
Wow that is great news for a lot of webmasters.
Posted on July 3, 2008 05:14 PM
congratulation for flash love. But flash still take time down loading.
Posted on July 3, 2008 06:23 PM
Excellent news, as we have been holding off making sites and advertising microsites in flash, this means we can at least re-assure our clients that their marketing spiel will be found by the engines and ranked.
Posted on July 4, 2008 05:48 AM
ok ! it is very nice news that google could index flash's texture content. But how do they crawl. How would be DOM structure for flash
Posted on July 5, 2008 12:53 AM
I think this is something which was always there but never accepted openly..as I have seen many flash based websites doing good on very competitive terms...
anyway I welcome this move
Posted on July 5, 2008 10:38 PM
That will certainly make life a lot easier for many Webmasters.
Posted on July 6, 2008 01:27 AM
Better late than never...to bad very few designers use flash as the main page anymore!
Posted on July 7, 2008 09:16 AM
Thanks again for the comments everyone. For those who have questions I recommend reading the interview with Google software engineers Ron Adler and Janis Stipins: http://googlewebmastercentral.blogspot.com/2008/06/improved-flash-indexing.html in addition to Adobe's SWF searchability FAQ: http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flashplayer/articles/swf_searchability.html
Posted on July 8, 2008 03:30 AM
Great News! I have been waiting for this news for past one year! But i still doubt the effectiveness!
Posted on July 2, 2008 06:55 AM
That's a very good news... because most of our flash web site aren't searchearble... but I wonder how much G will read my Flash Files...