Splash Pages are a (BIG) Mistake.

A splash page (usually made in Flash) is used to greet site visitors before they arrive at a homepage. Typically it does nothing other than play a fancy movie/animation and look great. Sometimes it will offer the user some type of choice or warn them about something.

Back in 1999, when I first started making websites, everyone wanted a splash page. It was almost the first thing a client would start describing - and they loved them. Web developers and designers loved them too. They were attractive and creative and allowed you to show off your best skills in design and animation. Site owners and their designers were working hard to out-do each other on creating the largest and most complex splash page with which to impress visitors.

Then something started creeping in... there was a realisation that users didn't always have the time to devote a minute or two of their lives to enjoying such handiwork and a 'skip' link below the movie or graphic was typically introduced. Then statistics started to show that in reality a lot of people either spent no time on the splash page (they simply clicked skip) or in many cases the splash page was the first and last page they visited on that site (oops).

Nowadays you will notice that almost no successful business website has a splash page. I cannot remember the last time I ran into one on a quality site. The reason is simple - content is king and time is at a premium. Web content needs to reflect this. People are visiting websites for information or to search for a solution to a problem. Regardless of what you include on a splash page the user will still need to view the actual content of the site - this is where actual decisions are made. So the question is, why would you slow them down on the way to this important content?

The answer in 2008 is that you would not. It is, in almost all cases, a bad idea. Users often explore many sites at once to find the information or solution they desire. If you deliberately slow them down what could you possibly achieve other than to lose some customers along the way to your more efficient and practical competitors?

Our advice is to drop the splash page and put your efforts and budget into a great homepage. if you want some flash in your site then incorporate it into your standard site pages.