I want to have a big splash image on my page on the front page of a website I'm designing - and nothing else.

There will be one of 5 random images displayed, say for example.

Now... I can obviously see that such a page would not be the most search engine optimised page in the world!

How can I get around this?
Is there anything I can do to improve things?

[B]IF[/B ]there are other pages on my website that contain relevant data, does it matter that my front page, i.e. index.htm isn't as relevant?

I did come up with one idea though.
I have my big splash image.
AND then have several rows below my main content.
The very last row would contain relevant text.
This text would not necessarily be for the reading of the average user.
But would be for search engines.

Erm... would the above would the above be counted as cheating?

Any help would be appreciated.

Thanks.


OM

*.. would the above be counted as cheating?*

If the text is visible to the average user by scrolling down past the images, no.

I just don't understand why you want that splash page to begin with. In my experience it always lower user conversions - some of the users will never click through to the "real site".

Your default "front" page is the page that is linked to when someone links to your domain. Generally, most of your inbounds will be to this page.

In my experience, a text-rich default page is extremely valuable for SEO, and yes, you'll lose one of your main tools if it's not relevant. Keep in mind that no one page on your site can be optimized for all your phrases... but your home page should generally be optimized for your most general and competitive, ideally taking advantage of likely inbound anchor text.

As a user and as an SEO, I can't stand image-only splash pages. I've described the SEO reasons. And users find splash pages to be a waste of time. Mikkel is right... they will cost you lots of conversions.

I'd agree with you guys in theory, but maybe OM2 has a valid rationale for a splash page, there are some "design" led sectors where....

I agree that a flash splash page is usually a poor idea for both search and usability but if you are going to do it anyway make sure you provide properly written text content and text navigation (&link to site map) at the bottom of the page. This can end up looking and working well if done right. Depending on how you are doing this you may want to build this page in divs so that the text is not buried under a pile of code. PM me if you want to see some examples of how this can work out well.

I still haven't seen one valid argument FOR splash pages - the closest one I've come across is: "The designer think it looks cool" errhhh, how much do the designer buy off your website, I may ask?

>I still haven't seen one valid argument FOR splash pages

and you won't get one from me either ;-) You can advise a client, but ultimately you have to the best you can with what they give you to work with.

Thats one theory, John :)
Personally I am more the "kick-ass" type :D

well thats true, but since I am a ass-kicker-for-hire I try to kick the asses I am paid to kick ;-)

Exactly, I just don't stop kicking because they say it hurts - I just kick harder :D

Hmmm... thanks for all the replies.

This is the front page I was thinking of:

http://metminex.net/test/bigSplashImage.jpg

Is this a bad idea?

Any feedback would be appreciated.

Thanks.


OM

Candidly, I think the page would be improved aesthetically by making the image smaller and adding some white space around it. I cannot imagine what's so hard about adding a a block of, say, 125-150 words of text beneath the image in an attractively formatted font, maybe greyed down so it doesn't jump out, but nevertheless clearly visible.

That is not really a 'splash page' - at least not in my understanding.

A 'splash page' normally is the home page with nothing but an image and a 'click here to enter' type message.

Your example shows the big image, but within the sites main framework. In other words, you have the menu / navigation on that page.

Whilst still not ideal for SEO and perhaps not for conversions, it is not nearly as bad as a splash page as described above.