More About Creative Flash Audio

Last week I told you about AudioGenerator: a tool for quickly adding Flash-based soundbites to a Website. Since then, I have observed new evidence convincing me that audio on Websites is growing in popularity.

My friend Tom shared with me another company/site at www.talkinsites.com that is using Flash's audio capabilities to turn a profit. They sell 'packages' ranging from $199.00 to 299.00, in which they create Flash-based sound modules that include scripting, voice-overs and music. The idea behind their product is to place modules on the pages of your site as audio narratives of the current page's content. I have to admit that while the design of their site could be improved a bit, their own use of this concept was really nice, and did give it a more professional feel. The effect is alot different than that of simply using a looping background audio clip, which typically tends to get annoying.

Most Flash developers could easily implement this kind of funtionality on their own, simply by placing a hidden Flash movie on a page that is used for nothing more than playing a reasonably sized audio clip. Would you want to? Are there really any good reasons to?

Well, I've seen reports that using audio in an informative manner (as I've just described) increases various response rates by three-fold, whether the response desired was for the visitor to buy something, sign up for something, or request more info. If true, that's a powerful stat!

Now, I've been party to debates about the use of audio on a Website, and most people fall into one of three camps:

• People who can't stand audio on a site, period!!


• People who don't mind audio on a site, as long as they can control its playback (these people hate audio to automatically begin as soon as a page loads because they may be at work when the page with audio is viewed, instantly alarming their boss that they're not actually working on company-related business)


• People who dig useful ways of using audio, and who don't really mind if audio begins automatically when a page is surfed to (saving the hassle of actually pressing a Play button manually - BTW, this is me)

If you're one of those who don't like audio on a site at all, all I can say is that you'd better get your head out of your butt and realize that interactive, multimedia-based content in one form or another *will* be standard on most sites in the very near future. True, some people don't want it, but most people do, and typically the 'most' crowd wins (thank goodness)!

Informative audio will be a concept to watch (or should I say, listen for?) in the coming months.

Before I go I wanted to give you the lowdown on a product similar to the AudioGenerator service I mentioned last week. It's called Sonic Memo. Sonic Memo also allows you to quickly add audio clips to a website. But unlike AudioGenerator, which requires you to pay a monthly subscription fee, Sonic Memo is purchased once, and you allowed to created an unlimited number of clips. To learn more about this useful product, visit the Sonic Memo site.