By Sanjib Kr Das  August 17, 2022

Your website accessibility ensures equal access for users with disabilities. It also makes your site legally compliant. This guide will teach you everything you need to know about accessibility.

People with disabilities won’t be able to use your website if it isn’t accessible-friendly coded and designed properly. You could be sued for violating the Americans with Disabilities Act.

Nearly 2,000 new accessibility lawsuits were filed in federal courts in 2019. These lawsuits can be costly and damage your business’ reputation. This could cause your bottom line to plummet.

It is important to make sure your business website accessible. You’ll avoid accessibility-related lawsuits and provide better access to all users regardless of their disabilities or impairments.

Overview: What is website access?

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) , an international group that develops web standards, is called . Web accessibility is the design and development of tools, technologies and websites that enable people with disabilities to use the internet effectively.

Accessible websites should be accessible to enable disabled people to use the internet to understand, comprehend, perceive and interact with it.

• People over 50 have changing visual and physical abilities as they age.
• Small-screen users, such as smartwatches and mobile phones, use devices with smaller screens.
• Persons with temporary disabilities (hand injuries, for example) that prevent them from using the keyboard

Accessibility is essential for people with disabilities to use your website. It will improve their experience and make your site more accessible.

Why is web accessibility so important?

Site accessibility is a key component of social responsibility and compassion for persons with disabilities (PWDs). There’s more.

Here are some more reasons web accessibility is so important.

Compliance with the law

Your site will be accessible if it is designed in accordance with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. The ADA is a civil right law that prohibits discrimination against persons with disabilities in all aspects of public life. This includes private places such as the internet.

The WCAG is a common standard and technical requirement that makes your web content more accessible for people with disabilities. Ensure that your website is accessible to all users by adhering to the ADA and WCAG. This will reduce your risk of being sued.

Improved user experience

Your website must be accessible to PWDs and easily navigated according to web accessibility regulations. Accessible sites improve user experience for everyone, not only for PWDs. This increases your visibility, your website traffic, as well as your sales potential.

Reputation boosting for your brand

Your brand will be more accessible if you make your website available to all users. Your business reputation will be improved by your social responsibility. This is a great way to build trust with potential customers and help you achieve better results in your website advertising efforts.

How to make your site more accessible

These tried-and-true methods will ensure that your website is accessible for people with disabilities.

1. Accessibility issues can be found on your website.

It doesn’t matter if you are building your website, or if you have been running it for years, accessibility issues should be checked. There may be errors that prevent your website from complying with accessibility standards and being fully accessible.

A website accessibility evaluation tool such as WAVE can help you to identify accessibility gaps on your site.To allow the website checker to analyze your site for accessibility issues, copy and paste your URL. It can detect missing forms labels, links and buttons that aren’t working, as well as color contrast issues.

To assess the accessibility of your website, perform an accessibility audit. This will help you to identify any issues and then make necessary adjustments. You can use the audit’s results to correct any issues and make sure your website is accessible to everyone.

2. To organize your content, use headings correctly

To organize your website’s contents, use headings such as heading 1 or heading 2.

Blind people can use screen reader software to read web content. This assistive tool, which “reads” web contents, uses the heading structure of your website to navigate effectively.

These tips will help you to create a website structure and heading order that is correct.

• Use

Use it only for your primary page titles.

• Avoid skipping over heading levels. If you skip heading 1, then skip heading 4, it can make your page appear empty. Screen readers may be confused by this.

Submit your website to search engines using proper headings. This makes it easier for search engines to read your website, which is great news for search engine optimization (SEO).

3. Choose a CMS that supports web accessibility

Select a content manager system that offers accessible themes, templates and plug-ins. WordPress provides a variety of accessible themes that comply with basic accessibility requirements.

It is worth noting that these themes do not contain all accessibility features and are not fully compliant with the ADA standards . These themes only provide basic web accessibility features such as accessible font styles and types and color palettes.

4. Automated web accessibility solutions

There are three options for creating accessible websites. The first is the manual approach, where web developers are hired by website owners to add web accessibility features to their site in order to comply with the ADA standards. This is a time-consuming and costly process.

Plug-ins are the second option. Installing web accessibility plugins makes your website more accessible for PWDs. Although the plug-ins can be affordable, their functionality is limited. You won’t be compliant even if you have several plug-ins.

Both methods are not reliable, unfortunately. Website updates can easily erase accessibility modifications you have coded or made to the website, which could lead to accessibility gaps.

A fully automated, AI-powered web accessibility solution such as accessiBe is the third and most reliable.

AccessiBe analyzes the structure of your site and any other elements to determine accessibility issues. Then, accessiBe automatically adjusts it to be fully accessible.

This platform offers an accessibility interface that allows users make adjustments to your site’s design, content and elements to suit their disabilities and limitations.

Automated web accessibility solutions allow you to make your website accessible to users with disabilities quickly and easily. Image source: Author

Bhavitra’s Machine learning service in India and AI automatically checks and fixes accessibility problems on your website every 24 hours. This ensures that you can be compliant at all times.

Managing your website in compliance with the legislation used to take a lot time, effort, money, and time. Automated web accessibility solutions make it possible to achieve full compliance faster and without spending a lot of money.

Examples of web accessibility

These excellent examples of web accessibility can be a source of inspiration.

1. NSW Government

The New South Wales government website was designed to be accessible to a broad range of users, including those using assistive technology.

The Skip to Main Content option is activated by pressing the tab key. This allows keyboard-only users to navigate quickly through the website and jump to any section or page with ease.

Accessibility for keyboard users via a skip to the main content option or site navigation using tab key Image source: Author

Website also provides clear information using large images and simple layouts. The keyboard allows for all functionalities such as menus, headers, buttons and icons, as well forms. This addresses the WCAG success criteria for keyboard navigation.

2. Taylor Guitars

AccessiBe powers the Taylor Guitars website. It offers a variety of accessibility options for users with different disabilities.

You can adjust content, color and orientation, as well as enable accessibility profiles for those who are blind or have cognitive impairments. Taylor also makes use of accessible rich internet applications (ARIA), attributes to add form labels and icon descriptions.

ARIA attributes provide valuable information to screen reader users. They give them precise descriptions

of forms, menus and popups that allow seamless website navigation.

3. Neil Patel

Users can use the Neil Patel website to enable web accessibility options. You can skip to certain headings or pages. You can also use visual tools to adjust contrast, text sizes and other elements of the website.

The website’s design has been kept simple with no distracting visual elements. Text font sizes, spacing and colors are all easy to read and see.

Get your website online today

It’s not rocket science to create an accessible website. Automated web accessibility tools make it easy to create accessible websites that are fully compliant and fast without having to spend a lot of money.

Do not be unprepared. To avoid costly ADA-related lawsuits, make sure your website is accessible immediately. It’s not only a way to protect your business but also a responsible and compassionate act. Contact web development company in India. We will guide you. We are also the best laravel development company in India.

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