Why is the accessibility of your website so important?
Imagine not being able to access the information and services you need because they are not accessible online. Sadly, this is the reality for millions of people with disabilities and impairments. Website accessibility is about making sure that everyone has the same opportunity to use the web, regardless of their abilities.
What is website accessibility?
Web accessibility is making sure there are no barriers that prevent someone from using or interacting with your website regardless of any physical disability or cognitive impairment. The internationally recognised set of guidelines/standards for accessibility are created and maintained by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) through their Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG). The guidelines are updated over time with WCAG 2.2 being the latest version being published on 5 October 2023.
What does WCAG 2.2 cover?
WCAG 2.2 is based on 4 design principles: Perceivable; Operable; Understandable; and Robust. The reason for focusing on principles, rather than technology, is to highlight the importance of the different ways that users interact with your content. Examples of this can include using a keyboard instead of a mouse, changing browser settings to make content easier to read, using a screen reader to speak the content out loud and voice commands to navigate a website.
Within the 4 design principles are 13 guidelines, each of which is broken down into specific success criteria that need to be met to meet the different levels of conformity. Examples of these include that content should not be restricted by screen orientation and content reflows into a single column when increased by 400%. These clearly make sense to someone with an impairment or disability, but if you think outside of this, there is a clear advantage to someone accessing your website on a mobile device. More information on the 13 guidelines can be found on the W3C website.
How does conformance with the guidelines work?
Within the guidelines are 3 levels of conformance - A, AA and AAA - with A being the lowest and AAA the highest. A good example to demonstrate how the three levels differ is thinking about how you would handle a video on your website. The requirements for conformity by level are as follows:
Level A - provide captions that are synchronised to the content for all pre-recorded videos. A text alternative such as a transcript with text descriptions of any important visual details is also available.
Level AA - as A with additional requirement to have captions for live video and to have audio descriptions (a narration added to the soundtrack) for any pre-recorded videos.
Level AAA - as AA with an additional requirement for sign language interpretation to be added to all pre-recorded video, extended audio descriptions and text-based alternatives of the videos (with audio descriptions).
At We3 Partners, we recommend AA conformance as standard and AAA where efficiently achievable. We feel this hits the best balance within typical budget and resource constraints especially when using the example above given the number of sign languages used globally.
Why is the accessibility of your website so important?
Website accessibility has generally been misunderstood over the years. It has been seen as more of a tax on website development than a fundamental part of design that can bring numerous opportunities to website owners.
Most website owners care deeply about the usability of their website and frequently commit significant budgets to UX reviews, eye-tracking monitoring, journey tracking, etc. Put simply, good accessibility is required to make your website usable to all internet users, not only those with disabilities and impairments. According to the latest figures from the Office for National Statistics, this represents 17.8% of the population of England and Wales - that’s 10.4m people in those two countries alone and globally is estimated as an audience of 1.3bn. As Sir Tim Berners-Lee said, the internet should empower all members of society, and greater adoption of accessibility standards clearly supports that principle.
What are the benefits of having an accessible website?
Improved user experience. Accessible websites are easier to use for all visitors. Clearly laid out, easy to navigate and predictable websites are appealing to everyone. In addition to people with disabilities or impairments, an accessible website will improve the user experience for older/less experienced website users and those using mobile devices (as previously mentioned).
Improved search engine optimisation (SEO). It is debatable whether accessibility is actively used by search engines to inform rankings, however, what is not debatable is that accessibility and SEO work hand-in-hand. The reason for this is that accessible websites become a lot more accessible for search engine algorithms to understand the content better. In addition to this, generative AI platforms such as ChatGPT and Bard understand the context better too which makes your content more likely to be referenced/returned from a prompt.
Improved sustainability. A little thought of benefit is the sustainability upside of an accessible website especially when looking at the Scope 2 and 3 emissions. Websites that adhere to accessible standards have efficient code as a byproduct - this allows assistive technologies (such as screen readers) to work effectively - reducing both the server load and user load of returning a page. It is estimated that over 50% of emissions related to a website can be reduced by efficient code and practices. In addition, simple actions for accessibility such as setting videos not to auto-play have a direct impact on energy consumption.
Improved brand image. By making your website accessible, you are demonstrating that you are a company that cares about diversity and inclusion - all of which help you to build a positive brand image and attract new customers.
Socio-economic inclusion. Whilst web content accessibility is primarily designed for those with a disability or impairment, there is a benefit at a socio-economic level. Accessible websites are low-code and have less client-side processing by nature. This means that in areas with slow cellular data connectivity or slow broadband, a website can be accessed in a timely and engaging manner.
Our 3 key recommendations
Review your website accessibility. There are plenty of free tools available online which allow you to test your conformity. This will help you create your ‘to-do’ list of areas for improvement.
Get to understand the guidelines and any local legal requirements. Review the guidance and establish your desired level of conformity and check whether you have a legal requirement for accessibility such as the Equality Act 2010 in the UK. In Norway, it is illegal for commercial websites not to provide equal access for people with disabilities.
Add accessibility standards to your digital brand guidelines and website development standards. Simple actions like contrast testing your brand colours against differing backgrounds and tweaking where appropriate (again there are plenty of free tools available online) need to be considered.
If you would like to discuss accessibility with us further, please get in contact.
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