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What is “Accessibility”? What is the point of “Accessibility”? There are a number of definitions out there for “Accessiblity”, but the one that I think best sums it up is the following from the Java Look and Feel Guidelines

The degree to which software can be used comfortably by a wide variety of people, including those who require assistive technologies like screen magnifiers or voice recognition.

In this article, we’re going to take a look at why you need to make sure that your website is accessible.

In the context of web browsers, “assistive technologies” are pieces of software that help users understand the contents of a web page. Examples could include screen readers or braille displays for the blind or partially sighted. These work by reading the raw HTML of the web page and they don’t pay attention to CSS, (although there are now styles in CSS2 that are targeting screen reading technology, so it is worth bearing in mind for the future). You can give these users the best chance of successfully using your website if you mark up your pages in a semantically correct fashion. This will help the software and therefore the users infer the correct meaning from your websites.

Bearing that in mind, you might think that this sounds like a great idea, but surely it is going to cost more to take the time to make sure that the page is accessible. Won’t it require some compromises in design? You’re right to think that, because it will. However, there are two big reasons to make sure your pages are accessible. The first one is the legal argument.

Back in the year 2000, the organisers of the Sydney Olympics were successfully sued by an individual, Bruce Maguire under the Australian Disability Discrimination Act, because parts of the Sydney Olympics website were inaccessible to him. Bruce, being blind, used a Braille display and encountered numerous problems with the site. For example, images on the site did not have a text alternative specified using the “alt” attribute for the “img” tag. The organisers ignored the ruling and were then fined A$20,000. They had argued that the W3C’s accessibility guidelines were too new to be taken into account when implementing the site, but they had also ignored things like the alt attribute, which had existed since HTML 2.0.

This has world wide implications because disability legislation is broadly similar in Australia, USA, Canada and the UK. The guidelines were new 8 years ago, but not anymore. It is generally understood that you need to reach the “AA” level these days. You could save a bit of time and money and create a site that doesn’t follow these guidelines, but prepared to face the legal consequences. Better then to take them into account at the earliest stage?

The second big reason doesn’t have anything to do with accessibility, but rather search engines. Search engines use “bots” to visit your site and index the content. Like screen readers and braille displays, these bots are pieces of software that read your HTML. When it comes to searching this content, how it is marked up and the contents of the attributes will have a direct bearing on how likely it is the search engine will think your content is relevant. This is because the algorithms they use will try and infer more meaning to the content. “Reading between the lines” as it were.

Making your ecommerce website accessible gives you three benefits.

1. Enables more people to use your site and spend money with you
2. Saves you legal worries in future - the guidelines will only get stronger!
3. Improves search engines understanding of your site

Here at neteffekt we’re experts in creating accessible ecommerce websites and email marketing campaigns. Get in touch with us if you want to start profiting from the above benefits. You can’t lose!