Web Accessibility

Improved web accessibility oftentimes leads to increased revenue, improved customer loyalty, and reduced expenses

We arrange more and more of our matters online. We make purchases, do our banking, request benefits and so much more. That’s easier said than done for some of us, though. More than two million residents of The Netherlands and more than fifteen million Europeans suffer from restrictions that limit their abilities to use the Internet.

Improving the accessibility of your website, (content) platform or online application leads to better user experience for everyone. So not “just” for people with an official restriction. As a result, you’ll quite likely see your revenue grow, your expenses reduce, and your churn will shrink, too.

Here’s how we can help out

• In need of a new site or a redesign? We’ll make sure it’s accessible.
• In need of recommendations to improve the accessibility of your site, platform or application? We’ll gladly map out an action plan.
• Looking to acquire knowledge? We suggest you to take a look at the A11Y Collective, our e-learning environment with high-quality accessibility courses.
• Need to know how accessible your website or application currently is? We’d be delighted to perform an accessibility audit.
• Would your team of developers benefit from a boost in accessibility expertise? We gladly train and coach your team. That could include review code and suggesting amendments in Git. That way you can rest assured all code you’re deploying meets the WCAG standards. And yes, we offer these services to fellow agencies, too.

Or read on to discover more about web accessibility, its benefits and how we can be of assistance.

What is web accessibility?

Web accessibility is making websites and online services available to the widest audience possible. That means that an accessible website is easy to use for people with restrictions as well.

There are many ways to improve web accessibility. You could, for instance, make sure to:

• use proper color contrast in the colors you pick for your copy;
• produce source code that is compliant with international standards;
• include useful descriptions for all images and links;
• create content that is easy to scan and to understand.

Who benefits from improved web accessibility?

Web accessibility primarily focuses on people with restrictions. If you’re for instance suffering from severely limited vision, you oftentimes depend on assistive technology to help you read content and use online services. Sometimes just zooming in your screen will do, but unfortunately, that makes important elements disappear on you at times. If you’re color blind, you may miss out on essential information to fill out forms. For instance, because you’re not able to see error messages marked in red. And if you suffer from an attention deficit disorder, you may have trouble understanding long and complicated texts.

More than a billion people worldwide benefit from improved web accessibility

The World Bank states that worldwide, more than a billion people benefit from improved web accessibility. That’s about 15% of the entire world population.

People without official diagnosis also benefit from improved web accessibility

When for instance, the contrast between the color of your copy and your background is adequate, it will be easier for all of your visitors to view your content, even when the sun shines on their screens. And when your site is fully responsive, everyone whose eyesight is less than optimal can easily zoom in their screens without essential elements disappearing on them.

So, what does this mean for your business?

When the Dutch SNS Bank improved the accessibility of its website, the number of calls to their call center decreased with 15-30%. As a result, their fixed expenses decreased substantially. Imagine reducing your expenses like that for a moment.

And, let’s step into the shoes of the e-commerce manager of an online shoe store. One that’s not all that accessible. And, as a result, a vision impaired mom gets stuck while trying to purchase a pair of sneakers for her daughter. Who needs them urgently. So she turns to one of your biggest competitors instead. Imagine for a moment that approximately 15% of your visitors get stuck like that. And all move on and purchase with your competitor. You’d be missing out on quite a bit of revenue.

Did you know that people tend to be more loyal when they perceive a website as user-friendly, by the way? Moreover, people with restrictions tend to be quite active in online networks. They use those networks to exchange positive and negative experiences. Your reputation could spread like wildfire that way. You’d better make sure it’s a sound one.  

Lastly, ensuring web accessibility helps you mitigate risk. More and more countries adopt legislation regarding web accessibility. And enforce these with fines and compensation payments.

Making websites, platforms, and applications accessible is therefore not only the right thing to do but will bring you substantial benefits from a business perspective, too.

What is all involved in making a website or application accessible?

We roughly distinguish three factors that make a website accessible or keep it from being inaccessible: code, design, and content.

Code

Make sure the source code of your website meets international standards. All devices, including for instance screen readers and Braille embossers, are able to render your content correctly that way.

Design

Design your website in a way that it automatically adjusts to the size of the screen and to what extent a user has zoomed in the screen. That will ensure that no essential elements will disappear when users zoom in on screens.

Additionally, ensure proper color contrast between your copy and background. That makes reading your content so much easier.

Content

Lastly, make sure your copy is easy to scan and easy to read. For instance by ensuring plenty of white space around paragraphs. But also by adding enough headers and subheaders. And by keeping your sentences nice and short.

How can we help you improve the accessibility of your website or application?

We help our clients in all sorts of ways.

Web accessibility is a standard operating procedure

We’re so convinced of the importance of web accessibility, that we have made it part of our workflow.

We offer audits

You might like to discover how accessible your site or online service currently is. We gladly perform a quick scan to give you a first, sound, impression. Or we could take a deep dive into the code, design, and content, and provide you with a full accessibility audit.

We offer consultancy

Maybe you already decided to prioritize web accessibility, but don’t really know where to start. We gladly assist you in creating an action plan. And we’d be delighted to arrange an (in-house) training for you, too.  

We offer coaching

And maybe you have a team of in-house developers, and you are planning to make sure your site or application will meet WCAG standards soon. We’d be pleased to assist with that, as well. We currently coach several teams of developers, including teams at agencies. We, for instance, review code and suggest improvements in your test environment. That way you’ll have the peace of mind that all code that gets deployed, meets international standards.

Let’s meet for a no-strings-attached brainstorm

Set aside 15-20 minutes of your time to have a conversation about your goals, to brainstorm ideas and to decide upon the next steps. We offer this service over the phone or while enjoying a nice cup of joe, Rotterdam style.