An explanation of accessibility issues, starting at the beginning.

Yesterday, in a forum for small business owners, someone asked me this question:

"Can I ask you what the **** an 'accessibility issue' on a website even is?"

I love this question.

Let's start at the beginning.

Disabled people often use the web in different ways than non-disabled people. For some people with disabilities, that means using assistive technology. Assistive tech is technology that we use to work around an impairment. For example:

• eyeglasses
• crutches
• wheelchairs
• hearing aids
• prosthetics
• screen readers

Let’s discuss screen readers because they're particularly relevant to small business owners in the U.S.

Screen readers are software that let you use a phone/tablet/computer with your hands (for input) and ears (for output) -- no vision required. They use text-to-speech to announce information on screen. They also give users all kinds of new ways to interact with their device.

They’re typically used by people with visual impairments or blindness. Sometimes they’re used by people with other disabilities, like dyslexia.

Screen readers are especially relevant to small businesses in the U.S. because many web accessibility lawsuits are brought by screen reader users.

When someone using a screen reader lands on a page in a website, they rely on the screen reader to announce its content. They generally navigate sequentially through a page, from top to bottom (though there are special ways that screen readers provide to jump around).

When a visitor comes across an image in your page, their screen reader checks to see if the image has alternative text. Alt text is something you define in code when you (or your web designer / developer) implement a web page. The alt text conveys information that’s equivalent to what’s in the image.

If the image is of a toaster, the alt text might be “black toaster with four slots, each holding a slice of bread.”

When an image has alt text defined, the screen reader will announce the alt text when the user lands on the image.

When an image doesn’t have alt text defined, the screen reader will simply announce “image”, or the filename of the image, or something else that isn’t useful. In this case, a blind visitor won’t know that the image is of a toaster — they’ll just know it’s an image of something.

This can be a big deal to both people with disabilities and small businesses. If, for example, the only way to tell that the toaster has four slots is by looking at the image, a screen reader user might abandon a purchase here.

This is one common web accessibility issue that affects one group of people using one kind of assistive tech.

Screen reader users face many other web accessibility issues that break buttons, links, menus, menu items, text input fields, checkboxes, radio buttons, on / off switches, headings, etc.

Other groups of disabled people using different assistive tech face different issues.

Some people with disabilities don't use assistive tech at all, and there are many accessibility issues that aren't related to assistive tech. Color contrast is a straightforward example -- if your site uses light gray text on a dark gray background, it's likely difficult to impossible for many people to read.

As a small business owner, you don’t need to understand all the intricacies of web accessibility. You need to know what it is, why it’s important, and how to hire someone to address it for you.

Avoiding lawsuits isn't the only reason to make your website accessible. In the U.S., 26% of people have a disability.

When you have an inaccessible site, many of these people cannot become your customers and give you their money, even if they would like to.

Making your site accessible helps both your business and your customers.

If you're not sure whether your site is accessible, or how to fix its accessibility issues, book a call with me. We'll do a quick check of your site and talk through your options.

I’m not a lawyer and this is not legal advice. Consult your own attorney if you are concerned about web accessibility lawsuits or have been sued.