How to create website accessibility guidelines
As the internet becomes more and more integral to our lives, it’s important to make sure that everyone can access and use it.
That’s why website accessibility guidelines are so important.
By creating guidelines that ensure your website can be used by people with disabilities, you’re not only making life easier for them – you’re also opening up your site to a whole new audience. So how do you create these guidelines? Read on to find out.
Define what website accessibility is and why it’s important
Website accessibility is the practice of designing and coding websites to be usable by people with disabilities, including vision impairments, hearing impairments, speech impairments, cognitive impairments, and motor impairments.
It can also refer to making a website easier to use for elderly individuals or anyone who may not be as familiar with using computers. Website accessibility is important because it makes web content available to a wide range of users, which equalizes access to information on the internet regardless of disability. Without Website Accessibility compliance, some people may not be able to access digital content—which could mean exclusion from resources and opportunities that many people take for granted. As technology advances so should our commitment to providing accessible websites – this helps ensure fair and equal access to information for all internet users.
Summarize the WCAG 2.0 standards
The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 are the standards that set the benchmark for making web content available and accessible to everyone, regardless of disability.
The guideline focuses on four key principles: content should be perceivable, operable, understandable and robust enough for software to interact with. WCAG 2.0 contains twelve guidelines which are broken down into testable success criteria at different levels of compliance – A, AA and AAA. In order to meet all WCAG 2.0 guidelines and criteria, websites need to ensure that users can access all types of content (text, audio, visual etc.), as well as easily use website elements like forms and page navigation links.
Taking these steps will significantly increase website accessibility for all users, creating an enjoyable experience for visitors using all types of devices with different assistive technology.
Give examples of how to make a website accessible
Making a website easily accessible is an important part of providing quality content and services to a wide variety of audiences. Examples for making a website more accessible include using descriptive link titles and labels, ensuring interactive elements are labeled correctly, including alt text descriptions for images, avoiding autoplay audio or video content, and providing captions or transcripts for audio or video content.
Additionally, it is important to organize webpages hierarchically with clear labels and titles so website visitors can quickly discern where they are navigating within the site. By following these steps and adhering to international standards such as WCAG 2.1 when creating websites, organisations can ensure their web presence is as inclusive as possible.
Offer tips on testing for accessibility
When designing or maintaining a website, accessibility is an important factor to keep in mind. To ensure that your website is inclusive and accessible to everyone, it’s essential to test for accessibility. One of the quickest ways to do this is by using an automated tool; these tools scan individual pages and report on potential problems.
You should also double-check with a manual review – look out for missed keyboard focus or other user interface elements that may create difficulty for certain users. Consider also if the page works across all major browsers, on both mobile devices as well as desktops. Testing regularly will help you identify any issues early on, ensuring maximum usability for your website’s visitors.
Making your website accessible is important not only to comply with WCAG 2.0 guidelines but also to ensure that everyone can use and enjoy your site, regardless of ability. By making a few simple tweaks to the design and layout of your site, you can make a world of difference for people with disabilities. And, as an added bonus, following these accessibility standards can actually help improve your SEO. So what are you waiting for? Make your site more accessible today! For more information on web accessibility or WCAG 2.0 compliance, check out the resources below.