If your website isn’t designed with accessibility in mind, it can be difficult to navigate and limit the number of people who visit your website. According to the CDC, one in five people in the U.S. lives with a disability. By designing or redesigning your website with accessibility in mind, you’ll give all potential customers the same experience and demonstrate your commitment to serving everyone equally. 

While it’s easy to unintentionally make your website inaccessible, it’s important to review any components that could potentially make it hard to use and start implementing the proper changes. 

Here are some ways you can make your website more accessible: 

  1. Review Your Use of Color 
  2. Allow Users To Enlarge Text 
  3. Include Alt Text for All Images 
  4. Carefully Design Your Forms 
  5. Make Dynamic Content Accessible 

Contact Horton Group today to learn how we can make your website more accessible. 

Review Your Use of Color 

According to the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, about 3.7%, or 12 million Americans are colorblind. This can make text and background images hard to distinguish, especially if there is low contrast between various colors. That’s why we recommend using colors with high contrast such as black and white which easily stand out from anything in the background. If you’re looking to still use certain colors that are part of your branding within your website, you can use tools like Contrast Checker to test how different colors would look on your website. 

Allow Users To Enlarge Text 

If the text on your website is too small, you can easily lose potential customers as they’ll struggle to read your content on both mobile and desktop devices. By using large text or having the option to increase the size of text on your website, it will be much easier to read and navigate content. You should also make sure that any CTA buttons and navigation footers are the proper size. 

Include Alt Text for All Images 

Also referred to as alt tags and alt descriptions, alt text is the written copy that appears in place of an image if it fails to load or if someone is using a screen reader. Almost 7.3 million people in the U.S. rely on screen readers to fully access the web as they can allow people who are blind and visually impaired to navigate and interact with content. When using alt text for an image, you’ll want to be sure to include a full description including what is in the photo and any text that may be in it. 

Carefully Design Your Forms 

If your website forms aren’t accessible, it can be difficult for people to fill out forms and get in contact with your business. Along with using contrasting colors, you’ll want to make sure that your forms are keyword accessible. That way, if people are only moving through the form with directional keys and other functions, they’ll be able to move between the different content blocks and easily submit their information. You’ll also need to make sure that every block within your form has a label so that screen readers can read them out loud as someone navigates through the form instead of leaving them blank. 

Make Dynamic Content Accessible 

Dynamic content is any content that changes over time to adapt to user behaviors, preferences, interests, or other specific data points. For example, your landing page may have a section that rotates out different images and text that takes people to other pages within your website. A way to test your dynamic content is by navigating your website using only your keyboard and seeing if it allows you to click on your dynamic content and visit the proper pages. If the content is getting in the way of a user’s ability to navigate content, you may need to make changes to your website code. To test your website using a screen reader, you can download free software such as Windows Narrator or VoiceOver (for macOS/iOS). 

Looking to make your website more accessible? Contact Horton Group today for award-winning web design, SEO, web hosting, and more for your business!