Did you know that over 41,000 people with disabilities reported that they lacked reasonable accommodations between 2012 and 2014? According to Cornell University, this is one of the most common issues that disabled citizens face.
That’s why so many companies are making their websites compliant with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Wondering how to make a website ADA compliant? Here are five easy steps.
1. Take a Look at Your Site
When it comes to having an ADA accessible website, you have to take a good, hard look at your current website first.
Don’t know where to start? Thankfully, several useful programs can do the hard work for you, such as WAVE.
How? By using special software that can test your screen by reading its contents. To make sure that you have an ADA compliance website, there are a few criteria to meet:
- Your website must be high visibility.
- Your website must be fully functional.
- Your website must be easily understood.
- Your website must bebe very durable.
Bottom line: your web page must follow the above requirements to have ADA website compliance.
Why does this matter? Because the Internet has to be ADA compliant for it to reach a larger customer base.
2. Choose Graphics Carefully
Here’s the deal: when it comes to ADA compliance for websites, it’s extremely important to choose your graphics carefully. That’s because you could accidentally harm someone by including too many flashy illustrations on your site.
For example, if you have any images that flash several times within a single sentence, then you could potentially cause someone to have a seizure.
Not only that, but it’s essential to include a caption underneath graphics. That’s because visually disabled customers can have it read to them.
If you follow this advice, then your site is guaranteed to have mass appeal!
3. Make Sure That Your Font is Readable
What’s the real deal about readable fonts? Most people don’t know that alt-text and legible fonts are a huge part of ADA web compliance.
In fact, it doesn’t take much effort to add alt-text to your pictures by changing the website’s code. This is a great way to help disabled readers to understand your website.
There are several super readable font types, including:
- Georgia
- Open Sans
- Quicksand
Just make sure that you don’t put lightly colored text on a lightly colored backdrop. For example, you definitely shouldn’t put yellow words on a pink background. This could cause readers to strain their eyes.
You shouldn’t have to stress out about readable fonts. The answer is simple: all that you have to do is put dark font onto a light backdrop.
4. Let Users Pause Your Content
Making sure that readers can use a keyboard on your site is one of the most vital requirements to meet when it comes to ADA website compliance. Why? Because many users struggle with using a traditional touchscreen or holding onto a mouse.
If you’re wondering how a keyboard can help your site’s readers, then you should know that they can use it to auto-scroll through your web page.
Want to know the best part? You can actually let disabled users “pause” your content.
Additionally, you can let your readers use a keyboard to hit play and pause on your site’s videos.
For those who are still scratching their heads, another great tip is to delete the auto-play option on videos with a time limit.
5. Read Up on Compliance Changes
What’s the best way to make sure that your website is ADA compliant? It’s easy: read up on compliance changes. Since new technology is created every day, there are a ton of new ways to make your site more ADA-friendly.
For instance, you can begin by making sure that your font is readable. And you can always stay in the loop with the latest ADA policies to keep your site up-to-date.
We can’t emphasize this enough: as long as you follow all of the rules that we’ve mentioned, you should have no problem making your site ADA compliant.
However, if you find that your site is still not compliant, you might want to take another look at this checklist.
Bonus points for reading more information about ADA lawsuits!
How to Make a Website ADA Accessible?
Still curious about how to make a website ADA compliant? One of the first things that you should do is take a look at your current site. Once you make sure that your site is highly visible, fully functional, easily understood, and very durable, you’re ready to move on to the next step.
Next, you have to choose your graphics carefully. That way, you can delete any flashing content that could cause seizures.
Then, you must make sure that your font is readable. That means using texts like Georgia, Open Sans, or Quicksand on your web page. Also, it’s a great idea to include alt-text captions underneath your photos as well.
Once your done fixing your site’s font and adding alt-text, then you’ll have to let users pause your content. They can do this by using a keyboard to interact with their screen. Of course, you have to remember to make your site keyboard-friendly as well.
Finally, we recommend that you read up on compliance changes. That way, you can stay up-to-date on the latest ADA news.
If you still have any questions, we can help. Schedule a consultation!