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eCommerce Accessibility Guidelines

Site Quality and Accessibility

Your websites functionality and accessibility will influence what customers think of your organisation and can directly impact sales and profitability. It is important to consider the types of technology and devices people may use to browse your site to ensure that they can access your online store and complete a purchase smoothly and efficiently.

• Red Technology takes accessibility issues into account when designing the structure and layout of your ecommerce website and design page templates to maximise accessibility.
• Our ecommerce solutions incorporate Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) on all page templates. This helps assistive technology separate content from structure and presentation styles so that disabled users can make sense of your site.
• Content management tools incorporate XHTML checkers to help ensure your site conforms to minimum disability access requirements W3C Priority 1.
• The incorporated media manager allows you to edit image alt-tags – to help screen readers describe your imagery to visitors with vision disabilities.
• All hyperlinks can be fully edited so that they display meaningful text, helping users understand where the link takes them.
• Templates and content are dynamically matched to the users browsing device so that you can be sure they are accessing content correctly whether on a PC, PDA or mobile phone.

Disability Types

The following types of disability and their particular access needs should be taken into account when producing content for your website. Contact Us via our ecommerce software enquiry form to find out how we can help your business.

• Vision Disabilities. Blindness, colour blindness, tunnel vision and poor sight mean that people may need to use text to speech software, screen magnifiers or Braille screens to access your content. They may not be able to see or understand your pictures so descriptive text, known as alt tags, and structured content flow is vital.
• Hearing Disabilities. Those with hearing problems may not be able to hear multimedia presentations and require a text transcript to understand your message.
• Mobility Disabilities. A variety of devices are used to navigate your website and click on links. Dexterity and co-ordination problems mean that instead of a mouse some of your site visitors may be using the keyboard or other input devices to navigate your site. It is essential that navigation patterns run in an intuitive and predictable manner to ensure ease of use.
• Cognitive Disabilities. These include dyslexia, memory problems and difficulties reading or understanding complex or inconsistent visual displays. Avoiding busy screens while using plain English and lots of white space will help these people understand your site.
• Technology Disabilities. Not all users have the latest browsers or monitors with large displays. Content that is dynamically presented in an accessible format will allow your site to be viewed by anyone regardless of whether they are using obsolete technology or the latest mobile phone.

W3C Consortium

W3C is an international consortium that develops and publishes guidelines on website accessibility. Implementing their recommended standards is considered best practice and takes into account how those with physical or cognitive problems interact with websites. Implementing W3C guidelines helps these groups to access your website – simplifying navigation and helping ensure adaptive technologies such as screen readers work correctly with your site.

W3C guidelines classify website accessibility into 3 priority levels:

• Priority 1 or “A” - without implementing their basic guidelines you will be making it impossible for at least one group of users to access your website.
• Priority 2 or “AA” - implementing their level 2 standards will make it easier for all users to access your content, but some may encounter minor difficulties.
• Priority 3 or “AAA” - this ideal accessibility standard is what all websites should be aiming for, but in the majority of cases is not yet attainable because of technology and cost limitations.

DDA - Disability Discrimination Act

The Disability Discrimination Act (1995) makes excluding those with disabilities from your products and services unlawful and that includes your website.

• Moral and legal issues aside – with millions of disabled web users in the UK it makes sense to ensure that as many potential customers as possible can use your website.
• The general public is becoming increasingly aware of accessibility issues and pressure groups are starting to threaten legal action against sites that do not take accessibility into account.
• While there are no firm guidelines, there is a general consensus that conforming to W3C ‘A’ standards is sufficient to comply with the law. Additionally, EU guidelines also recommend this as a minimum requirement.

Contact us today to find out about how we can help your business: eCommerce Software Enquiry Form