Augusta limo rentals .. Chicago Drug testing

Benefits Of An Accessible Website: Part 1 - Increase In Reach

The DDA (Disability Discrimination Act) states that service providers must not discriminate against disabled people. A website is regarded as a service and therefore falls under this law, and as such must be made accessible to everyone.

Some organisations are making accessibility improvements to their websites, but many are seemingly not making the accessibility adjustments. Disabled people don't access their website, they say, so why should they care?

Why you should care about disabled Internet users

The statistics on the number of users who may face difficulties due to your website's accessibility are quite startling:

* There are 8.6 million registered disabled people in the UK - 14% of the population (source: DRC)

* One in 12 men and one in 200 women have some form of colour blindness - 9% of the UK population (source: Institution of Electrical Engineers)

* Two million UK residents have a sight problem - 4% of the population (source: RNIB)

* There are 12 million people aged 60 or over - 21% of the UK population (source: UK government)

Although there is inevitably some overlap between the aforementioned groups, adding up these numbers provides a total of 48% of the UK population that could potentially face problems with your website's accessibility. That's an extraordinarily high number.

It's not just disabled users who can't access your website

Non-disabled people may also experience difficulties with your website's accessibility. Not everyone is viewing your website on the latest version of Internet Explorer, with all the plug-ins and programs that you may require them to have for optimal access.

If your website relies on images, Flash or JavaScript, and fails to provide alternatives, then your website won't be accessible to a number of web users. The following examples are a common occurrence:

* Users on slow connections regularly turn images off to enable a quicker download time. Some browsers, such as the text-only Lynx browser do not display images at all.

* Not every user has downloaded the latest Flash program that's needed to access your site. Additionally, the download time on Flash websites often takes so long that users lose patience and don't even wait to see the content. Just 25% of web users in the UK are connected to the Internet via broadband (source: National Statistics).

* JavaScript is a scripting language that can cause changes to a page, often through mouse functions, buttons, or other actions from the user. For example, pop-ups are opened using JavaScript. JavaScript is unsupported by about 5% of web users, either because they have turned it off to prevent pop-up adverts or because their browser doesn't support it (source: The Counter). Any JavaScript-driven content provided on your website won't be accessible to these users.

* PDAs, mobile phones and WebTV have limited support for large images, Flash and JavaScript. You can test your website by downloading the free WebTV viewer. You can also check how your website looks on a mobile phone with the Wapalizer. Don't underestimate the importance of this: in 2008 alone an estimated 58 million PDAs will be sold (source: eTForecast) and one third of the world's population will own a wireless device (source: ClickZ)

This article was written by Trenton Moss. He's crazy about web usability and accessibility - so crazy that he went and started his own web usability and accessibility consultancy ( Webcredible - http://www.webcredible.co.uk ) to help make the Internet a better place for everyone. They offer fantastic accessibility & CSS support packages, which you can read all about at http://www.webcredible.co.uk/support .

In The News:

Web Content Strategy 101

Your content is what gets you in search engines, speaks... Read More

6 Steps To Your Own Website

A lot of people these days are interested in getting... Read More

4 Rock Solid Reasons For Building Your Own Website

What is the point of having a website, you may... Read More

Ten Ways NOT to Set Up a Website-based Service Business

1. As the first step, "Hire a web designer."First create... Read More

Ten Quick Tests To Check Your Website For Accessibility

The Disability Discrimination Act says that websites must be made... Read More

Top 10 Webmaster Challenges

Webmasters deal with a myriad of complex design challenges every... Read More

Develop a Solid Website Presence

Starting an internet business can be confusing to non-veterans. The... Read More

Now You Have a Web Site - Have You Ever Heard of Accessibility?

An accessible Web site is easily approached, easily understood, and... Read More

Why A Simple Counter is Never Enough for Your Website

A simple website stats counter is not enough if you... Read More

Build a Web Site that Works...Even for a Safari Hobby!

My life's greatest passion is a safari hobby. And what... Read More

How To Write More Powerful Online Text

Although there are significant differences among the various types of... Read More

Instant Relevant Web Site Content - No Its Not a Bot

In about the Time it takes to Watch a Reality... Read More

Traffic for Webmasters

"If you build it, they will come"; is an age... Read More

Top 5 Reasons to Track Your Website Traffic

#5 User Satisfaction: Learn what your visitors and site users... Read More

Whats Your Business Online Attitude?

This article was prompted by some customer support work I... Read More

Be Creative Before You Purchase Or Create A Website

Before you jump into spending coutnless hours on designing and... Read More

Improve Conversion Rates ? Effective Content

Your site is fast and getting traffic, but conversion rates... Read More

Are You Losing Sales Because of These 4 Simple Website Mistakes?

Losing website sales and traffic is sometimes simply a case... Read More

35% Revenue Increase? from Your Website!

2 Golden Rules for an Engaging Website35% of visitors fail... Read More

Is Your Website Innovative? Increase Your Business Over Night!

While studying online for IT investment opportunities, I found that... Read More

You Don?t Have to be Amazon.com to Achieve 12% Conversion Rates!

That's right. According to a recent study by Nielsen/NetRatings, Amazon.com... Read More

Using Psychology Easily on Your Website to Make More Sales!

Psychology is a long word which everyone thinks, "no, that's... Read More

Easy Steps To Website Development and Promotion

One of the most important parts of establishing a new... Read More

Cost Effective and Powerful Dynamic Websites w. Fantastico Web Hosting

If you are developing your website on a host that... Read More

Free Webmaster Tools - 7 Things Every Webmaster Needs in Their Toolbox

Webmaster tools are vital to becoming both efficient and effective... Read More