Website Accessibility & the Law: Why Your Website Must Be Compliant

The Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) of 1990 wrote into law the right of all persons to have access to public facilities, spaces, and resources regardless of visible or invisible disability. While this legislation has been very helpful in increasing physical accessibility through initiatives like ramp-building, TTY programs, designated parking areas, and more – the ADA was drafted before the internet became a mainstay of daily life, and does not provide clear guidance on how to adapt accessibility to the digital and virtual realms. Because general accessibility liabilities apply equally to your business’ physical store or office location and to your company website, it’s important to understand how the ADA applies to your digital presence. Learn more about accessibility law and how to be in compliance in this article.

Read the full article at: www.searchenginejournal.com

What is Digital Accessibility?

You’re probably familiar with the concept of accessibility – adding wheelchair ramps, reserving disability-friendly parking, including Braille on signage, providing automatic doors, and many other initiatives and adaptations that allow equal access to stores, facilities, and resources. The Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) has enforced the right of all people to have equal opportunity regardless of ability status. This legislation has made sweeping improvements in physical accessibility, but did you realize that the ADA applies to the digital world as well?

Website accessibility is often overlooked, in part because the ADA legislation was drafted in 1990 – before the internet boom created a new set of virtual and digital accessibility issues. From a legal perspective, the gray area in the ADA regarding internet accessibility isn’t an excuse to forego the same standards on a company website or application. And of course, you could be missing out on customers if your website isn’t adaptable to different needs and accommodations – that’s about 25% of the population, according to the Centers for Disease Control!
Consider some of these situations:

• Can someone with a visual impairment still learn about your business from your website, or is all of your content directed at someone who can read your words and see your images? For instance, does your site design incorporate high contrast and legible font size?
• Can someone with limited physical mobility interact with your website? Is your site navigable without the ability to use a keyboard? Is it navigable without the use of a mouse?
• Can a screen reader access your site to properly translate it as needed? Are your pages dependent on a style sheet that might confuse a screen reader? Do you use an HTML table that cannot be parsed properly by a screen reader? Do your images have alt-text screen readers use to speak text aloud?
• Do your videos or other content negatively affect groups of users? Are there flashing elements on your site that might cause seizures? Are you using a color scheme that may be difficult to parse with color blindness?

If you’re not sure about any of these questions, you’re not alone – many businesses aren’t well acquainted with website accessibility yet. It also used to be much more expensive and difficult to implement accessibility features, often requiring highly specialized (and high-cost) consultancies to create a program, and though the ADA laws apply equally to all companies, many small businesses simply couldn’t afford the price tag.
Unfortunately, a lack of understanding or a smaller budget have not been shield enough against legal action, and the number of ADA claims are on the rise. The Wall Street Journal reported a 23% increase in web, app, and video accessibility lawsuits from 2019 to 2020, possibly linked to COVID shutdowns forcing greater scrutiny of virtual and digital accessibility for work-related purposes.

The first step towards making your digital content more accessible and meeting compliance guidelines is learning about web accessibility and how to apply it to your company’s sites, applications, and content. We recommend checking USAbility.gov’s Accessibility Basics for a quick snapshot of website accessibility. If you’re looking for a deeper dive, deque’s Beginner’s Guide to Web Accessibility offers a more robust set of discussions about different facets of accessibility.
Additionally, we at Sales Renewal offer accessibility packages to bring your business’ website into compliance, then continue to monitor and fix any issues that arise as your site evolves over time. If you’re interested in seeing how an accessibility solution can help ALL of your website visitors, not just the ones with disabilities, try clicking the universal accessibility icon at the bottom right part of your screen, available on any Sales Renewal webpage!
Let us know how we can bring accessibility to your business. Contact us today!

Google My Business not functioning as expected under the strain of coronavirus

Many updates are taking considerably longer than normal.

Source: searchengineland.com
During this time of crisis, it’s so important for local businesses and companies to make sure they are keeping all of their channels, including their Google My Business listing up to date with special hours, contact information and posts to keep their community informed to any changes or updates.
This was advice that Google had laid out not long ago, but now the listing service has been experiencing delays and functionality issues as local businesses and companies have been flooding the site and Google’s own staff is reduced. That’s not to say they haven’t been trying to avoid these problems – on Friday, Google temporarily disabled new local reviews as well as the ability of businesses to post responses to limit functionality during the crisis.
As such, it is critical to make sure your listing is updated and to be aware of any posting delays to your community. Remember to also update other channels such as your website, social media and local listings to ensure the information is accessible.

Home Grown vs. Professional Video – Each Has a Role to Play in Small Business Marketing

Guest Poster: Peter Stassa of Davideo Company, corporate video production specialists.
You probably don’t have an unlimited budget. We get that, neither do we. We understand that while you value the use of video content to build brand awareness and credibility, you still need to stay within your means. So, ask yourself this:

Where is your content going to be seen?

If you’re posting short videos to consumer-driven social media (Facebook, TikTok, Instagram, etc.) to promote live events or short-term special offers, go right ahead and shoot those yourself. The audience on those platforms is used to seeing a more impromptu, “selfie” style and is less critical of production quality.
But what about the important video content that lives on your website or is being embedded in email campaigns and newsletters? The “about us” videos that explain what your organization does and why you do it? The testimonial stories that are intended to build trust?
You may think: “My phone has a really good camera, I can save money by producing marketing videos in-house instead of hiring an outside company to do it!”
Yes, you can – you can also save money by doing your own dental work with a mirror and a pair of pliers, but it will cost you more in the long run.
For one thing, it takes more than just a good camera. Do you have the other necessary tools and skills to properly record and edit the raw footage so that the end product is worth watching? Do you have the time?

You have to be careful when cutting corners on the production process because home-grown video can backfire on you.

For example, a Brightcove survey of more than 1,200 consumers revealed that the quality of a video has the potential to change the perception viewers have of your brand:
“When consumers are confronted with poor-quality video, they are 62 percent more likely to have a negative perception of the brand that published the video.”
“23 percent of consumers who have been presented with a poor-quality video experience would hesitate to purchase from the brand.”
Sure, the world of B2B and B2C communication has become relatively casual in recent years, and some marketing pundits have been saying that consumers prefer video that is more “spontaneous”, less “flashy”, and thus more “authentic”. But if your camera work is shaky and your image is dark and your audio is hard to hear, your viewer will not stick with it long enough to absorb any of your “authentic” content.

Poor production values are a turn-off. They distract from your message.

Today’s buyers are doing most of their initial research online before they ever get to the point of reaching out for a proposal, which means your odds of getting onto their shortlist depend largely on the quality of the content you post online.
As the saying goes, “you get only one chance to make a first impression” and if the video content on your website, on business-oriented platforms like LinkedIn and Twitter, and in your newsletters and email campaigns looks amateurish, it will pale in comparison with the content offered by your competitors… and you won’t be getting those calls.
Effective and engaging video does not have to look like the opening to the Super Bowl, but sticking to the basic best practices of clean production will allow the viewer to focus on your content. For this reason, you should stay away from a “homegrown” video for critical applications and consider working with a professional when your target audience is made up of your core prospects and potential partners and supporters.
 

Understanding Searches Better Than Ever Before

Google is understanding natural language in searches better than ever before, so well, that it represents “the biggest leap forward in the past five years, and one of the biggest leaps forward in the history of Search …
Particularly for longer, more conversational queries, or searches where prepositions like “for” and “to” matter a lot to the meaning [1 in 10 searches], Search will be able to understand the context of the words in your query. You can search in a way that feels natural for you.”

Key SEO Elements to Have in Place Before You Hit “Publish”

When creating online content, be it a webpage, blog post or video, you’ve likely set high expectations for performance in search engine rankings. To that end, it’s important to consider how you can optimize your content for SEO before you even begin. Doing so can boost your ranking in search results and also allow possible leads to find you organically. Many people know that using relevant keywords can help you rank well, but that isn’t all there is to it. Knowing how to use keywords correctly to avoid appearing as spam, optimizing images, and employing strong meta descriptions are just a few elements to consider when creating your content. Don’t wait until the next time you create some content to use these tips – start applying them to the pages and articles you’ve already created and help send them to the top of the search results page, too.

Video SEO: 5 Ways to Optimize Your Videos for Search Engines

Video marketing has been steadily on the rise among businesses as videos are typically met with a large number of views, conversions and are shared more frequently. They have proven to be a beneficial way to help consumers understand brands, products and services in a more personal way. However, before spending time and resources on creating a video, it’s important to be aware of how you can optimize it to be indexed and outrank your competitors for the target keywords on search engines.

The negative impact of an outdated firm website

A common mistake that a business can make is creating their website and never updating it again. When visitors come to a site that is out of date, it creates a very poor first impression: if you don’t care about your business why would any prospect? Regularly updating a site’s content helps with its search engine ranking and ability to retain visitors and generate leads. Scheduling time to check for updates, bugs or sharing a post will help keep your site safe, up to date and welcoming to visitors.