Adding Digital Accessibility to Your Web Agency Services Part One

Episode 36 of the AAArdvark Accessibility Podcast explores actionable steps for integrating accessibility into various services offered by web agencies, from web development and SEO to branding, marketing, and website maintenance.

26 Sep 14min

Join co-hosts Natalie Garza and digital accessibility expert Natalie MacLees for episode 34 of the AAArdvark Accessibility Podcast. This episode delves into the overlap between accessibility and SEO, highlighting how both can benefit from keyword targeting, content readability, page titles, link purposes, headings, and adaptable content. The hosts discuss various Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) criteria that also enhance SEO and provide practical tips for making your website more accessible and search-engine-friendly.  Intro: Accessibility Meets SEO Natalie Garza: Hello everybody, and welcome to the AAArdvark Accessibility Podcast. This is episode 34. I’m one of the co-hosts, Natalie Garza, and with me today is, Natalie MacLees: Natalie MacLees, the other co-host. Natalie Garza: And she is a digital accessibility expert here to walk us through today’s topic, which is the overlap, the handshake between accessibility and SEO.  Intro: Accessibility Meets SEO So let’s give the viewers a little refresher. What does SEO even stand for to begin with? Natalie MacLees: Search engine optimization. And it’s just some things that you can do on your website to make sure that search engines are more likely to find it, especially when they’re searching for particular keywords. Natalie Garza: Yeah, and we’re not gonna get into all SEO basics. We just wanna show you guys how much overlap there is between accessibility topics and fixes for your website and SEO improvements.  Alt Text and Non-Text Content So, starting off with the concept of keyword targeting. Basically, creating content based on what people search for. So what is the first WCAG success criterion that we’re gonna talk about that overlaps with this? Natalie MacLees: Yeah, so 1.1.1, which is called Non-text Content, but this is basically the WCAG rule that says our images need alt text. It says some other things as well, but that’s the main thing that most people take away from that one.  So you do wanna make sure that if you have non-decorative images, images that are conveying information of some kind, that they have alternative text. So for somebody who can’t see the image, for whatever reason, they can still get information about what is contained in that image. Search engines can’t see your images, so they also benefit from having alt text.  Where you wanna be careful is that your alt text is for people first. So don’t just use your alt text for keyword stuffing for SEO. Make sure it works for people first. Natalie Garza: Exactly. Yeah. Would you be embarrassed if this gets shown to a person, or will this be actually helpful? So alt text is a great way to incorporate keywords.  Keep It Simple: Reading Level What’s the next way to incorporate keyword targeting that also overlaps with accessibility? Natalie MacLees: Yeah, so your content itself, so we have 3.1.5 Reading Level, we wanna keep things to about an eighth grade reading level. So if you’re not in the US that’s around like junior high, like where you are when you’re 12 or 13 years old. Very friendly, straightforward language, that is going to be helpful for the search engines to ingest that and figure out what your page is about. But it’s also helpfu...

29 Aug 14min

Join Natalie Garza and Natalie MacLees on the AAArdvark Accessibility Podcast as they discuss the importance of keyboard accessibility in web design. The episode highlights why some users rely on keyboards instead of mice or touchscreens and provides key insights and practical tips for ensuring websites are fully navigable via keyboard. Topics covered include the importance of using semantic HTML, testing custom components thoroughly, and understanding native keyboard interactions. Natalie Garza: Hello everybody, and welcome to the AAArdvark Accessibility Podcast. I’m Natalie Garza, I’m one of the co-hosts, and with me today is, Natalie MacLees: Natalie MacLees, the other co-host. Natalie Garza: and she is a digital accessibility expert here to answer our questions on today’s topic, which is keyboard accessibility 101, the basics you can’t ignore.  So we’re gonna talk about why keyboard accessibility is important and some key notes on when you’re testing for keyboard navigation on your website. Why Keyboard Accessibility Matters So why doesn’t everyone just use a mouse or tap on their phones to navigate a website? Why keyboards? Natalie MacLees: Well, not everybody can do that. Not everybody has hands. Not everybody has hands that they can move. So we have lots of different cases where people aren’t able to use a mouse or a touchscreen reliably.  So sometimes it’s limited mobility. Sometimes it can be cognitive disorders or fine motor control issues. Like you can move your hand, but you don’t have a lot of control over exactly where it goes.  If you have no vision or limited vision, you can’t see where a mouse cursor is on a screen and you can’t tell where to tap on a touch screen so you don’t have any other option other than to use a keyboard to navigate around the screen, and also sometimes just power users don’t wanna move their hand off the keyboard. They’re going too fast. They’re setting their keyboard on fire, just going through too fast. No time to move your hand over to the mouse. Natalie Garza: Yeah. Even everyday users like you use Control-C, Control-V to copy/paste. I’m sure a lot of people do. That’s a form of keyboard navigation too. Natalie MacLees: Yeah, which, you know, you could do that with your mouse. You could right-click with your mouse and say copy and paste, but you could also do it with your keyboard. So anything you can do with a mouse, you can do with a keyboard. Natalie Garza: And a lot of assistive devices, although they don’t look like keyboards, they fall under the same category as keyboards. Natalie MacLees: They get treated as a keyboard by the computer. Yeah. As far as the computer is concerned, it’s a keyboard that’s attached. The computer can’t tell the difference. Natalie Garza: Exactly. Alright, so that’s why keyboard and navigation are so important.  Ensuring Keyboard Accessibility on Your Website So how do we translate that into our website? How can we make sure that people using only keyboards can access everything on a site? Natalie MacLees: Yeah, we have to make sure that we’re not building anything that only works with a mouse. And where that usually happens is when we’re building custom components and not using semantic HTML. So the easiest fix is to just always use semantic HTML.  Whenever you can, you wanna try to do that, and HTML has gotten to be a lot more robust, a lot more powerf...

22 Aug 12min

Join Natalie MacLees and Natalie Garza in the 32nd episode of the AAArdvark Accessibility Podcast as they discuss how to make social media posts accessible. They cover using emojis, shortened links, adding alt text to images, creating easy-to-read text, avoiding fancy decorative fonts, and ensuring videos have captions and audio descriptions. Learn practical accessibility tips to enhance the inclusivity of your social media content! Social Media Without Barriers Natalie Garza: Hello, everybody, and welcome to the AAArdvark Accessibility Podcast. My name’s Natalie Garza. I’m one of the co-hosts, and with me today is. Natalie MacLees: Natalie MacLees, the other co-host. Natalie Garza: And she is a digital accessibility expert here to answer our questions on today’s topic. So in this episode, we’re gonna cover accessibility and social media posts. Even the content you post on social media platforms should aim to be accessible.  Emojis in Social Media Posts So, starting with emoji, what about emoji do we have to keep in mind with social media posts? Natalie MacLees: Don’t do posts that are all emojis. Those are terrible. We did our episode last time on The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly of Emojis. So if you want more information about how emojis work, you can check that out.  But generally, a social media post, wanna try to limit yourself to one emoji per message. And don’t put it at the beginning. It’s better if it’s at the end of the message, so that way it’s not blocking somebody from getting to the rest of the message.  (WCAG 1.1.1 Non-text Content – Emojis are non-text elements that need a text alternative or must be used in ways that don’t block meaning.) But very quickly, the emoji gets read out to a screen reader. It does not announce that it’s an emoji. It just reads the name of the emoji. So we’ll just say like “slightly smiling face” with no context. No hint that it’s an emoji. So it can be a very odd experience if there’s lots of emojis in a message. Natalie Garza: And also I’ve seen a lot of social media posts using emoji lists to replace the bullet points. Natalie MacLees: Yeah, that’s, that’s, that one is pretty rough for screen reader users, so try not to do that.  If you need to do a bulleted list, you can actually use the Unicode bullet character, which just gets read out as “bullet”, and everybody can understand what that means. So if you really need bullets, try to use that one instead. Natalie Garza: Oh, I see. So if you’re gonna use the emoji, let it be the little bullet emoji. Is that what you’re saying? Natalie MacLees: Yeah, I think it’s not even technically an emoji. It’s just one of the characters that’s in a font. Natalie Garza: Oh, I see. This is just a copy-paste. Natalie MacLees: Yeah. Links vs Shortened Links for Accessibility  Natalie Garza: All right. Next on the list, we have links versus shortened links. Natalie MacLees: So most social media platforms don’t let you do what you would do on a website, where you can take a word or a phrase, link that, and have the words that are visible be different from the link, right?  It’s like on your website, you could be like,

16 Aug 12min

Join Natalie Garza and digital accessibility expert Natalie MacLees in episode 31 of the AAArdvark Accessibility Podcast. This episode talks about the implications of accessible emojis, exploring the good, the bad, and the ugly sides. Learn about specific WCAG success criteria, the role of emojis in aiding comprehension, and the challenges they pose for screen readers. Natalie Garza: Hello, and welcome to the AAArdvark Accessibility Podcast. This is Natalie Garza. I’m one of the co-hosts, and with me today is, Natalie MacLees: Natalie MacLees, the other co-host. Natalie Garza: And she is a digital accessibility expert here to answer our […]

8 Aug 13min

Join Natalie Garza and Natalie MacLees for the 30th episode of the AAArdvark Accessibility Podcast to explore statistics and dive into state-level compliance with accessibility laws and the prevalence of ADA lawsuits. The hosts discuss specific state requirements in Texas, Illinois, and Minnesota, and elaborate on the differences between Section 508 and WCAG guidelines. They also analyze the statistics of ADA lawsuits targeting WordPress, Shopify, and custom-coded websites, and provide crucial compliance deadlines for the European Accessibility Act (EAA) and ADA Title II. Natalie Garza: Hello everybody, and welcome to the AAArdvark Accessibility Podcast. I’m Natalie Garza, and with me today is, Natalie MacLees: Natalie MacLees. Natalie Garza: And in this episode, we’re gonna go over some more statistics and dive into them. So first statistic, I’m going to read out: “The key areas of focus for businesses in 2025 include state-level compliance, proactive accessibility measures, and preparation for the EAA, which will begin enforcement in June 2025.”  And I looked into the United States. That’s where we live. I actually found, in addition to the ADA, that each state may or may not have its own accessibility requirements. So I wanted to talk about state level accessibility. So, Natalie, I know you talked about California last time and also New York. Do you wanna go over some of the other states?  Natalie MacLees: Yeah, Sure. We can go over some of the other states. So we have Texas, which has Administrative Code Section 206 that generally is aligned with Section 508, Section 504, saying that websites are required to meet specific standards.  (Texas Administrative Code Chapter 206 is only applicable to state agencies and higher education websites as of 08/2025) Do you know Natalie, if that is just government websites or does it apply to private business websites as well? Natalie Garza: I am gonna have to look into that. But you mentioned that there is a difference, and most states, and most laws apply to government sites, don’t they? Natalie MacLees: In the United States, that’s generally true. Most of our accessibility laws that apply to websites apply only to government websites.  There are a few states and, like local governments, that have requirements for private websites, but most of the laws are focused on government websites or websites that are associated with the government in some way, like public universities, public libraries and things like that. So you know, our borders, our political borders that we use as humans, kind of become meaningless on the web, and it gets a little bit sticky about who can apply, which laws where and how. So we could talk about Illinois, which has a law that applies to the state agencies, so any of their state agencies must have accessible websites. So following similar rules to Section 508. (Illinois Information Technology Accessibility Act applies to state agencies and universities; however, it does not apply to local governments, school districts, community colleges, or private organizations.) And, Minnesota has a similar law, and that also applies to all of their state websites, and they were one of the earliest states to have a law, an accessibility law that applied to their government websites. (Minnesota Statutes 16E.03, 363A.42, and 363.43 apply to state agencies, continuing education, or professional deve...

1 Aug 12min

Join Natalie MacLees and Natalie Garza for the 29th episode of the AAArdvark Accessibility Podcast. They delve into the significant rise in ADA lawsuits related to digital properties, examining how these lawsuits affect small business websites and government entities. The discussion covers key statistics, including the increase in state-level lawsuits, repeat lawsuits, and the impact of accessibility widgets. They also emphasize the importance of education and proactive efforts in making websites accessible. Natalie Garza: Hello everybody and welcome to the AAArdvark Accessibility Podcast. My name’s Natalie Garza. I’m one of the co-hosts, and with me today is, Natalie MacLees: Natalie MacLees, the other co-host. Natalie Garza: and she is a digital accessibility expert here to answer our questions. Talk to us about today’s topic, which is how accessibility lawsuits have affected small business websites and also government websites.  So we’re gonna go through some statistics and then dive in. So to get started, first one, we found that “Over 4,000 ADA lawsuits related to digital properties were filed in 2024. With a decline in federal cases and an increase in state level lawsuits, particularly in New York and California.” (UsableNet 2024 Report) Natalie MacLees: I think generally the decline in the federal cases is probably due to the change of the administration at the federal level and the administration demonstrating a different set of priorities around accessibility right now. So we see those cases kind of shifting to the state level.  California has a Civil Rights Act, the Unruh Civil Rights Act, that was passed in 1959. Which does let plaintiffs claim $4,000 per violation, per person, per visit, so that does create an incentive structure for frivolous lawsuits, unfortunately. Not all accessibility lawsuits are frivolous. But there is a problem I think, in the industry with abuse of using the judicial systemfor personal gain. And there are definitely legitimate cases, and I don’t wanna take that away from anybody, but there are also cases where it seems like nobody actually did go try to use the website, and then they file these lawsuits.  So unfortunately, there’s that incentive for that to happen, and it’s meant to be an incentive for small businesses and government websites and things like that, it’s meant to be an incentive for them to avoid those fines and fees and make their, you know, the, it’s not just their websites, right? That law applies to physical locations, like having a wheelchair ramp for your restaurant and accessible restrooms, like it applies to all different all different situations, but it does include websites. So it’s meant to be an incentive for businesses and governments to make things accessible. And I think it has accomplished that to a certain degree, but I think it also has this kind of other unfortunate side effect, that we see.  And then in New York, there’s not a specific law in New York that’s causing the extra lawsuits there. I think it’s just a friendly court district that happens to be in New York, and I know that there are a lot of family-owned wineries in upstate New York that have been for some reason targeted by these lawsuits. Which is also unfortunate that what’s getting targeted are they small family run businesses. I agree that they should all have accessible websites and accessible premises I think they should be doing everything that they can to make their websites and their shops accessible. But...

25 Juli 11min