Way for agency owners to begin to sell Accessibility to their clients and so When you think about it it impacts Potentially 25 percent of all adults That's a lot of broadening your Potential audience right there's a huge If you you would pay a lot of money just To get a fraction of that uh broadening Right sure you increase your audience You can Um when you do accessibility right You're not only improving that user Experience for people with disabilities You almost always improve that user Experience for everybody else Foreign And welcome to another episode of the High level Spotlight sessions where we Showcase awesome marketers doing awesome Marketing today I'm excited to be joined By bet Hannon she's the founder and CEO Of excessive cart which is a service Services based agency that focuses on Web accessibility and e-commerce bet Thanks so much for coming on the show Great to be here thanks for the invite I'm excited to have you we met Um has it been two months now I guess we Met on a webinar for I can't remember Which I think it was a WordPress group Right yep Got it which has evolved to be more than Just a WordPress group right yeah I Think we met actually on the agency
Owners kind of um Happy that's right and uh and then you But you were promoing the webinar you Were going to do so yeah yeah that's Right I got invited to speak to the Group we had a great time and um I guess In the chat I quickly realized that bet Is an accessibility expert and so I Extended the invite to come on the show Because it's a topic we have not Discussed before and it's actually a Topic I know very little about even Though I ran a team that built hundreds Of WordPress websites Um back when I was running an agency and It's probably something I should have Been thinking about Um so bet why don't we start with that Like what what is accessibility and why Should people care yeah and and I don't Know you know when you say I should have Known you know it certainly is something Accessibility has sort of been growing In kind of urgency and and kind of uh Conversations more recently and so it's It's uh it's growing so web Accessibility is making sure that your Website works is usable by people who Have disabilities so if a person is Blind they use a screen reader to read Out the content not just the content but The placeholders and the markers and the The structure of the page and your Website has to be put together properly
For that to work for them if somebody is Can't use a mouse for a variety maybe They don't have a hand maybe they're Paralyzed then they also have to have They can get through the website with an Accessibility device of some kind but All of those devices come down to Keyboard navigation and getting through The website and then you know we can Talk about not just those are the kind Of things people initially think of but Website accessibility includes a whole Variety of disabilities including things Like color blindness and reading Disabilities and even we begin to think Sometimes about anxiety and depression Right if you create a process that's Super long and you're not telling people How far they are through the process They can just bounce off because they They can't deal with that anxiety of That so all kinds of things but it's Basically uh you know making your Website more usable for people with Disabilities and sometimes I think People are surprised when they hear that You know we think of that as a really Small number of people but in the United States the CDC says that that's about 25 Percent of all U.S adults and in similar In other developed Nations right So so it's not a small that's a big it's A big no that's a big number of people And I feel like
Anybody who has a friend a family a Loved one with a disability you can Quickly relate to how frustrating it is For a person who's trying to access this Information or something and can't it's You know I try to be real careful about You know inspiration porn but when you Get a glimpse For when you do this work to make your Website more accessible what it can do For people's human dignity and and being Able to live an independent life they Don't have to depend on friends or Family members Um or even strangers to like help them Do things on the web which we all do so Much more on the web today it's it's a Powerful thing I mean it's a big deal And we we talk about it you know it's a There's some kind of you know it's just The right thing to do right you would Never like slam the door of your store To somebody right if you were a store Owner for sure same kind of thing right Now now the flip side of it you know Just to be completely honest is like oh My gosh extra work now I need to think About you know it's like first we got to Design the thing that we build the thing And then we got SEO the thing and now There's this other thing we got to do Yeah before we get into kind of that Conversation is there a uh a legal Urgency here as well yep yep uh yeah
Let's let me get to the league let's say But let me let me say Okay Um while you might think about it as Extra work There are we there's a flip side to Think about it uh the positives and the Business positives who are doing this And this is a great way for agency Owners to begin to sell accessibility to Their clients and so when you think About it it impacts potentially 25 of All adults That's a lot of broadening your Potential audience right there's a huge If you you would pay a lot of money just To get a fraction of that uh broadening Right sure you increase your audience You can Um when you do accessibility right You're not only improving that user Experience for people with disabilities You almost always improve that user Experience for everybody else so people Who are aging and having trouble with Smaller print people who are on their Phone in a bright sunlight somebody That's holding a wiggly baby all of Those people get a better user Experience when a site is accessible And then third almost always when you do Accessibility correctly you're improving Your SEO because of all the structural Pieces of the site that you're all the Technical pieces you're doing so so
While it is yes more stuff Um you you'll uh you do there's some big Benefits too it's not just an outlay uh A piece right I would imagine you know And again we'll talk about the legal Stuff in a second that another big Benefit is uh differentiation between Your agency and others kind of like with HIPAA right a lot of absences ignore HIPAA and it's like you know I don't Know who else you're talking to but if They're not taking this seriously you Know they could be leading you right Into a problem here yep exactly and so If you begin to do accessibility and Talk about accessibility in in what You're putting out in terms of proposals And and client projects and and talking To people I think that can be a great Differentiator Um you my the best advice I ever got Though when we were starting to do this Was to never forever Offer accessibility as an option to be Turned down because if you do that What essentially what you're doing is Saying well I'll let you save some money By throwing disabled people under the Bus And it kind of it it just is not a great Look it's a bad look it's a bad look and So I think sometimes people don't think About it in that way and so uh you know Part of it is just it's a commitment to
Doing things right just like no Self-respecting agency would build a Website today that's not mobile Responsive you know or right that Doesn't have some level of SEO on it all Of those things it's just another one of Those pieces that we do because we we're We're proud of the craft we do And again a Savvy business person is Also gonna you know absolutely float Dangle suggests like lead to the idea That you know while all of our plans Include this our competitors often do Not and you know there are some legal Potential legal ramifications here so so Let's get into that let's talk about What's the scary side of this Oh shoot is a scary side of it sure in The in the U.S and it's different in Different places in the world and I'm Not sure how Global your audience is but Um in the U.S we have we don't have any Spec Um generally speaking don't have any Specific laws around website Accessibility Um okay that are that are um National Right so uh do you get some in California and there are some other Places that are beginning to talk about That but uh so what's left is that People with disabilities Um are suing website owners under the Americans with Disabilities Act Now Ada
Was signed in 1990 before websites were Really so much of a thing and it doesn't Deal explicitly with websites but there Have been some court cases that now make It pretty clear that you you that they Do consider that a a place and now there Are some levels of what needs to happen So Um there's a there's some different law There is a law that the government Websites must be accessible so any level Of government from federal down through You know tiny little cities and counties All of those websites have to be Accessible also have to be accessible Education so lights And then what's called public Accommodation and so that's where we Start hitting this gray area so there's Some public accommodations that's pretty Clear you need to be accessible Banks Utilities anything that uh you know my Garbage company website should probably Be accessible because people with Disabilities have to pay their garbage Bills right those anywhere where a Consumer is kind of mandated to use it Or ought to be able to use it as a Citizen those have to be accessible then We start getting into a lot of what's a Public accommodation right and so there Have been a few there's a some court Cases that have gone you know both ways But the kind of preponderance of
Evidence is that we're moving toward uh You know everybody sort of sees that We're going to all have to be accessible And it may take us three or five or ten Years until we're required to do it in That way but in the meantime the way People are doing this is with law Lawsuits and so you also have what are Called the predatory lawsuits So one plaintiff typically a blind Person and one attorney together might Sue hundreds let's go on a rampage They're just going to Rampage and uh you Know and sometimes it's just like we saw There was a one set of people that sued All the museums in New York State Starting with the A's and they're Working their way down an alphabetical List and so while it can be seem like Those are scammy and the Le and Initially what you would do is you get a Letter typically you get what's called a Demand letter first and the letter the Intent to suit and what they're hoping Is that they will not have to see you That you'll settle and so you get the Demand letter and they can look really Spammy and scammy and you know one of Our clients got one from a lawyer that Had been disbarred three times and you Know it's just kind of wild uh kind of Wild west but you need to take them Seriously you need to take them Seriously the the the website owner
Needs to get Um legal representation you need you can Push back some Depending on what's going on people may Need to you know may want to settle even If they are compliant but uh that it may Be cheaper right and you would think That these uh predatory suits are going After the you know bigger Revenue sites With deeper Pockets but actually they Come after some pretty small but you Know small small businesses too so so It's not a guarantee Um I do think that all of those reasons We talked about before in terms of their Benefits that it's not that when you're Selling accessibility to people it's the Fear of the lawsuit is not maybe the Best motivator but it is the thing that Most people Kind of come to Um and I I recently I don't like the Fear-mongering right I don't like to I Don't like the fear-mongering and Somebody said well well why would you Not want to talk about risk that's what Like there's whole Industries like Insurance built on that and I was like Well okay but You know it I think the positive reasons Are are there too so Yeah yeah I mean it's definitely valid To talk about all the sides of it is There a
Um a badge or something like a HIPAA Compliance type of badge that you can Put on your site once you know that You're compliant and use that as again a Signal of hey we're A step above our Competitors here no not really and I Mean part of it is that no website is Really 100 complete uh you know like Oh a compliant right there's no there Really is no such thing as 100 compliant It's kind of like SEO in that way right You know there's there's low kind of Base best practices and then you know You can be doing all kinds of things you Know above those base practices But it never ends right you're there's Always optimizations to happen because It's essentially a user optimization uh User experience optimization and so Um there's not a badge there's not and Even what it means to be compliant is Sometimes really On you know not clear-cut because some Of it is how things are implemented and The context for them and so uh you know You can that's I think what makes it Really difficult sometimes is is to you Know there's not something clear-cut now What we recommend you you can do what's Called a voluntary Um Uh Uh project accessibility uh well it's a It's a it's basically a self report that
You're accessible but okay they get to Be expensive and they're not really Things people look for but what we Recommend is that people put an Accessibility policy or statement Accessibility statement in the footer Right next to the privacy policy and so You know not uh just kind of write down There with the privacy policy and on Your accessibility statement you're Going to say uh generally they have like Three little statements and one says we Want this website to be usable by Everybody we're trying to follow Um the WIC act wcag website content Accessibility guidelines 2.0 at Double A You know whatever the standard is that You're trying to find and then just an Acknowledgment there are that website Accessibility is um you know is is a is An ongoing matter and if you find Something that's not accessible please Be in touch and so it gives gives you a Chance to put it out there and it's Working on it People now that's not a you know a Fail-Safe to keep you from getting sued But it's a It's an invitation and it's out there And people that see it it can be very Powerful and that can be a real driver For uh what we call values driven uh Buyers right so people who are concerned About you know sweatshops or concerned
About the local economy right you know Those values driven people Um the accessibility statement can be a Great piece of that sure again if you Have a disabled person in your family it Probably means a lot when you see that On a website well I'll tell you what if You if you for example we see this maybe And it's easier to tell maybe with E-commerce sites but if you're an E-commerce site that is accessible to People with disabilities and somebody Who's disabled figures that out they are A then incredibly loyal to you and B They will trumpet your site to a lot of Other people so you want some some Incredibly loyal uh customers you can um Reach out that makes sense yeah yeah so So are there some some low-hanging fruit Best practices that you could give us Yeah the weekend is a kind of a Technique lots of technos speak kind of Piece Um and you can find a there's a lot of Places where you can find some some Um word Camp presentations or uh the Accessibility talks presentations a lot Of kind of webinars out there with kind Of basic best practices Um but you know they come down to uh They say that uh about 80 percent of all Accessibility issues have to do with uh Some of the content on the site making Sure that you have alt text on your
Images your heading structures Uh you know the H tag structure is Properly nested uh that those two things Alone would be about eighty percent of Issues Um but then you're looking at what you Said it's like double dipping with SEO You know if you're doing good exactly Yeah it sounds like you're checking a Lot of accessibility boxes yeah and so Then things like color contrast that's a Big one uh and then uh making sure that Your site is keyboard navigable so if You go to your website and you just Start pressing the tab key so people who Are blind use keyboard navigation and People who are are have Mobility Disabilities and so if you start Pressing the Tab Key you should be able To see you know see a little outline of Where you are now some developers turn Off that Focus indicator outline which Is why would you turn it off nobody sees It except if they're using needing it And so uh but you know you can tab Through and uh hit return and try to see How far you can get through your website And that's sometimes very enlightening How Um you know it's maybe not as easy as You might hope Uh or sometimes if if pop-ups or for Example uh sometimes a pop-up will open Or your search box will open and then
The person who's keyboard navigating Can't get out of it That's a big problem when the pop-up is Your cart I mean I have full use of my hands and Sight and sometimes I can't figure out How to close and pop up and that drives Me insane Are there are there any tools that you Could like a scanner tool where you can Throw a URL in there and it'll tell you Yeah there are one of them is called the Wave to a w Ave and you could just Google wave Accessibility and you'll find that tool That's a great one there's uh you can Put on the ax tools on the Chrome Inspector and that's another one Um it's important and those are huh What's the Chrome access Uh ax accessibility tools And um the important thing to know Though and those are great uh there's Some color contrast Checkers where you Can put in the the hex code of the font And the hex code of the background and It'll tell you if you're meeting the the Contrast guidelines and then how big the Fun sometimes you can you can meet the Color contrast guideline if the font is Big enough right and then if the font is Too small then it is right and so those Tools will help you do that Um the important thing to know though is
That those sorts of online tools and Tests will only help you with about 30 Of accessibility issues so for example You can put that wave tool on and There's a there's actually a Chrome Extension for for wave you could put That on there but it can't tell you if Your site is keyboard navigable right it Can only it can only test what AI can Test so they're great tools to get you I Mean use those tools to as a start but Just know that they're not going to be Everything you need and so that's why You need to be suspicious when somebody Says they're going to do an audit and All they do is run it through those AI Checkers because they're probably Missing a lot right and so uh and and The same with you know sometimes I don't Know if you want to get into the Controversy but you know there's there's Some overlay plugins so Um some familiar names might be user way Or accessibility and so they promote Themselves as sort of a one-click stop For making your site accessible well the Thing is they use Ai and they can only Fix those things that AI can fix So maybe about 30 of issues but they Also if a person is disabled and they Need those tools that that overlay Provides they've already got them Installed because the 99 of other Websites they need them on and so when
You put that overlay on it conflicts With their tools and that neither one of Them work And so lots of disabled people are Blocking those overlays because they Don't have to deal with it and then Recently we've become aware that there's Privacy issues that that when the Disabled person puts in that I need you Know I need a magnification or I need Color changes blah blah blah all of Those things are stored by the by the Platform but without notifying the user And there's no way for the user to Remove that data you know like under Gdpr where you have to notify them about The data you're storing and so there's Some concerns about whether it meets Privacy Law pieces too so overlays uh You might want to go to Overlay Factsheet.com that's a great uh kind of Uh sort of help you understand what Overlays are and how they work and why They are not real great and then like Over 700 accessibility professionals Have signed this um statement about Overlays and so Interesting so then I'm assuming you Talked about some tools I appreciate That people can go check those out Um I'm assuming that if you get called In to do an audit you you guys know how To check 100 or 90. and that's and That's really why you're calling in an
Outside agency is that you're wanting Folks that are going to use the tools But also then do the human testing right So when we do an audit we do Um we typically do you you almost never Anymore get uh all the pages of a Website audited unless it's a very small Site right so we we typically do about 10 URLs or views sometimes the what's on The page can change without changing the URL so when we do 10 URLs or views and And we try to help the clients then pick A variety of templates and just you know Layouts and all of those just so we're Making sure we get everything but Between that you get all the global Things the menu and the glitter and then You get on those pretty usually you can Get a pretty good idea of the Accessibility of the site and then you Know the other piece of what we do is We're doing that human testing then we Provide an hour of consult to help you Understand what's there usually the site Owners that come to us have their own Development team and those folks can Implement the changes once they know What needs to be changed but if they Need to they could come back and do a Little more checking with us or Consultation with us and all that but Um so it's a and do you do this in a In a white labeled or a resellable Manner like if I have an agency is there
A business model here where I kind of Say hey would you be interested in an Accessibility report and then I'm Essentially having your team run it and I'm just putting a margin on that Um you could do that it makes it kind of A little awkward to do that consultation With the developer who did the audit Then because then they're clearly not a Part of your team and what we have done With some agencies is do instead of Doing white labeling I mean we I'm open To that I talk to people but but Um but what we have done instead is just Give a referral feedback to the agency Or give it to them as a bit of a Discount and they can upsell it And now do you guys also then Make the changes I I could see A bit an embarrassment Factor here right If I'm like I recommend you you come in You're like wow whoever made this really Screwed it up and then they come back to Me and they're like yeah you need to Redo this whole thing because we have Had a couple of agencies that say we Don't we don't want the client to know That we're doing this yet right We just want to do this right and so uh I mean we've had a couple agencies do That Um uh you know it can be I I think we Try to be gentle and we are you know our Approach is educative right we just want
To educate the client educate the agency The developers on that Um we have had some folks who you know Some agencies where they just said look This is a Rel you know we're just really Newly aware of this in the in our in our Niche is really newly aware of this We're gonna call these folks in let's Work together and we sort of work Together with them we do do remediations But typically we're I mean that's pretty Less common I think in some ways Typically Um you know typically the agency folks Want to have their people get up to Speed to know how to do this right and There's yeah also the added benefit that If the developer has to go back and fix These things themselves then they're Less likely to make that same mistake You know Implement that same issue again That was going to be my next point right It sounds like it's probably worth Having you guys come and audit you know If I'm building websites one of my sites Just so I know because if there is an Issue I'm assuming I would be like oh Got it moving forward we're not we do That on every site we should go back and Fix that right yeah exactly yeah so we Um yeah we do that and um we we also do Consulting work Um so if we've done this with several Agencies where they they have a client
That they know has to be accessible Right it's a bank or credit union it's You know they know that there's an Accessibility requirement there and so Sometimes they'll just build it into of The project budget that they're going to Bring us in to consult along the way to Make sure that things are up to speed And and typically there uh the you know You mentioned at the beginning like Accessibility is another thing I have to Add on I just want to kind of put out There that that's the most expensive way To do accessibility so it's it's uh it's Much better if you start at the Beginning with uh and and kind of have Some touch points along the way and so What we typically do when we're going to Do that is we Um we would be in to visit with the Developers as they're thinking about Feature development which plugins are They going to use how which custom Coding are they going to do what should They be looking out for how you know Where are some resources for putting That together in a more accessible way Then look at talking with the design Team about color contrast uh color Schemes and contrast and then also Mock-ups uh touch point there and then We recommend although people don't Always want to have us come in after You've gotten started with the build out
And you're part way typically when You've got a little bit of the content Done because the content People putting in the content can create Issues too right so so if we come in Early and we catch what they're doing And we get that fixed early then you Don't have to go back and fix that later So now you can see at the end is the is The most expensive thing if you realize This feature that you spend all this Time building out now has to be recorded Yeah all of those things Um that makes sense yeah and that's Interesting for sure if you're working With a bank or a government agency or Something like that it makes sense to Say hey we need to make sure that this Is a part of the process here yeah well I didn't increasingly e-commerce or Other kinds of user interaction sites They're becoming aware that they need to Be accessible so it's not you know I I Would think about it as something you Could offer and then you know put it out There we do work with folks in and um in One other kind of capacity and that's uh With some uh in terms of their own Retainer work so if an agency has Retainers with clients where they have a Bucket of hours and they're pitching Things to you know improve the website Typically if the agency has us come in For every hour they have us do some not
An audit but just assessment of the site We can just list out uh and kind of Prioritize what's the most impactful Things to start changing they can Generate three to five hours of billable Labor from every hour they have us Spending on Yeah that sounds like a pretty good Business model I like it Um so but I I know the website your Website is accessorycart.com A-c-c-e-s-s-i-cart.com and you guys have A a pretty robust Blog full of content Right if somebody's interested in kind Of just learning more about this and Reading up on it would you say your blog Is a good resource I yeah I would say so We have some you know downloadable Resources and we you know we try to make It a good Um resource piece but there you know There's some other places that folks Could um look for help Um one of the places that if people are New to accessibility and they're wanting To try and get on board DQ D-e-q-u-e.com they are a services Company but they also have an online Learning kind of component Um and they have some self-paced online Learning and so when we for instance They have a great module that just Introduces people to basically you know
The world of disabilities and and Disability law and just helping people Kind of wrap their head around the Different sorts of disabilities that Impact website development and anytime We get somebody new on our team we make Even like the support agents right we Just make sure they've taken that and Then they have some other additional Ones for people that are doing more Development pieces and so that's a great Resource Um there is a word and and while I say These WordPress I know people have their Own platforms and other things right Like we typically come out of WordPress World but but uh but a lot of Accessibility stuff is really platform Agnostic and so Um you can get some great resources There's a WordPress accessibility Meetup That is global and they meet twice a Month online and some great just some of The most uh you know best known you know Uh really highly acclaimed accessibility Experts that are doing webinars and Giving presentations and they have a Whole Archive of stuff so if you have a Particular topic that you're looking for Help on you might find a presentation on It there that's a great spot and then um There's a there's another Meetup called Um Ally talk so as so accessibility is Sometimes abbreviated
A11y because between the A and the Y in Accessibility there are 11 letters so A11y talks is a kind of they do webinars And and uh kind of presentation stuff And they have an archive as well so some Great resources there the WordPress uh Meetup also has a Facebook group Ally talks has a slack channel in General accessibility folk are really Generous about trying to help I was Going to say it sounds like a pretty That's right you're a giving Community To be a part of you can um ask your Questions uh people may refer you to you Know resources around or be able to Answer your question uh you know I I Obviously you know you should do a Little of your own homework before you Show up but you know like you know uh But uh but you know yeah those are great Places to uh ask and answer you know get Get answers to questions so That's awesome and so if uh if any of Our community are listening they'd like To learn more maybe reach out to you as Far as possibly working together should They just head to accessorycard.com yeah There's a contact form there that's Great yeah that's probably the best I used to say Twitter and now it's hard To know it's what's going on with Twitter Um it's still my favorite network yeah You know I know this is a lot there's a
Lot that's going on but I just say since We're talking to agency owners and People that are interested are thinking About selling accessibility There is another kind of great Um uh way to sell accessibility because It it does bring some added costs and That is okay anytime anyone is improving The accessibility of their website Whether that's getting an audit having Remediations done or building a new Website that has accessibility included They may be eligible for a tax credit of Up to 50 percent of the expense up to Ten thousand dollars so they can spend Up to ten thousand dollars they can get A non-refundable so it just reduces what They owe by five thousand dollars that's Pretty significant I mean up to that They have to be either under 30 Employees or under a million in Revenue And so so some of the higher end folks May not qualify and of course those are Only U.S based businesses but but it's a Great kind of uh we've had a number of Clients that's really interesting so if I'm selling a website For eight thousand dollars and I can say But I might be able to get half of this Back for you because you know we build Under accessibility standards or whatnot If if if our typical website build has Been eight thousand dollars now we can Say we're going to build an
Accessibility for you and you charge ten Thousand dollars but the client is only Going to have to pay I mean they have to pay it out front They do have to pay it up front and then They're dealing with Uncle Sam and the And the you know the the tax credit but And you want to make sure that when if You know they're going to do that that You're labeling your invoices very Clearly around all of that but Accessibility improvements and all That that's really interesting so that Goes back to you know you want to work With us because we you know make sure That your site's going to be accessible And because we're doing that work you're Likely eligible for a refund and you Know here's how you can go about doing That after the project is finished yep Yep it's a it's right where can people Learn more about that that seems like Very very valid there's a um there's a Post on our blog Um just Google uh just search blog uh Attacks tax credit on the On the blog very cool link to the link To the Forum it's a very simple form too It's not hard to claim so Really do you know what the turn the Duke will turn around on that is What do you mean with the turnaround Like of them actually processing the Refund back to the business it's with
Your taxes Right so oh got it so so you you the the Business owner has to pay you the whole Ten thousand dollars but they're getting Invoices from you that say accessibility It was included they take those they Make sure they put those in with this Plant this form Oh God it's a pretty simple form to fill Out and then it gets submitted as a part Of their tax return and then Theoretically They that Control process and yeah wow That's great Well bet thank you so much for coming on And sharing all this Insight I feel like I got a lot of actionable tips here Um sounds like some great tools to use I Love the policy uh that sounds like a Great idea it honestly sounds like that Would go a long way if somebody were to Try to cause a problem you know like You're documenting what you're doing That you're trying to do the right thing There Um I just realized I like that a lot we Talked in the pre-show about uh about Liability and we didn't mention that Oh right do you want to mention that Quickly okay so of course yeah go for it Um while the client is liable for being Sued under Ada anytime you're doing even If you're not doing accessibility work I Think you should be starting to include
In your contract Um a release of liability you can find On our blog a more much more kind of uh Verbose release of liability that Ryan Kenny did with us in conjunction with a Word Camp a couple years back but what I Try to do is I just try to say it's Uncertain what uh what meets criteria And the legal landscape is changing Therefore we can't be responsible for Any legal responsibility for for uh Making your website compliant uh with Accessibility compliant and ultimately That is the uh responsibility of the Site owner so once they once they sign Off on ultimately it's the Responsibility of the site owner then They may want to share the pain when They come back when they get sued but That kind of prevents them from doing That and then additionally in the Process if the client wants to do Something that's not accessible so for Instance we we have client that they're Using this uh kind of beautiful salmon Color but with a the white font on top Of it is not color com compliant the Color contrast is not compliant so we Come back to the client when they want To insist that they want to do this we Come back and ask them to sign another Legal document that says we've informed You that this particular choice is not Accessible and other choices that you
May make may not may also not be Accessible but you're acknowledging that We have advised you of this and you are Committing to uh if you get sued over This or any other accessibility issues That you will be paying our expenses Related to that lawsuit because if they Get sued You will you as you as the developer Will almost certainly get pulled in to Give depositions to give testimony if it Goes to court right and so uh even if it Doesn't go to court even if it's just in Some kind of settlement thing you may Get pulled in and you want to make sure That you're not having to pay out for Your own attorney and all those things On on all of that so you get to choose Your own attorney and submit the bill to Them so you know you you want to do that Nine times out of ten that makes the Client go oh I guess I should take this All pretty seriously and they change Their mind and start going with your Recommendations sometimes they do not And you know uh that's their risk Tolerance is their risk tolerance and so Uh but you're yeah that's a great Yourself that's a great piece of advice Though I mean it makes total sense to Just add a clause into your contract Template Um in regard to accessibility for sure And I think you Illustrated the point
There that also Um it's really important because after You build it if a client goes and makes A change Changes the color that then what was Compliant is no longer compliant and you Want to make sure that that can't come Back to you as well yeah I also like the Fact that like you said anything that Gets a client more in line with you on Design is a positive in my book yeah It's important to realize that pretty Much any change to the website can Affect accessibility updating plugins Updating content change changes in the Theme all of those things can affect Accessibility so so yeah it's it's good To get yourself covered and And to be sure you're keeping if if You're If you are uh part of the project is Delivering something that has some Accessibility compliance with it make Sure you're keeping a copy of what You've delivered so that The future that's interesting as well Right you could say no when we it looked Like this one we delivered it it didn't Look like that there's no salmon and White combination going on there yeah Yeah awesome well bet thanks so much for Coming by this has been really Eye-opening uh I really appreciate it You're welcome I always love helping to
Helping people learn about Accessibilities I have no doubt that uh the viewers Learned a lot in this one so thank you For watching guys we will see you in the Next one [Music]
