Perth Web Standards Group, March 30, 2006.
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Alex GrahamMy name's Alex Graham, I run Cadmium Design and Development which is a very small operation, which basically means me. I focus basically on standards-based accessible web design. Our work has been recognized by the Guild of Accessible Web Designers with their inaugural site of the day for the "Treasures of the Battye Library" website, and we're also finalists in last year's WA web awards for accessibility and standards category for the same website.
Ok, now tonight I want to talk about accessibility and how to deal with trying to sell it to your clients, as an actual aspect of web design. First thing is what is accessibility? Most people, when they think about accessibility it's disabled users, things like blindness, stuff like that, but really, it's about a bit more than that. It's really about making the site as accessible as possible to as many people as possible, regardless of whether they have a disability or not, whether they're using different kinds of tools to access the information or stuff like that. So basically it's making a web site available to as many different people as possible regardless of their ability or equipment.
So it encompasses disabled people but there's a lot more to it as well.
So it caters people with disabilities, blind or visually impaired, usually including color blindness as the most obvious ones and they're usually the ones that most people cover when they're actually including accessibility in their design. You've got to take into account physical disabilities as well, so people may not be so good at clicking with the mouse and things like that, they might be accessing it through the keyboard, or something like that. People with learning difficulties, lowered reading ages, dyslexia, stuff like that, they might not be able to read what you've written so you have to make sure it's written as simply as possible and in the easiest language possible.
You've got designing for a variety of browsers and platforms, so becoming much more popular lately, is people accessing the internet by mobile phones and PDA's. There's things like 3G and all that and broadband phones and all the rest that's come along that's going to become far more popular, anyway. The most obvious challenge there is screen size so you have to take that into account. People with slow connections, there's still a lot of people using dial-up, and old phones and things like that. People who have old computers and software like large organizations that don't update their equipment and stuff like that, so you have to take those into account as well.
Then, the skill level and situation, there are a lot of older web users now using the internet, they're not used to using computers, so you need to make things pretty straight forward, basically. Young children, again similar to people with motor difficulties, may not be able to actually use the mouse very well, so you're looking at big spaces to click on, things like that. People whose first language isn't English, which is a big one, because the internet, you can do it from anywhere so you can't guess who is actually accessing it so you need to take into account what or whether people can understand what you've actually put up on the web.
So basically, it's catering to people with disabilities, considering the usability issues and challenges of using the web site, developing them for multiple browsers and platforms and basically maximum access. So how do you sell it to your clients, that's the big question. You need to ask yourself, is it a feature or process of web design? Because depending on how you look at it will depend on how you sell it to that particular client. To work that out, we'll have a look at a definition of each of those words.
A feature is a prominent or distinctive aspect, quality or characteristic of something, whereas a process is a series of actions, changes or functions bringing about a result. Looking at those two, it could be either, or could be both, but in this case from a web developer's perspective we need to treat it as a process, even though it's both of them.
I'll explain that now, because the processes of creating an accessible web site results in the features of a better web site, so you use the process to make the better web site which then the client will want to know about. They don't care how you made the web site, so when you look back at the series of actions, changes or functions bringing about a result, that's what the process of doing, or making a web site work for everybody does.
So then if we take those two words and then change the definition to apply to web design, you've got the process is actually combining the usability cross platform development with considerations for disabled users so that's how we would define the process of accessibility. If you're going to define it as a feature, it'd be in easy to use words like; there can be access from multiple platforms in different situations for as many different people as possible. They're both accessibility, but from different points of view.
When it comes to selling it to clients, what do they actually want? Basically they want a web site that works, one that they can find, and one that they can use, or that people can use. Which basically ties in with the features, they don't care about accessibility, that's the bottom line. If you go up to a client and say, "I'm going to make you an accessible web site, " unless they're a government department or something like that where it's actually an issue for them, they're not going to bother. Because to them, accessibility doesn't mean anything, but when you put it as a feature, and telling them it can be accessed from anywhere, by anyone, at anytime. That will open them up to better business and all that sort of thing, then they are more likely to listen to you. Sell the features, not the process. Then again that these quite easy to use website is one that works, that people can find, and people can use.
Another method to sell it to them is to actually give them the arguments for and against. For example, you can talk in positive arguments and it will appeal to affluent markets, because they're the people using the latest technology, this "super phone", and the PDA's and all that sort of thing, and they're the ones with the money to spend so they're the ones your clients are going to want to attract. There's the positive payoff of being socially responsible, you can say, "Yep, our web site works for everybody, we don't discriminate," all that sort of thing. Basically the improved search performance which Andy Budd(sp) mentioned was Google is the biggest blind user of the web so if you optimize it for them, then you've pretty much got it covered for other people.
Then you've got the negative arguments about why not having an accessible web site is bad. Basically you could be turning users away. If people can't use your site, then they're not going to hang around, and they'll talk about it. If they can't use your site they're not going to recommend you to anybody, but they will say, "Oh, that site's rubbish", they won't go around saying; oh, that site's great. They're much more likely to tell people if there's something wrong with it than if there's something good about it. There's the exposure to litigation like which that happened at the Sydney Olympics when someone couldn't use the web site so that's a pretty big one to use to convince them.
Things to remember:
It's about more than disabled users, it's an overall concept to apply to the web, web design as a whole and you need to build it into your development process as opposed to actually adding it on, because you just do it straight through the whole time and you make that a part of your web sites, then you're just going to be making better web sites anyway so clients are more likely to choose you.
Make sure you're selling the features, don't talk in developer speak, like I said at the beginning, they don't care about how you made it accessible, just as long as people can use it. So make sure it's that usability that you're selling when you're talking to the clients. You just make the good web sites, don't make a big deal out of it to the clients, it's something that matters to developers because it's something that we do. But again, it's just a part of the end product, it's not anything that will really bother your client.
So that's pretty much it, does anyone have any questions? Yes?
Audience Member:Has there been any besides the Sydney Olympics?
Alex Graham:In Australia, not that I know of, I haven't really looked into it, but I don't think so. I think that was the biggest one.
Audience Member:[xx]
Alex Graham:Possibly, but not in Australia, they're still doing it, so it's still an issue. Anyone else?
Audience Member:[xx]
Alex Graham:In Australia?
Audience Member:[xx]
Alex Graham:Possibly, in most cases the action would go against the company's web site, but then they could turn around and say, "Well, you were the developer, why did you do this?" So there's still that risk there that you could...
Audience Member:[xx]
Alex Graham:Yes, pretty much, that'd probably be a pretty good idea, yes definitely, just to cover your own back, you can't be sure what anybody's going to do.