One third of American senior citizens, a number which accounts for 19 million people, live with some form of disability.
More so than ever before, members of this group are now treated with the respect and dignity they deserve, when interacting with businesses’ and organizations’ physical environments.
But when engaging with brands’ digital environments (namely, their websites and apps), data tells a much different story.
Only about 4% of websites are accessible to people with disabilities.
Chances are, your website is part of that statistic.
However, that can and should change, and we’re here to help show you why taking action is not only the right thing to do, but also can have a transformative effect on business and revenue.
In this article:
- We will lay out a number of reasons that should incentivize you to take the necessary steps to change your website’s accessibility status
- You will learn why an accessible website leads to better business results, and why modern consumers expect you to take action to be fully inclusive
- We will also show how pursuing accessibility will see you fulfilling important legal obligations under laws such as the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)
A quick introduction to web accessibility
People with disabilities, including senior citizens with a variety of impairments, are largely marginalized when it comes to access to digital environments, including most websites.
Companies striving to create more inclusive and welcoming online presences, as well as comply with relevant web accessibility legislation (which will be elaborated on later in the blog), need to ensure their websites conform to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG).
Created by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), WCAG is widely accepted as the most important set of web accessibility guidelines in the world. Additionally, WCAG has a deciding impact on the shaping of web accessibility legislation around the world.
Despite being composed of numerous criteria and guidelines, WCAG is ultimately based on four guiding principles:
- Perceivable: Website visitors need to be able to perceive content appearing on your website through their senses of touch, sound, and sight. To that, alternative text needs to be added to meaningful images (i.e., the kind that convey critical information, and do not appear purely for decorative purposes), and captions need to be added to meaningful video content, among other measures
- Operable: Visitors to your website visitors must be able to operate it regardless of ability. In practices, this means that user interface components and navigation elements need to be fully operable solely via keyboard, among other measures
- Understandable: The Information appearing on your website, as well as the operation of the user interface, needs to be understandable. For this to be achieved, your website's layout should be simple and predictable. Additionally, the information appearing within it should not include complicated jargon
- Robust: Content must be robust enough to work with current and assistive technologies, such as screen readers
For your website to be considered accessible to people with disabilities, it will need to fully conform to WCAG.
As WCAG has a deciding impact on web accessibility, it is therefore beneficial to gain a better understanding of its myriad sections, versions, and conformance levels. This should help you on your journey to reach full accessibility.
To that end, we recommend that you take a look at the following guides and articles:
Why invest in web accessibility for seniors with disabilities?
1. Web accessibility is a legal requirement under the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)
Most public facing businesses need to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). Title III of the ADA, which applies to the ways in which businesses should accommodate the need of people with disabilities within physical environments, is now widely applied by many U.S. courts to digital environments, as well.
The Department of Justice (DOJ), in a number of instances, has stressed that website accessibility falls under the ADA, and has repeatedly referenced WCAG as the standard websites should conform to under the law.
It is generally accepted that to comply with the ADA, websites should conform to WCAG at Level AA. To understand what that entails and how to achieve WCAG conformance at that level, we recommend you check out our comprehensive ADA compliance checklist.
The consequences of not complying with the ADA
As the ADA is a federal law, businesses that fail to comply with it can face serious consequences. As long as your website is inaccessible, you are at the risk of receiving a demand letter, in which your website’s accessibility shortcomings are laid out, along with a date by which you will need to address them.
Additionally, and irrespective of receiving a demand letter, failing to comply with the ADA in the form of presenting a website that does not conform with WCAG can result in you facing ADA website compliance lawsuits. Legal action under the ADA has been on a steady rise in the last few years, with more than 4,000 lawsuits set to be filed in federal court by the end of 2024.
Equally as importantly, failure to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act can harm your brand’s reputation.
Not extending people with disabilities with the same accommodating digital experience, one they rightfully deserve, can be justifiably perceived as a discriminatory act. As we will showcase later in the blog, modern consumers are deeply concerned with the values expressed by the brands they support, and expect them to exhibit a high level of Social Corporate Responsibility.
Denying people with disabilities, including the millions of seniors living with disabilities, of equal access to your website and online assets, can lead them to view you in a negative light.
Bottom line: Most public facing businesses need to comply with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), and present an accessible website. Failing to comply with the law - by falling short of conforming to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), can result in significant legal issues, including receiving demand letters and being met with lawsuits.
2. Web accessibility is smart business
American senior citizens wield considerable spending power, accounting for 22% of all consumer spending in 2022 - a record number, and one which is expected to rise even higher in coming years.
At the same time, people with disabilities, including members of their extended families, command trillions of dollars in annual expendable income.
When you apply the necessary measures so that your website is welcoming to them, people with disabilities, seniors included, are able to consider your goods and services. This increases the likelihood of them spending their hard earned money on your business’ offerings.
It is important to realize that people aged 65 and older have a greater aversion toward digital-first purchasing experiences than others. Recent research shows that senior citizens are less likely to adopt new technology quickly, shop online regularly, and trust digital payment methods.
Accessible websites, at their core, are those that follow design guidelines that benefit all website visitors.
Under WCAG, your website needs to feature large and readable fonts and highly contrasting colors, as well as feature simple, straightforward, and easy to understand language. Additionally, an accessible website will be devoid of elements that can cause distress among senior citizens, such as flashing imagery that can induce seizures.
Investing in accessibility can therefore help ingratiate your brand to the senior citizen class as a whole, including those who do not have a disability.
Bottom line: Investing in accessibility will allow senior citizens with and without disabilities - a group with considerable spending power - to browse your goods and services and to potentially become your customer.
3. Consumers today expect the brands they support to be inclusive and accessible
Recent research conducted by Harvard Business School yielded some significant insights into the priorities of modern consumers. No longer driven solely by competitive pricing, people today are very particular about the brands they support, and are more likely to shift their loyalty when they feel their values do not align with the companies they consume from.
According to the study, 72% of consumers believe companies should have a legal responsibility to society. Furthermore, more than 66% of consumers would pay more to buy from socially responsible businesses.
There are few ways to demonstrate a higher level of Corporate Social Responsibility than by ensuring you are welcoming to a group as marginalized as senior citizens with disabilities.
Creating inclusive online spaces, the kind which seniors with disabilities can navigate confidently and with relative ease, signals to modern consumers that you don’t just proclaim to be equitable and inclusive; you actually are.
This can lead to positive business impacts, as the research shows that more than 66% of consumers would pay more to buy from socially and environmentally responsible businesses, and over 90% (!) of consumers worldwide are likely to switch to brands supporting a good cause.
Bottom line: Investing in accessibility demonstrates your business’ high level of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). As modern consumers continue to showcase loyalty to brands that exhibit high levels of CSR, an accessible website can help attract new audiences, and retain socially-conscious customers and clients.
Take the next step toward accessibility
To create an accessible website, and to adjust an existing one so that it conforms to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), you will need to address various design and technical elements of your website.
Although it may seem daunting, embarking on your accessibility journey is not as difficult as it used to be, thanks to powerful, AI-driven solutions that natively integrate into your website.
Platforms like accessiBe offer a number of tools and services which each tackle individual stages of the accessibility journey, as well as target specific digital assets and environments, such as online documents and mobile adaptation.
If you’re interested in learning more about the ways in which accessiBe can help you on your journey toward accessibility, press here.
