The Need for Web Accessibility Testing

 What's Web Accessibility Testing

Website accessibility is a critical aspect of online business success. With ecommerce stores quickly closing the retail sales gap and more users than ever willing to leverage online services for financial, health, and legal advice, there’s a growing need for websites to deliver accessible content to all visitors. This, then, will contribute a lot to the success of a business as we work to get the application accessible to every user.

The Need for Improved Accessibility Testing:

These disabilities fit into six major categories:

• Freedom: Difficulties walking, climbing stairs, and obtaining physical foundation
• Cognition: Difficulty concentrating, remembering, or making conclusions
• Hearing: Difficulty hearing conversations and/ or digital media
• Vision: Difficulty reading text or watching videos
• Independent Living: Difficulty with basic daily activities related to separate living, like running errands or cooking meals
• Self-care: Difficulty with day-to-day behaviours like bathing or dressing

What To Test For

Website testing for access must evaluate two important results: universality and usability.

Universality covers components and aspects of your site which are usable for everyone. For instance, lower curbs on sidewalks and walkways give universal access; both able-bodied consumers and those with mobility problems benefit.

Usability, meanwhile, speaks to the ease and functionality of accessible design elements. The simpler to use your website, the better your odds of getting visitor interest.

To effectively examine web accessibility, it's worth considering each of the six CDC categories we mentioned previously:

Freedom : Just how do those with mobility challenges get into your website? According to Karl Groves, founder of this Tenon.io web accessibility platform, there's an easy starter test: Unplug your mouse. Can you interact with controls on your own site? Would you see which controls are active? Do command orders make sense? If the solution is no, you want to boost keyboard support.

Cognition: How complex are the forms and menus on your website? Are they really contextually-relevant and simple to identify for people with cognitive issues? Does every form field indicate exactly what's required from consumers? In case you have form prerequisites hiding in area boxes, then consider moving them out.

Hearing: If your site has multiple movies or audio clips, do you have options for those who are hearing impaired?

Vision: On the flip side, does your site support audio descriptions and include context-first text which makes it simple for visitors using text-to-voice applications to rapidly find what they want?

Independent Living: Ease-of-use is paramount here. Users with separate living challenges are often able to take on increasingly complicated tasks provided that they comprise easy and straightforward steps. This is the reason a streamlined site design makes it simpler for these visitors to get what they're searching for.

Self-care: several of those who struggle with self-care as a result of cognitive or physical disabilities still possess remarkable psychological prowess -- here, easily-scalable text and image elements can conserve these users unnecessary frustration.