Accessible content means easier access for all people, not just people with disability.
Accessible content is available in a range of formats, easy to understand and uses clear language. It also makes the desired action you’re trying to achieve more likely to happen!
We’ve pulled together some simple tips to make your content accessible in this guide.
A common mistake with using links is creating a hyperlink using words that don’t tell the reader what they are linking to, such as 'read more' or 'click here'. It’s ambiguous and a barrier for people with vision impairment who use screen reader software.
Screen readers literally read the text on screen to the user, so a link that says click here is not meaningful enough for the reader to decide if they want to follow the link.
Image descriptions (also known as alternative text or alt text) are critical for people with vision impairment and cognitive or learning disability.
Screen readers pick up alt text and read it aloud to help people understand the image on screen. Without alt text, the user might feel they have missed some information.
For images with text included, the same text should also appear on the web page or in the corresponding social post.
It is also important to ensure sufficient contrast between the background of an image and the text. Web Content Accessibility Guidelines recommend a contrast of at least 4.5:1.
There are several online tools you can use to create text contrast including The Paciello Group’s Contrast Analyser and Contrast Ratio.
Making video accessible is about captions and transcripts.
Captions are a synchronised text version of all dialogue and important sounds in a video.
Captions are important for people who are hearing impaired, people who have a different preferred language from the one being spoken in the video and also in noisy situations or even quiet ones when having the sound on is not an option.
Open captions are part of the video and always visible, whereas closed captions can be turned on and off.
Transcripts are a text version of what is being said during a video for people who can’t or don’t want to access the audio. Transcripts can also include descriptions, explanations and comments.
Audio descriptions are another way to improve the accessibility of video content. An audio description enables people who are vision impaired to understand what’s happening. Most videos move too fast for this to be possible, but it is often possible to add announcements to videos of a speech or interview.
Written content uses headings to create sections and organise information into smaller, easier chunks.
Meaningful or ‘true’ headings make content easier to navigate. For example, many people will ‘skim’ over the headings before deciding which sections of content to read.
People with vision impairment rely on a screen reader to read content to them. So, if you’ve only used visual cues to identify headings (e.g. a larger font, bold, a different colour), someone using a screen reader won’t know that it’s a heading.
‘True’ headings can be used to identify the heading hierarchy from the ‘back end’ of a website. The hierarchy uses numbers, such as H1 for the top level, H2 for the next level of heading and so on.
Although you can’t see the heading hierarchy when you view the content online, the screen reader will pick it up and tell the user, to aid understanding. Most content creation software has a tool for creating true headings: