Is your site accessible? No? Why the h*ck not?
Ensuring websites are accessible and usable for everyone should be a major goal for anyone who works within the online space. In the UK alone there are 14.1 million people living with a disability; all of whom should be able to use your site.
Accessibility creates a more loyal customer base, increases sales and improves inclusivity.
However, steps towards accessibility are often seen as a low priority or neglected completely.
So, let’s talk about how you can be more inclusive and profit from it.
By the end of this session:
Attendees will leave this session with the ability to facilitate a conversation around accessibility with stakeholders
Attendees will leave with actionable steps to apply to their site(s)
Attendees will be able to identify common accessbility issues and take steps to resolve them
As a neurodivergent person working SEO, I often find myself going down rabbit holes on the internet. I feel responsible for solving problems and making lives easier for my friends and family. This became an obsession in my work; I have worked on dozens of websites over the years and have publicly (and sometimes secretly) completed steps towards accessibility for my clients.
There are many activities we can complete that can improve the accessibility of a website, and in turn would have a significant knock on effect for SEO. I try my best to advocate this workflow, however I have consistently seen pushback from clients over the years, insisting that I separate accessibility from SEO.
I want to raise awareness of how easy this work actually is, and that it is simply the right thing to do. Unfortunately in my experience it always comes back to “what’s in it for me” – I would like to share my experiences, how to work out the value of having an accessible website and give actionable advice on simple changes that SEO’s, Developers and Project Managers can take away.