Website Accessibility: A Business Case for Inclusive Design

Website accessibility is often framed as compliance or charity. This misses the point. Accessible websites perform better for everyone, reach more customers, rank better in search, and reduce legal risk.

This article makes the business case for accessibility and outlines what it means for your website development.

What Accessibility Means

Web accessibility ensures people with disabilities can use your website. This includes people with:

Visual impairments: Blindness, low vision, colour blindness
Hearing impairments: Deafness, hard of hearing
Motor impairments: Difficulty using a mouse, limited fine motor control
Cognitive impairments: Learning disabilities, attention disorders, memory issues

Accessible websites also help people in situational limitations:

Using a phone in bright sunlight
Watching video without sound in a public place
Navigating with one hand while holding something
Using the internet on slow connections

The principles of accessibility—clear structure, good contrast, keyboard navigation, descriptive text—make websites better for everyone.

The Business Case

Expanded Market

According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, 18% of Australians have a disability. That is roughly one in five potential customers.

If your website is inaccessible, you are excluding this market. In a competitive environment, every customer matters.

Improved SEO

Many accessibility best practices align with SEO best practices:

Alt text on images: Helps screen readers AND helps Google understand images
Heading structure: Helps screen readers AND helps search engines understand content hierarchy
Descriptive link text: Helps screen readers AND helps search engines understand link context
Page titles: Helps screen readers AND improves search snippets
Video captions: Help deaf users AND provide indexable text for search

Google has explicitly stated that accessible websites provide better user experience, which is a ranking factor.

Better User Experience

Accessibility improvements benefit all users, enhancing overall UX design:

High contrast text is easier to read in any lighting
Keyboard navigation helps power users move faster
Clear labels reduce confusion for everyone
Logical structure helps all users find information

When you design for edge cases, you improve the experience for everyone.

Legal Risk Reduction

Inaccessible websites create legal exposure. The Disability Discrimination Act 1992 prohibits discrimination on the basis of disability, and this has been interpreted to include websites.

Australian case law and Human Rights Commission complaints have addressed website accessibility. Businesses have been required to remediate websites and pay compensation.

The legal landscape is evolving toward greater accessibility requirements. Getting ahead of this reduces future risk and cost.

Brand Reputation

Accessibility demonstrates that you value all customers. For government contracts, large corporate clients, or socially conscious markets, accessibility can be a requirement or differentiator.

Conversely, an inaccessible website can create negative publicity if a customer has a poor experience and shares it publicly.

Understanding WCAG

The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) are the international standard for web accessibility. WCAG is organised around four principles:

Perceivable

Information must be presentable in ways users can perceive.

Text alternatives for images
Captions for video
Sufficient colour contrast
Content that works when colours are not visible

Operable

Interface components must be operable.

Keyboard accessible
Enough time to read and use content
No content that causes seizures
Easy navigation

Understandable

Information and interface must be understandable.

Readable text
Predictable behaviour
Input assistance (clear labels, error messages)

Robust

Content must be robust enough for diverse technologies.

Compatible with assistive technologies
Valid code
Future-compatible approaches

Compliance Levels

WCAG defines three levels:

Level A: Minimum accessibility
Level AA: Addresses major barriers (most common target)
Level AAA: Highest level (often not fully achievable for all content)

Most organisations target WCAG 2.1 Level AA as a reasonable standard.

Common Accessibility Issues

Based on automated and manual audits, these issues appear repeatedly:

Low Colour Contrast

Text that is too similar in colour to its background is hard to read. WCAG requires:

Normal text: 4.5:1 contrast ratio minimum
Large text: 3:1 contrast ratio minimum

Grey text on light backgrounds is a common offender. Use tools like WebAIM’s contrast checker to verify.

Missing Alt Text

Images need alternative text that describes them for screen reader users and when images fail to load.

Decorative images: Use empty alt (alt="")
Informative images: Describe the content or function
Complex images: Provide detailed descriptions

Missing Form Labels

Form fields need associated labels. Placeholders are not sufficient—they disappear when typing begins.

<!-- Bad -->
<input type="text" placeholder="Name">

<!-- Good -->
<label for="name">Name</label>
<input type="text" id="name">

Users who cannot use a mouse navigate by keyboard. Issues include:

No visible focus indicator (cannot tell what is selected)
Focus traps (cannot escape certain elements)
Illogical tab order
Interactive elements that are not keyboard accessible

Missing Document Structure

Screen readers rely on heading structure to navigate. This is also important for technical SEO. Issues include:

No headings at all
Skipped heading levels (H1 to H4)
Headings used for styling rather than structure
Multiple H1 headings

Video Without Captions

Videos need captions for deaf users. Auto-generated captions are better than nothing but often contain errors.

Link Text Problems

Links should describe their destination:

Bad: “Click here,” “Read more,” “Learn more”
Good: “View our plumbing services,” “Read the complete guide to SEO”

Getting Started with Accessibility

Audit Your Current Site

Start by understanding where you stand:

Automated testing:

WAVE (wave.webaim.org)
axe DevTools (browser extension)
Lighthouse (built into Chrome DevTools)

Automated tools catch 30-50% of issues. They miss context-dependent problems.

Manual testing:

Navigate your site using only keyboard
Use your site with a screen reader (VoiceOver on Mac, NVDA on Windows)
View your site at 200% zoom
Check with colour blindness simulation tools

Professional audit: For thorough assessment, engage an accessibility specialist who can test manually and provide detailed recommendations.

Prioritise Fixes

Not all issues are equally important. Prioritise:

Critical: Issues that completely block access

Missing form labels
No keyboard access to key functions
Video without any captions

High: Issues that significantly impede use

Low contrast text
Missing alt text on important images
No skip links for repetitive navigation

Medium: Issues that create difficulty

Missing heading structure
Ambiguous link text
Minor contrast issues

Low: Issues that are suboptimal

Decorative images without empty alt
Minor heading structure problems

Build Accessibility Into Process

Accessibility is easier to build in than to retrofit:

Include accessibility requirements in project briefs
Choose accessible frameworks and components
Test during development, not just at launch
Train team members on accessibility basics
Include accessibility in QA checklists

Quick Wins

Some accessibility improvements are straightforward:

Add alt text to all meaningful images
Ensure sufficient colour contrast (4.5:1 for text)
Add visible focus states to interactive elements
Use proper heading hierarchy (H1, H2, H3 in order)
Label all form fields explicitly
Make links descriptive (avoid “click here”)
Add skip navigation link for keyboard users
Ensure video has captions

Accessibility and Business Websites

For typical South East Queensland business websites:

Minimum requirements:

All images have appropriate alt text
Colour contrast meets standards
Forms are labelled and usable
Site navigable by keyboard
Videos have captions if present

Best practice:

WCAG 2.1 Level AA compliance
Regular auditing and maintenance
Accessibility statement on website
Process for users to report issues

The Investment

Accessibility does require investment—in design, development, content creation, and testing. But:

Accessible design is not more expensive if considered from the start
Retrofitting is more expensive than building accessible initially
The cost is offset by expanded market and reduced risk
Accessibility improvements often improve conversion for all users

For new websites, accessibility should be a requirement, not an afterthought. For existing websites, create a remediation plan that addresses critical issues first.

Moving Forward

Accessibility is not about checking boxes for compliance. It is about ensuring everyone can access your business, use your services, and become your customer.

The websites that serve everyone best tend to perform best overall. Accessibility is good design, and good design is good business.

Need an accessible website? Platform21 builds WCAG-compliant websites and can audit existing sites for accessibility issues. Get in touch or explore our UX design services to discuss your accessibility requirements.

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