Website Accessibility (ADA) Basics Every Business Owner Should Know

I want to talk about something that most small business owners have never thought about, but probably should. Website accessibility. Specifically, the fact that the Americans with Disabilities Act applies to your website, and people are getting sued over it.

This isn't a scare tactic. It's a real legal trend that's been growing for years. But the good news is that the basics are not complicated, and building an accessible website actually makes it better for everyone.

The ADA Applies to Websites. Yes, Yours.

The Americans with Disabilities Act was written in 1990, long before most businesses had websites. But courts have consistently ruled that commercial websites count as "places of public accommodation." If your business serves the public, your website needs to be usable by people with disabilities.

In 2024 alone, over 4,000 ADA lawsuits were filed against websites. These aren't just targeting big corporations. Small businesses, local shops, restaurants, service companies. If your site is inaccessible and someone can't use it, you could be on the receiving end of a demand letter. The average settlement runs $5,000 to $25,000, and that's before legal fees.

I'm not a lawyer, and this isn't legal advice. But these are real numbers from real cases.

What "Accessible" Actually Means

When we say a website is accessible, we mean that people with various disabilities can actually use it. That includes people who are blind and use screen readers, people with low vision who need high contrast, people who can't use a mouse and navigate entirely with a keyboard, and people who are deaf and need captions on video content.

About 15% of the world's population has some form of disability. In the U.S., that's roughly 61 million adults. These are real people trying to use your website to find your business, read your services, and contact you. If they can't, you're turning away customers.

The Standard: WCAG 2.1 AA

The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) are the industry standard. Version 2.1, Level AA is what courts and regulators reference when evaluating website accessibility. It covers four principles. Your website content must be perceivable, operable, understandable, and robust.

That sounds abstract, so let me break down what it looks like in practice.

The Basics (In Plain English)

Here are the most common accessibility requirements and what they actually mean for your site:

• Alt text on images: every image needs a text description that screen readers can announce. If someone can't see the photo of your storefront, the alt text tells them what's there.
• Proper heading structure: headings need to follow a logical order (h1, then h2, then h3). Screen reader users navigate pages by jumping between headings, the same way sighted users scan for bold section titles.
• Keyboard navigation: every link, button, form field, and interactive element must be usable with just the keyboard. No mouse required. This matters for people with motor disabilities who can't use a mouse or trackpad.
• Color contrast: text needs to have enough contrast against its background to be readable. Light gray text on a white background might look "clean" to a designer, but it's unreadable for people with low vision. WCAG requires a contrast ratio of at least 4.5:1 for normal text.
• Form labels: every input field needs a proper label that screen readers can associate with the field. Placeholder text inside the field is not a label.
• Skip links: a hidden link at the top of the page that lets keyboard users jump straight to the main content without tabbing through every navigation link first.
• Video captions: if you have videos on your site, they need captions. Not auto-generated captions that say nonsense, but accurate ones.

None of this is exotic or expensive. It's just building websites correctly.

The Most Common Failures

I've looked at hundreds of small business websites, and the same accessibility problems come up over and over:

• Low contrast text: gray text on slightly less gray backgrounds. It looks subtle and modern to the designer, but fails contrast requirements and is genuinely hard to read.
• Missing alt text: images with no alt attribute at all, or alt text that says "image1.jpg" instead of describing what's in the photo.
• No form labels: contact forms where the only indication of what to type is the placeholder text inside the field. When a screen reader hits that field, it announces nothing useful.
• Broken heading hierarchy: jumping from h1 to h4 because the developer picked heading levels based on how big they wanted the text, not on document structure.
• No keyboard focus indicators: when you tab through a page with your keyboard, you should be able to see which element is currently selected. Many sites remove these focus outlines because they "look ugly." That makes the site unusable for keyboard users.

Every single one of these is a basic fix. And every single one gets flagged in an accessibility audit.

How I Handle This

I build accessibility into every site from day one. It's not an add-on. It's not an upsell. It's just how I build.

When I finished the Lemko Coating website, I ran a Lighthouse accessibility audit. Score: 100 out of 100. The Orlov Digital site you're reading right now? Also 100. That means proper heading structure, sufficient color contrast, labeled form fields, keyboard navigation, skip links, ARIA attributes where needed. All of it.

I don't charge extra for this because it shouldn't be extra. It's like a contractor asking if you want the building to have a ramp to the front door. That's not a premium feature. It's a requirement, and it's the right thing to do.

How to Check Your Own Site

You can run a free accessibility audit right now using Google Chrome. Here's how:

1. Open your website in Chrome
2. Right-click anywhere and select "Inspect"
3. Click the "Lighthouse" tab at the top of the panel that opens
4. Check "Accessibility" and click "Analyze page load"
5. Wait about 30 seconds for the report

You'll get a score out of 100 and a list of specific issues with explanations. It won't catch everything (automated tools can only test about 30% of WCAG criteria), but it catches the major problems. If your score is below 80, your site has real issues that need attention.

It's Not Just About Lawsuits

I started this article talking about lawsuits because that gets people's attention. But honestly, avoiding a lawsuit is the least interesting reason to care about accessibility.

The real reason is simpler. Roughly one in six people has a disability. When your website works for them, you're reaching more customers. When it doesn't, you're telling 15% of the population that you don't care if they can use your site or not. That's probably not the message you want to send.

There's a practical upside too. Accessible websites tend to be better for everyone. Clear headings, readable text, logical navigation, properly labeled forms. Those things help every visitor, not just people with disabilities. And search engines love them. Google can't "see" your images either, so alt text helps your SEO. Proper heading structure helps Google understand your content. Clean code runs faster.

Building for accessibility makes your site better, full stop.

What to Do Next

Run that Lighthouse audit. See where you stand. If the number is low (and for most small business sites, it will be), that's not a reason to panic. It's information you can act on.

If you want someone to look at your site and tell you honestly what needs fixing, send me a message. I'll run the audit, explain what the issues are in plain language, and tell you what it would take to fix them. No jargon, no pressure.