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altajackuniverse · 4 years

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1,000,000 Web Site Home Pages Analyzed for Web Accessibility

Web Site Accessibility Analysis has Mixed Results

A survey of 1,000,000 web site home pages conducted by Utah State University in February, 2019 collected a huge amount of accessibility data. The survey results give a close look at the state of web accessibility today. The results show that there are significant web accessibility issues with many of the most popular web sites. Though it's evident that there is a need for imptovements in web accessibility, the findings allow us to identify where our accessibility efforts should be focused. How can you ensure that your web pages are compliant with the Web Content accessibility Guidelines? 97.8% of Home Pages had Detectable WCAG 2 Failures! There is good news and bad news to be found in the research. The good news is that the errors found during the research are mostly automatically detectable errors that reliably align with WCAG conformance failures. The bad news is that automatically detectable errors only constitute a small portion of all possible WCAG failures. This means that the actual web site home page WCAG 2 A/AA conformance level is very low, probably below 1%. Although the web site home pages are prone to have many failures, there is some good news. The good news is that there are relatively few different types of common errors. By addressing these few common types of errors there would be a significant positive impact on overall web accessibility for most web sites. The most frequent WCAG compliance failures include low contrast text (85.3%), missing alternative text (68%), empty links (58.1%), missing form input labels (52.8%), missing document language (33.1%), and empty buttons (25%). This article will examine the top four common errors which account for the majority is the web accessibility non compliance issues. Low Contrast Text WCAG Compliance The most common web accessibility issue encountered below the WCAG 2 AA thresholds is low contrast text. The majority (85.3%) of home pages analyzed had detectable WCAG contrast failures. Contrast errors were only detected on elements that contain text. The average home page tested for the survey had 36 distinct instances of text with insufficient contrast. 4.6% of all home page HTML elements analyzed had insufficient contrast. This included all elements, not just visible elements with text. The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines recommend a contrast ratio of at least 4.5:1 between the relative luminance of text and its background color or at least 3:1 for large text. Enhanced accessibility requires contrast ratios greater than 7:1.Addressing accessibility concerns is not only a matter of increasing the contrast ratio, as a report to the Web Accessibility Initiative indicates. Dyslexic readers are better served by contrast ratios below the maximum. Notice that the colors named in the report use different color values than the web colors of the same name. Missing Alternative Text for Images WCAG Compliance The sample studied included 36,713,043 images, or 36.7 images per home page on average. 33.6% of all images or 12.3 per page on average had missing alternative text. This did not include images which used the alt="" fuction. 18.5% of all images or 6.7 per page on average were linked images with missing or empty alternative text. This resulted in both an alternative text issue and a link lacking any description. 16% of pages had images and no alt attributes at all. 16.8% of images that were assigned alternative text had questionable or repetitive alternative text. Assuming that this million page sample is indicative of accessibility of broader web pages, this data indicate that around half of images encountered by users with disabilities would definitively have inappropriate alternative text. Missing Form Input Labels for WCAG Compliance 59% of the 3.4 million form inputs identified were unlabeled either by , aria-label, or aria-labelledby elements. The presence of unlabeled form controls was a strong indicator of broader errors. Pages with at least one missing form label averaged nearly 30 more errors than those without any label errors. A webform, web form or HTML form on a web page allows a user to enter data that is sent to a server for processing. Forms can resemble paper or database forms because web users fill out the forms using checkboxes, radio buttons, or text fields. For example, forms can be used to enter shipping or credit card data to order a product, or can be used to retrieve search results from a search engine. Missing Document Language for WCAG Compliance Your

through headings are important document language necessary to organize your web pages and to promote web accessibility. During the study 18,910,980 headings were detected. These break down to 1.7 million

's (9.1%), 5.9 million

's (31.4%), 6.5 million 's (34.5%), 3.2 million 's (16.7%), 1.1 million 's (5.7%), and .5 million 's (2.6%). There were 908,784 instances of skipped heading levels, such as improperly jumping from

to . One in every 20 headings was improperly structured. Skipped headings were present on 362,659 home pages (36.3% of all pages). 148,573 home pages (14.9%) had no headings present at all. Visit Our Better Business Blog Visit our Business Sustainability Blog

A Few Takeaways From the Data Gathered

Let's Examine the Studies Findings From the Data Gathered The Web Site Home pages averaged 59.6 detectable errors each. 6% of all home page elements (1 in 13) have a detectable accessibility error. The WCAG failure rate for home pages was at least 97.8%. Low contrast text was the most common detectable issue with an average of 36 instances of low contrasts text on each home pages. One-third of all images (12.3 images per page on average) were missing alternative text. 59% of form inputs were not properly labeled. Home pages with ARIA present averaged 11.2 more detectable errors than pages without ARIA. The report outlines numerous common web technologies with details on how these technologies correspond to increased or decreased accessibility errors. Using the DIVI Theme for WordPress You might ask if it is possible to test your web pages for WCAG compliance? As shown in the image above, the DIVI Theme for WordPress provides built in testing of each web page to ensure compliance with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines. When DIVI finds a potential problem, it is highlighted and makes correcting your errors much quicker and easier than having to do so by examining lines of code. Headings: Highlights headings (

etc. ) and order violations. Contrast: Labels elements with insufficient contrast. Link text: Identifies links that may be confusing when read by a screen reader. Labels: Identifies inputs with missing labels. Image alt-text: Annotates images without alt text. Landmarks: Labels all ARIA landmarks. Read the full article

#accessibility #AccessibilityInternational #Accessible #ADA #AmericanswithDisabilitiesAct #disabilities #disability #UniversalDesign #UserExperienceDesign #WCAG #webaccessibility #WebAccessibilityInitiative #WebContentAccessibilityGuidelines

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altajackuniverse · 4 years

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Why Your Business Should Openly Embrace Sustainability!

Sustainability Programs Encourage Green Choices

Visitors to your business, whether online or to your physical location all arrive with their own set of values. When we shop, each of us applies our personal values as part of the equation that determines who gets our business. Two of the strongest values your audience probably shares are concerning Accessibility and Sustainability. Insightful business people understand the preconceptions that accompany every interaction they have with visitors and what they have to do to turn them into customers. Often a business will already have an established business sustainability program in place. Many companies do this to improve their company culture and encourage their employees to live and work green. The bottom line for all of us is that embracing sustainability is just the right thing to do. We all understand how important it is to protect our environment. The added bonus is attracting customers interested in patronizing businesses who promote Sustainability. Sustainability May Challenge Your Business Often small companies are operating with limited resources and they may find embracing sustainability to be challenging. The rewards, however, may be worth the effort. Surveys show that almost 75% of small business owners reported that during the recession from 2008 to 2011 they experienced an interesting phenomenon. Business owners reported that they saw an increase in the number of customers wanting to patronize “green businesses.” This was especially true according to owners of “microbusinesses” with five or fewer employees.

4 Principles of Business Sustainability Success

The companies surveyed cited several reasons associated with their sustainability practices for their business increases. They boiled it down to four key principles making the difference between success and failure with their sustainability programs. Your Sustainability Program Must be Simple A simple program is easy and improves the chances of success. The first most rolled out was a wellness program, which has just three requirements: Sign a non-smoker or smoking cessation affidavit (no cost). Complete an annual physical or health screening. Participate in one company-sponsored wellness activity. Your Sustainability Program Must Scale Down “Big” Ideas There are many ways to scale things to a small business. Recycling programs are most effective when volunteers take a box of cardboard or a bag of plastic and glass home each week to include in their home recycling at no cost to the company. Company event planners also can look at the menu for company events and find a caterer with healthy food alternatives. Preferably a caterer who sources their meals locally. It might be possible for a local food truck operator to set up in your office parking lot. Reducing travel by employees at lunchtime reduces carbon emissions. Take it a step further by coordinating the time with other offices in the area to maximize having food prepared on site. If reducing waste is a goal, companies can look at installing motion detector light switches in less used rooms or offices. If you have small children do this in rooms they use. You don't have to "make the rounds" turning out all the lights they leave on. A company of any size can reduce printed output just by eliminating the printing of presentation slides for meetings. Reduce your paper waste. Make email and text messages your first choice for office communications. Even small steps are accomplishments. Small steps add up when you actually accomplish something, rather than setting unreachable and lofty goals. Your Sustainability Program Must Engage and Reward Employees Employees who fulfill a wellness program requirements "buy down" their health insurance premium contribution by 10%, a direct financial incentive to them. This program has been so successful that 100% of eligible employees qualified for the premium buy-down. Employees not currently on the Briteskies plan participate in case they switch plans during open enrollment. We all appreciate recognition and a pat on the head. Once engaged, employees often contribute additional ideas to implement and manage their sustainability issues. As an example, one employee coordinates an office community-supported agriculture program, which he suggested during a company survey to identify wellness activity interests. Several employees have also approached the recycling coordinators with questions about recycling and composting at home. This confirms that office practices are becoming part of employees’ daily lives. The recycling program was also mentioned in a recent meeting with local city officials who approached us about ways to improve the climate for local business. Your Sustainability Program Must Be Consistent One objective of your program should be to embed your sustainability goals in as many daily activities as possible. Inconsistency gives a mixed message, reduces the chances of long-term participation and runs the risk of appearing as though the company is simply greenwashing. It’s better to implement just a few small programs to begin. Instead of attempting to launch a wide-ranging program that no one follows through on. Visit Our Web Accessibility Blog Visit Our Better Business Blog

Your Sustainability Program Must Overcome Competing Priorities

For a small business, competing priorities easily can get in the way without leadership embracing the sustainability message. Management Has to Commit to Sustainability We have learned that once the message and behaviors permeate the company culture acceptance is more likely. When they are reinforced with manageable initiatives on a daily basis, sustainability programs become, in fact, sustainable. Calculate Your Carbon Footprint If you would like to calculate your Carbon Footprint, follow the link to the free carbon footprint calculator of the United States Environmental Protection Agency. Read the full article

#businesssustainability #businesssustainabilityengagement #CalculateYourCarbonFootprint #carbonfootprint #eco #ecofriendly #environmentalimpact #green #sustainability #sustainabilityinternational #sustainabilitystrategy #sustainable

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altajackuniverse · 4 years

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Can Sustainable Development Actually Exist Today?

Is Sustainable Development Possible?

Sustainable development is meeting human development goals while also protecting our environment and natural systems ability to provide the resources we depend on. Ideally our natural resources continue to meet human needs without destabilizing our environment. Sustainable development is also defined as development that meets our present needs without compromising the environment for future generations. Sustainable Development's Roots The concept of sustainable development is rooted in the Brundtland Report of 1987. It is also derived from earlier ideas about sustainable forest management. As the concept of Sustainable development has developed the focus has shifted to other issues. These include such things as economic development, social development and future environmental protection. Many view sustainability as societies goal of maintaining a state of equilibrium between humans and nature. We are trying to balance economic development and our need to preserve our natural resources and ecosystems.

Three Pillars Of Sustainable Development

The three main pillars of sustainable development include economic growth, environmental protection, and social equality. Economic Growth Economic Growth is the pillar that most focus on when attempting to attain sustainable efforts and development. In building their economies, many countries focus on resource extraction, which leads to unsustainable efforts for environmental protection as well as economic growth sustainability. While we have been able to revise the link between economic growth and resource extraction, the worldwide consumption of resources is constantly growing as our population increases. Since much of our natural world has been converted into human use, the focus cannot remain on economic growth and ignore the growing problem of environmental sustainability. The United Nations Agenda 21 reinforces the importance of finding ways to generate economic growth without hurting the environment. Environmental Protection Environmental Protection is important to government and businesses, and has lead to improvements bringing more people willing to invest in green technologies. The United States and Europe continue to add power capacity from renewable sources such as wind and solar. Those efforts continue with many new wind energy projects beginning in 25 different states. Environmental protection has expanded globally as well, including investment in renewable energy power capacity. Eco-city development around the globe helps develop and implement water conservation, smart grids with renewable energy sources, LED street lights and energy efficient buildings. The consumption gap remains, consisting of the fact that "roughly 80 percent of the natural resources used each year are consumed by about 20 percent of the world's population". This level is striking and still needs to be addressed now and throughout the future. Social Equality and Equity The Social Equality and Equity pillars of sustainable development focus on the social well-being of people. The growing gap between incomes of rich and poor is evident throughout the world. As the incomes of the richer households increasing at a faster pace compared to the incomes of middle and lower class households. Inequality is attributed partly to land distribution patterns in rural areas where the majority make their living from the land. Global inequality has been declining, but the world is still extremely unequal. 1% of the richest of the world’s population own 40% of the world’s wealth and the poorest 50% owning around 1%. Visit Our Web Accessibility Blog Visit Our Better Business Blog

Many Criticize Sustainable Development

Sustainable development has been subject to criticism, including the question of what is actually sustained in sustainable development. Many development opponents argue that the use of a non-renewable finite resources will eventually lead to the exhaustion of earth's finite stock. Some Argue That Sustainable Development is Impossible Some also argue that the meaning has been stretched from 'conservation management' to 'economic development', and this promotes a business as usual strategy for world development. Sustainable development is an ambiguous and insubstantial concept attached as a public relations slogan. Calculate Your Carbon Footprint If you would like to calculate your Carbon Footprint, follow the link to the free carbon footprint calculator of the United States Environmental Protection Agency. Read the full article

#CalculateYourCarbonFootprint #eco #green #greenpractices #greenprinciples #sustainability #sustainabilityinternational #sustainabilitystrategy #sustainable

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altajackuniverse · 4 years

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Achieving Web Accessibility by Constructing a POUR Website

Why Should You Create Accessible Web Content?

Many reasons that might motivate people to create accessible web content. The three main reasons are to improve disabled peoples lives, create a wider audience for your content, and finally to avoid lawsuits or bad publicity. The first resaon is a humanity-centered motivation, the second is an economics-centered motivation, while the third is a self-preservation motivation that we all prefer to avoid conflict. Each by themselves is a good reason to create web accessible content. It doesn't really matter what your motivation is. Web accessibility is most easily achieved when people are at the center of the process. Even if you are just trying to avoid lawsuits, sooner or later you will understand that the needs of people with disabilities must be carefully considered and addressed. You need to understand your user's perspective and how you can help them have an accessible experience. You need to move beyond just technical accessibility considerations. This can be acheived if you focus on the principles of accessibility. You Need to Understand Your User's Perspective The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines are designed to make life easier for people with disabilities. Those with disabilities want to have equal access to all of the resources offered on the web. Ideally, the web is the perfect medium to make the world more accessible to people with disabilities. The web should not be a barrier to people with disabilities, it should be the solution to many of their challenges. However for the web to reach its full potential for people with disabilities, web developers must commit to always designing with accessibility in mind. This is why web accessibility has become so important. Web developers must keep their user's perspective in mind when developing web sites. An accessible Internet is not a solution to every obstacle faced by people with disabilities, but it is at least a step in the right direction. You Must Move Beyond Technical Accessibility The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) are the most widely-accepted set of recommendations for web accessibility. The process used to develop the guidelines is purposefully slow and methodical to consider a wide variety of viewpoints and issues. The accessibility guidelines provide an excellent foundation upon which to build accessible web content. Developers need to understand the reasons behind the guidelines to help them apply the guidelines correctly and effectively. For example, one of the best-known guidelines is to provide alternative text for images using the alt attribute of the tag. If web developers learn only the guideline, but don't understand the reason for the guideline, they may provide alternative text that is not helpful to users who need it. They may even create rather than solve accessibility barriers. When developers focus on technical specifications, they may achieve technical accessibility, but may not achieve usable accessibility. To make a comparison, a large office building may be technically accessible to a person who is blind. A blind person may be able to walk through all the hallways, use the elevators, open the doors, etc.. But without an explanation or perhaps a tactile map, the building will be difficult to navigate, especially at first. The person may find locations through a process of trial and error, but this is a very slow and cumbersome process. The building is accessible, but would not be easily usable. In a similar way, web developers can create web sites that are possible for people with disabilities to access, but only with great difficulty. The technical standards are important, but they may be insufficient on their own. Developers need to learn when and how to go beyond the technical standards when necessary. You Must Focus on the Principles of Accessibility Version 1.0 of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines focused heavily on the techniques for accomplishing accessibility, especially as related to HTML. WCAG 2.0 takes a different approach. It focuses more heavily on the principles of accessibility, and presents some techniques in separate documents. By focusing more on principles rather than techniques, version 2.0 of the guidelines is more flexible, and encourages developers to think through the process conceptually. The four guiding principles of accessibility in WCAG 2.0 are that web content must be perceivable, operable, understandable, and robust for it to be truly accessible. Conveniently, these principles spell out an acronym that is relatively easy to remember, POUR. The idea is to create a POUR web site, so to speak. The pun may be a bad one, but if it helps developers memorize the principles, then it has served its purpose. Each of these principles is discussed more in depth in the following sections. If a developer makes the POUR principles his priority, the web content produced will be accessible. It also helps if you put people at the center of the process.

Your Web Site Must be Perceivable

Input into the brain via at least one of the senses of the body is required with every form of communication. The Internet is a communication format which provides access to knowledge and processes through electronic means. The most relevant senses in this context are sight, hearing, and touch. Any discussion of web accessibility is based upon the assumption that people need to be able to perceive web content. You need to be able to input the information into your brain so that it can process it. If the information cannot get into the brain, it is not accessible. As obvious as that statement may be, it is a principle which is frequently ignored by web developers. Too many sites contain web content that cannot even be perceived by some of the people who try to access it. Your Web Site Must Address Visual Disabilities People with full use of their vision are able to read text, view images, understand the visual cues afforded by web page layouts, understand the symbolic meaning of colors in certain cultural contexts (as with red and green street lights, or blue and pink baby clothing), and in general can use their eyes to make sense of information that is presented to them. This mode of perception—from the eye to the brain—is powerful, and Web developers should take full advantage of its communicative strengths. Visual perception is especially important to individuals who lack one of the other main communicative senses, such as people who are deaf. For such individuals, their remaining senses take on heightened importance. However, there are people who cannot take full advantage of this mode of communication. Some people have no vision at all. Others have a limited amount of vision. For these individuals, other modes of communication are necessary. In some cases this means that information must be converted into a format which they can more easily perceive, such as an audio format. Assistive technologies can perform this conversion, but only if the content is designed with accessibility in mind. Your Web Content Must Address Sensory Disabilities For most people, touch is not their main form of communication. For them, touch may have relevance for indirect expressions of solidarity, as in romantic relationships, among friends, and other situations that communicate emotions but which do not directly communicate information per se. For individuals who have neither sight nor hearing, touch is the most important form of communication of all. Communication is possible through sign language, in which two people use their hands to feel each other's gestures, signed language, and body movements. The fingers can be used to perceive textual information printed in Braille formats. Refreshable Braille devices can even convert text into Braille output for use on the web. Your Web Site Must Address Auditory Disabilities Oral conversations between people occurr daily. The Internet enables people to engage in voice chats, to leave voice messages, to watch videos, to hear music, and to listen to web radio broadcasts. Individuals can also participate in other kinds of audio interactions with people or with prepared electronic content. Technologies and methods exist for making audio information available to people Unable to hear it. These technologies and methods cannot help anybody though unless someone actually uses them to make the information accessible to people who cannot hear it. Your Web Content Must Have Transformability Since not everyone has the same abilities or equal use of the same senses, a key to accessibility is ensuring that information is transformable from one form into another. Your content should be able to be perceived in multiple ways. Text can be transformed into audio and into Braille by assistive technologies. Audio can be transformed into text, which should be done before it reaches the user. Technologies to automatically convert audio to text are usually unreliable and not commonly available. Graphics, animations, and videos are similar to audio in the sense that developers must provide the text alternative to users. Text is the most easily and universally transformable format. This does not mean that web accessibility means an end to all non-text elements. On the contrary, the non-text elements in many cases are crucial to accessibility, as explained in Text-only Versions. The take-home message is that the information must be perceivable somehow. That is the first step to accessibility upon which all others are based, and without which accessibility cannot happen. Your Web Content Must Come Before Style and Presentation The main content should be separable from the way it is styled or presented. Even though styling can enhance the user experience, and in some cases even improve comprehension, the main message should not depend on the mode of presentation. Semantic structure and meaning should be independent of the "look and feel." This is important because not all users will be able to perceive the presentational look and feel aspects of web content. When the presentation is disabled, the web content should still be able to communicate its message effectively. See Creating Semantic Structure for more information. In addition, background colors, graphics, and sounds should not interfere with the content. If the main content is presented in an audio format, background sounds should not obscure the message. Content presented in a visual format should likewise be distinguishable from extraneous stylistic visual elements. Text should be distinguishable from its background.

Your Web Content Must be Operable

Not everyone uses a standard keyboard and mouse to access the web. Some people use adaptive devices or alternative devices that accommodate their disabilities. Some people simply prefer to use the alternative technologies. While this may not seem like an important point at first, consider the fact that some web content can be operated only with a mouse. Mouse-dependent web content will be inaccessible to a person cannot use a standard mouse—due to tremors, insufficient fine motor control, or even a lack of hands altogether. A person in this situation is likely to use an adaptive technology of some sort, such as a mouth stick, to manipulate the keyboard. In some cases, the person may be able to use a trackball mouse, but others need to rely on the functionality of the keyboard. Check out my article on motor disabilities. People who do not have use of their vision usually rely on the functionality of the keyboard as well. They may be able to manipulate a mouse just fine, but it doesn't do them much good because they can't see where to click on the screen. The keyboard is much easier for a person who is blind to manipulate. See my visual disabilities article. Keyboard accessibility is one of the most important principles of Web accessibility because it cuts across disability types and technologies. Most of the alternative and adaptive devices used by people with disabilities emulate keyboard functionality. Content that is accessible to the keyboard is operable by the devices that emulate keyboard functionality, no matter how different those devices are from standard keyboards. Your Web Content Must be Interactive Users should be able to find, navigate through, and interact with web content. Site search features, site indexes, and site maps allow users to locate content within a Web site. Your users should also be able to bypass extraneous or irrelevant pieces of content in order to focus on the content of interest to them. They should be able discern the structure of the content by its headings, subsections, bulleted lists, and other elements of semantic markup. Which simply means that your site content should be navigable or operable by multiple methods. Your Web Content Must be User Controllable If possible, your users should have an unlimited amount of time to complete tasks on the web. Motor disabilities can slow a person's muscle movements. Cognitive disabilities can slow a person's mental processes. Even visual or auditory disabilities can slow a person's response time if the information is not ideally accessible. Security concerns can become an issue, and time limits must be set on Web content. A common example is online banking. Allowing the user an unlimited amount of time to complete tasks would put that user's bank account information at risk, especially if the computer is in a shared or public environment. In all cases, users should be allowed sufficient time to complete the tasks they are supposed to complete. This can be done by allowing everyone an unlimited amount of time, allowing special accommodations for those who need them, or some other solution between those two extremes. Your users should also be able to manipulate and control media players, animations, and any other kind of time-dependent content. Media players should include ways of pausing, rewinding, and fast-forwarding content. Users should be able to stop animations, especially if they flicker or strobe, because this puts some users at risk for experiencing seizures. Your Web Content Must be Recoverable From Errors No one likes to accidentally and permanently delete a file, pay for the wrong product, send an email to the wrong person, or make any mistake that can't be corrected. Users with disabilities are no exception. Unfortunately people with disabilities may be more likely than people without disabilities to make a mistake. People with tremors may hit the wrong key or click on the wrong link. People with cognitive disabilities may misunderstand the purpose of a link and click the wrong one. People make spelling mistakes when typing search terms, their address, or any other kind of content. We all appreciate being able to recover from mistakes. We all deserve a second chance. Web developers should program second chances into their Web functionality. Confirmation screens, error alerts, and warnings should all be an integral part of the design of interactive web content. It is often helpful to provide users with instructions. Especially if the interaction is complicated or if the site is information rich and some things may be difficult to find. Often a few words of instruction can eliminate or at least decrease the number of errors committed by users.

Your Web Content Must be Understandable

Let's say that web content is perceivable and operable by all kinds of users of all abilities, but nobody can understand your content. Is your web content accessible? Of course not. Understandability can be just as big a barrier to accessibility as any of the more technical issues. Talking about understandability moves the discussion into the broader realm of usability. Usability became a hot topic in the late nineties and early 21st century. It still is a hot topic, but has moved from being a fad to being a mainstream topic of conversation among web developers. Web accessibility never achieved "fad" status, but awareness of the topic has also increased over time. Unfortunately, too many people still separate usability and accessibility into two separate disciplines. Trying to separate principles into mutually exclusive categories of "usability" versus "accessibility" is pointless. There is too much of an overlap between the two. After all, could an unusable site ever be considered an accessible site? Not if accessibility means anything. Your Web Content Must be in a Common Language Most web content contains information communicated through language. The language should be as easy to understand as possible. The wording as well as the words should be simple and concise. How simple and concise? That depends on a number of factors, many of which depend upon the characteristics of the intended audience. Factors such as the audience's educational background, their familiarity with the subject matter, their background knowledge and life experiences, their culture, and so on. Authors do not always know the exact characteristics of their audience, so it is usually best to err on the side of caution by using simple language and explaining background information that readers may not know. Other factors are related to the content itself, such as the level of detail required to understand it, reason for talking about about the subject matter, and so on. Follow this link for further information about Writing Clearly and Simply. Your Web Content Must Provide Alternative or Supplemental Representations Providing alternative or supplemental representations of information can often increase understandability. Text can be supplemented with illustrations, videos, animations, audio, and content in other alternative formats. In fact, for some people with more severe cognitive disabilities or people with reading disabilities, these alternative formats may be necessary for comprehension. Providing summaries or abstracts of lengthy content can also make it more understandable. Your Web Content Must be Functional The functionality of web content must also be understandable. Your users must be able to understand all navigation and other forms of interaction. On static web sites, the interaction may be limited to hypertext links. Every point of interaction deserves attention in order to give users the best experience possible. If users don't understand any of the points of interaction, they may not be able to complete the necessary tasks on that web site.Your navigation should be consistent and predictable throughout the context of the web site. Interactive elements such as form controls should also be predictable and should be clearly labeled. Users should be able to access instructions or receive guidance. If math calculations are involved, such as when subtotaling items in a shopping cart, the math should either be calculated automatically, or else users should be provided with guidance and/or tools on how to perform the calculations.

Your Web Content Must be Robust

Despite the differences between users and the technologies they use, they all expect the web to work. When they go to a site that uses methods not supported by their technologies, they get frustrated and may never return. In the past it was common to see sites optimized for certain browsers or versions of browsers. Fortunately, most developers now try to develop their content so that it will work in many versions of many browsers. Your Web Content Must be Functional Across Technologies Not everyone uses the same technologies now, nor will they in the future. People use different operating systems, different browsers, and different versions of browsers. Some people have advanced features enabled. Others have these features turned off. Some people are early adopters of new technologies. Others are slow to adapt to the rapidly-changing currents in the flow of technological advances. Users should be allowed to choose their own technologies to access web content. This allows the users to customize their technologies to meet their needs, including accessibility needs. Web content that requires a certain technology, such as a certain browser or screen reader, may exclude some types of users who either don't want to use that technology or can't use it because of their disability. As a general rule, the more control the user has, the more likely the user will be able to access the content effectively. Of course, there are limits to this logic. Many technologies and web accessibility techniques are not supported in older browsers and screen readers. Modern web developers should not be forced to develop to the "lowest common denominator". Developers can and should feel free to take advantage of technological advances, including in areas related to accessibility. When considering implementation of innovative technologies and techniques, they must strike a balance between pushing innovation boundaries and considering the technologies their end users will be using. Developers can set a baseline of requirements. For example, they could decide to fully support browsers that are four years old or newer. Users of older browsers could still access the content, but perhaps it wouldn't be styled properly due to lack of support for newer features. As long as the baseline is not too restrictive, limiting full support to a subset of technologies is a reasonable approach. And, again, to the extent possible, it is still best to let the user decide which technologies to use. Visit Our Better Business Blog Visit our Business Sustainability Blog Your Web Content Must Use Technologies According to Specification Modern browsers are much better than older browsers at supporting content and accessibility properly. However, browsers cannot correct or compensate for all of the errors and inconsistencies that developers introduce in web content. The best way to ensure that content displays properly and accessibly is to create web content that validates against the technical standards for the technologies commonly used. Valid HTML is much more likely to work correctly across browsers and platforms than sloppy HTML. It is also more likely to work consistently in the different types of assistive technologies that people with disabilities use. Invalid HTML may still work for some users on some technologies, but it is a gamble that puts accessibility at risk for all users.Rather than focus on the limitations of old technologies, it is often better to focus on the possibilities offered by current and future technologies. Screen reader users surveys indicate that most screen reader users tend to use fairly up-to-date browsers and screen readers, though there will always be some who lag behind. In order to create content that is "future proof"— compatible with future technologies — it is necessary to use current technologies according to specification. Doing this ensures that future browsers and content viewers will know how to interpret the content.In some cases it may take more time and effort to develop web content according to the specifications of the technologies being used. However, it will produce more reliable results and will increase the chances that the content will be accessible to people with disabilities. Read the full article

#accessibility #AccessibilityInternational #Accessible #cognitivedisability #hearingdisability #motordisability #visualdisability #WCAG #webaccessibility #WebAccessibilityInitiative #WebContentAccessibilityGuidelines

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altajackuniverse · 4 years

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How You Can Make Your Images Accessible on the Web

Many people do understand the need to provide visitors to their website with alternative text to ensure that they enjoy the same experience as those without disabilities. However this is not the sole purpose for providing alternative text. Additional accessibility principles must also be addressed when dealing with the various types of images which may be used on websites. Images Enhance Our Comprehension Some wrongly assume that images are bad for accessibility. When an image is present, the webpage replaces the image with a text-only version of that image for text readers. Logically we would then assume that text-only sites are ideal for accessibility. The hole in this logic, is that it is assuming that there is only one type of disability, visual disabilities. Most other users benefit greatly from the presence of images while screen reader users are presented with alternative text to give them a full experience. Illustrations Require Alternative Text Many ideas can only effectively be presented with the addition of illustrations, maps, and charts. It's hard to imagine how difficult it would be to learn human anatomy from a book with no illustrations. Would that be an effective method to learn human anatomy? Below is an example of an annotated illustration of the human hand that might appear in an anatomy textbook . You will probably find it hard to imagine that a text description alone could be as understandable as text supplemented by illustrations. In this case, a picture is worth 10,000 words, at least. Illustrations, maps, charts, etc. can enhance comprehension, especially for those with learning disabilities or reading disorders. Color and Contrast Just like text, color must not be used as the sole means of conveying meaning or content. What does it mean to convey meaning with color alone within images? Let's take a look at this map of the London Underground: A person who can see colors will have no trouble distinguishing between the red line, the dark blue line, the light blue line, and so on. A person who cannot see color well, due to color-blindness or low vision, will probably not be able to distinguish the different routes as easily. Remember, some users may override your page colors to a high contrast color combination they require. Someone who is blind will not be able to see them at all. What happens if you take the colors away from this image?When color is removed, the map becomes almost unusable. Test your web pages to ensure that none of the meaning is lost when you remove the colors, even within images. You can do this by printing out the page on a black and white printer, making sure that your printing preferences are set to print background colors. There are also tools, such as Vischeck, which will remove all page color or that will simulate color-blindness.In addition to color reliance, images that convey text must present that text with sufficient contrast. Text contrast within images is particularly important if the image is of low quality or when the image is enlarged.WCAG 2.0 sets minimal contrast thresholds for text and images of text. Testing of contrast values within images can be more difficult (there is typically not a defined RGB color value to easily access), but common sense can usually tell you if an image has insufficient contrast. Make Your Icons Accessible Web applications often use icons to supplement or replace the text. Complex content and functions, such as clicking the home icon in a browser to go to your home page, can easily be conveyed through a very small icon. Icons should be simple, and they need to be easily understood. Icons almost always require familiarity in order to be useful. You have to be careful because across cultures and languages, icons may misinterpreted quite easily. If you use icons, ensure that the icons are well designed, easy-to-understand, and used consistently. In many cases, text may be necessary instead in addition to unclear or potentially ambiguous icons. Make Your Animations Accessible Animations are rarely used to enhance the accessibility of web content. Most of the time they are simply annoying and distracting. Banner ads often animate to distract us from the main purpose of a web page. Well designed animations can, however, can enhance content by presenting media content or by focusing attention on important content. An animated graphic may present a sequence of images that convey content that cannot adequately be presented to one static image. Highlighting or other animations can focus the user on important information, such as error messages or required inputs. Animation should almost always be user controlled or very short in duration. Images that continually animate can cause the rest of the page to be more difficult to navigate and comprehend. For users with very high levels of distractibility, animations may make a page totally inaccessible to some users. WCAG 2.0 Success Criterion 2.2.2 (Level A) requires that automatically moving, blinking, or scrolling content that lasts longer than 5 seconds can be paused, stopped, or hidden by the user. Avoid Image Pixelation if Possible Some users with low vision use programs that enlarge the elements on their screen so that they can more easily see them. When images are enlarged, they can become pixelated and more difficult to read. So does this mean you shouldn't use text in your graphics? Not necessarily, though true text should be used when practicable. WCAG 2.0 Success Criterion 1.4.5 (Level AA) requires that if the same visual presentation can be made using text alone, an image should not used to present that text. There are many benefits to using true text instead of images. However, the primary reason is that true text can enlarged without pixelization or degradation of the image quality. It should be noted that logos are exempt from the WCAG requirement. Fortunately, modern browsers do a much better job of enlarging graphical content than in the past. With the increased use of CSS, it is easier to style true text to achieve the desired visual presentation. Consider the readability of text within an image, and if possible, use text instead. Avoid Graphics That Cause Seizures Bright, strobing images or media can cause photo-epileptic seizures in some users. These seizures can be dangerous, even life-threatening to some. Practice proper universal design techniques. You don't want to be responsible for any of your users to having seizures induced by your content. In order to potentially cause a seizure by users with photo-sensitive epilepsy, a flashing image or multimedia must: Flash more than 3 times per second (note that Section 508 specifies 2 times per second). Be sufficiently large. A very small flashing image, such as a cursor, will not cause a seizure. There must be significant contrast between the flashes The color red is also more likely to cause a seizure. While large, flashing images are not commonplace on the web, seizure-inducing media is often present. Web video, especially HD-quality video that includes strobing special effects is becoming more common. You should avoid using this type of media. WCAG 2.0 Success Criterion 2.3.1 (Level A) provides thresholds for frequency, size, contrast, and color of strobing images. Visit Our Better Business Blog Visit our Business Sustainability Blog What Does Web Accessibility Mean to the Disabled? Most of us are familiar with how Accessibility applies to physical business places. Little thought has been given to how Accessibility applies to the Internet. Accessibility on the World Wide Web demands that we break down barriers and open a clear path for everyone. This means that your web pages must de designed so that those with Visual, Hearing, Motor and Cognitive disabilities have an equal opportunity to navigate and access every web page. Web Accessibility for all is more than just a catchphrase, it's the right thing to do. Read the full article

#accessibility #AccessibilityInternational #Accessible #compliance #disabilities #disability #WCAG #webaccessibility #WebAccessibilityInitiative #WebContentAccessibilityGuidelines

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altajackuniverse · 4 years

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Entrepreneurs Embracing Sustainability Become Ecopreneurs

Is Sustainability A Good Choice For Your Business?

Beginning in the 1980's eco-awareness grew from the growth in pollution during the 1960's. Today growing consumer demand has brought sustainability into the main stream in business practices. Sustainable strategies have grown in popularity with consumers, and recognizing their benefits companies have embraced the concept of sustainability. Responding to consumer demand, many companies are riding the popularity of sustainability and reaping the benefit's by publicizing their "Green Practices" to their targeted customers. Sustainability's Competitive Advantage Sustainability concepts and practices must produce visible results to be embraced by both business and consumers. Many companies have found that a competitive advantage can be accomplished through a balance between economic progress, social responsibility and environmental protection. Using this formula more companies have been willing to implement sustainability concepts.

Sustainability Gains Acceptance

Sustainability Grows in Popularity With the growing popularity of sustainability, it is not surprising that the trend is also growing in popularity among entrepreneurs. Sustainability entrepreneurs are a new breed of entrepreneur that work to combine the social, economic, and environmental aspects of sustainability. These business owners are leading the trend, starting their companies from the ground up in a way that produces an immediate advantage in their respective industries. Entrepreneurs Embrace Sustainability Sustainability entrepreneurs have an alternative approach to doing business that also assists them in building their advantage. In common practice, the primary strategy of businesses is to do whatever it takes to earn a profit. While profit is key to the success of any business, it is not the primary concern of the sustainability entrepreneur. Instead, these business owners focus on environmental health and social concerns. These owners are more likely than the traditional entrepreneurs to focus on reducing their companies’ carbon footprint and keeping their employees happy.

Sustainability Entrepreneurs Balance Business and the Environment

Entrepreneurs Become Ecopreneurs Sustainability entrepreneurs, by definition, show a concern for society, the economy, and the environment. However, another group of entrepreneurs is known for their ability to combine an environmental focus with their for-profit business. These entrepreneurs have been called Ecopreneurs, by definition they are entrepreneurs who combine their business activities with an environmental awareness in order to shift the basis of economic development towards a more environmentally friendly basis. These Ecopreneurs are at the forefront of leading the way towards “going green.” Sustainability may not work for every business Sustainability is a good choice for companies, the environment, and society. These strategies have numerous benefits for everyone. However, sustainability strategies may not be feasible for a number of companies. Small and medium sized companies face a number of challenges at start-up and throughout the life of the company. These challenges include barriers to entry, high operating costs, and small customer base. All of the challenges affect a company’s ability to spend money. With tight budgets, it can be difficult to convince managers to pursue an often costly move towards an environmental focus or social concern strategy. Sustainability Must be Affordable Research of small and medium sized businesses in the U.S wine industry, concluded that this particular group and size of businesses did show favorable acceptance of environmental practices. Some aspects of the data they gathered they found could be applicable to other industries. The wine industry study found that any environmental plan needs to be appropriate for the size of business. Also any successful environmental plan needs to be modest and affordable. Grand-scale plans for solving environmental concerns are appealing, they lack financial feasibility for most small and medium sized companies.

Voluntary Sustainability Not Legislated

Sustainability Must be Voluntary An important part of most research findings is that they suggest that environmental plans must be voluntarily adopted and implemented by an industry’s trade association. This discovery is key to understanding how businesses identify trends that they may want to associate with, such as implementing favorable environmental practices. Sustainability Must be Scalable Small companies often feel pressured to implement favorable environmental practices. While they might agree that the practices are good for the environment, they may not be financially good for their company. It should be noted that environmental plans that are composed for large companies cannot be simply scaled down for a small business. Instead of scaling down a plan to fit a small business, a new plan needs to be specifically developed for small companies. It must be realistic in it's approach to be implemented by small companies with their unique company structures. Sustainability Implementation Factors What are the other critical factors that play a part in small businesses being able to implement environmental plans. We can identify several factors that affect small business managers and their choice to implement environmental plans. The first factor to be examined is why there is a gap between the attitude small business managers have about environmental practices and the actions they take towards implementing environmental plans. The second factor is how the gap between small business attitude and small business action can be narrowed or if it can be narrowed. Companies need to look to several identifiable driving forces to environmental practices. A majority of small business only implement minor improvements to their environmental practices. The third factor we must examine is whether or not small businesses can be convinced to pursue environmentally friendly practices. While it is important that methods exist that can be used to help small companies use environmentally favorable practices, these methods are useless if these companies cannot be convinced to use the methods. Implementing Sustainability Perspectives In additional to the factors about implementing sustainability there are also three perspective approaches which must be considered. The first perspective is the ethical perspective. This perspective believes that small company managers can be influenced by their ethical and moral beliefs to pursue favorable environmental practices. The second perspective is the economic perspective. This perspective is at center of the debate about small companies using environmental practices. This perspective assumes that the decision to use environmental practices is affected by the economic conditions faced by the company. If the costs of implementing the environmental strategy can be justified, then the company will move forward. The last perspective is the management perspective. This viewpoint examines changing management’s thought process. Management must change their values and align them with environmental values.

Sustainability is a Choice

Is Sustainability the Best Choice for Your Business Many studies show that small businesses can choose an environmentally friendly way of doing business. While changes require effort, several approaches that have been identified that can make the change possible. With changes possible and advantages quantifiable, there is still debate about whether or not sustainability strategies produce long-term economic benefits. The most common belief is that changes made for a company to “go green” are more costly than the company’s current cost structure. Following this reasoning, it makes sense that a company must see a strong economic benefit before implementing environmentally friendly processes. However some believe that a company can form a long-term relationship with consumers by adopting a “green advantage” perspective. Consumers are beginning to realize more and more that environmental practices cannot be overlooked. That "green practices" are essential to the health of our planet. With this in mind, companies can feel safe moving towards green practices because consumers will come to expect green practices from the companies they choose to patronize. Visit Our Web Accessibility Blog Visit Our Better Business Blog

Businesses Move to Sustainability

The study of green practices will definitely be the topic of interest and research going forward. As companies discover the competitive advantage they seek through green practices, more will embrace sustainability and enjoy the financial reward offered by green practices and sustainability. Embrace Sustainability, Protect the Environment The thinking of business managers is shifting from traditional profit-obsessed business strategies to a more holistic sustainability strategy. In order to make this transition, it is likely that changes will be more to business education and the training of future business leaders. This “rethinking” concept will need to start in training in order to make a solid transition. Calculate Your Carbon Footprint If you would like to calculate your Carbon Footprint, follow the link to the free carbon footprint calculator of the United States Environmental Protection Agency. Read the full article

#CalculateYourCarbonFootprint #eco #ecofriendly #ecotourism #green #greenbuilding #greentourism #greentravel #sustainability #sustainabilityinternational #sustainable

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altajackuniverse · 4 years

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How to Create Captions and Make Your Web Content Accessible

What Are Captions and Why Do They Matter?

What are Captions? Captions are text versions of the spoken word presented within multimedia to provide web accessibility. Captions allow the content of web audio and video to be accessible to those who do not have access to audio. Captioning is primarily intended for those who cannot hear the audio. However, it also helps those that can hear audio content, those who may not be fluent in the language in which the audio is presented, those for whom the language spoken is not their primary language, etc. Common web accessibility guidelines require that captions be: Synchronized- the text content should appear at approximately the same time that audio would be available Equivalent- content provided in captions should be equivalent to that of the spoken word Accessible- caption content should be readily accessible and available to those who need it Why Are Captions Crucial to Web Accessibility? Whenever multimedia content is present on the web, synchronized and equivalent captions are required to meet accessibility guidelines. Both visual and auditory web content must be captioned. Audio and video played through multimedia players and HTML5 video would both require captioning. It can also apply to Flash or Java technologies when audio content is part of a multimedia presentation.

The Real-time Captioning Dilemma

Web multimedia is increasingly used to deliver real-time, live content over the Internet. This ranges from video conferencing, to VoIP (Voice-over-Internet Protocol), to live video streaming. Accessibility standards require that equivalent alternatives be provided for all audio and visual content to ensure the content is accessible to everyone. For real-time web multimedia, this means that visual content must be provided in an audible form and that audible content must be provided in a visual form. The equivalents must also be synchronized with the presentation, meaning that they must be delivered to the end user at the same time as the main content. This means that captions for audio must display at the same time that the audio would be heard. Accessibility Requires an Audio Description for Visual Content Web Accessibility requires an alternative to visual content in standard web media often takes the form of audio descriptions. Where visual content that is not also provided in the audio stream of the multimedia is described by a narrator or other person. Audio descriptions are very difficult to incorporate into real-time web broadcasts. As an alternative, you can simply ensure that any visual content is natively described in the audio. For instance, if there is a person speaking on the video, they could audibly describe any additional visual content that is displayed in the movie. This removes the need for a separate form of audio description. This is the only feasible way to make live web broadcasts that include visual information accessible to individuals who are blind or have low vision. If produced with this in mind, and if those involved in the video broadcast are aware of and provide these descriptions, then the multimedia will be accessible to these audiences. Synchronized Web Text Captions The alternative to audible content in standard web media is usually synchronized captions. Captions provide a textual equivalent of all audible information. The difficulties in generating real-time captions are: Audio information must be converted into text in real time. The text captions must be delivered to the end user so they are synchronized with the audio.

Generating Real-Time Text Captions

Converting audio information into text in real time is difficult. There are few typists capable of typing fast enough to transcribe the spoken word. Thus, there are two primary technologies used to do this. Stenography/Real-time transcription Stenography involves having a trained transcriptionist that uses a special steno machine to transcribe the spoken word to a text format in real-time. The steno machine has fewer keys than a typical keyboard. Rather than typing each letter, a stenographer hits key sequences on the steno machine to represent phonetic parts of words or phrases, or special codes representing words. Software then analyzes the phonetic information and forms words. Such technology allows a trained transcriptionist to generate text versions of audible conversation in real time. Stenography allows the audible information to be converted to text in real time. While accuracy levels are high, it is common to have words incorrectly typed or interpreted by the steno software. Also, real-time transcription can be expensive, usually costing around $70-$120 USD per hour. Voice Recognition Generated Captions While voice recognition offers great possibilities for real-time generation of captions, the technology is not yet at a level where it can be used to do so. In certain settings, such as when one person is speaking and is using voice recognition software that is well-trained, then voice recognition may be a viable option. Even in such settings, however, there are weaknesses, such as a lack of punctuation, poor accuracy, and inability for other speakers to be captioned. While voice recognition technology is improving and promises future multi-user, highly accurate, speaker independent voice recognition, at this time, its feasibility in generating text for use in captions is isolated to few situations.

Real-time Caption Delivery

As soon as the text equivalent of the audio has been generated, that text must be delivered to the end user so it is synchronized with the audio stream. Unfortunately, few real-time multimedia technologies have native support for captioning. Thus, the real-time captions must usually be delivered through a different technology running parallel to the multimedia software or hardware. This is often done through dedicated applications or through clients that are built into a web page and run in a web browser. For video conferencing and voice chats, where the audio is delivered in real time, the captions must be generated, converted into a format for broadcast across the Internet, and then delivered to the end user - all in real time. For streaming video, there is often a delay between when the media is captured and when it displays to the end user, often due to encoding and buffering. In these cases, the delivery mechanism for the real-time captions must provide functionality for ensuring that the captions display at roughly the same time that the audio would be heard, even if the delay between caption generation and delivery is a long time. Web Accessibility Requires Captioned Multimedia Open captions are similar to, and include the same text, as closed captions. However, the captions are a permanent part of the video picture, and cannot typically be turned off. Open captions are not decoded by the television set, but are a part of the video information. This typically requires a video editing or encoding program that allows you to overlay titles onto the video. The captions are visible to anybody viewing the video clip and cannot be turned off. This gives you total control over the way the captions appear, but can be very time consuming and expensive to produce. This technique allows for more control over caption location, size, color, font, and timing. For web video, captions can be open, closed, or both. Closed captions are most common, utilizing functionality within video players and browsers to display closed captions on top of or immediately below the video area. The most common forms of web multimedia - Flash and HTML5 Video - both support captioning. Older technologies, such a Windows Media Player, QuickTime, and RealPlayer also support captioning. The formats and techniques for authoring and implementing captions may vary based on the technology used. Visit Our Better Business Blog Visit our Business Sustainability Blog

Wrapping Up Web Captioning

While captioning real-time web multimedia is not always easy, it is possible and should always be done when real-time multimedia is being delivered. Fortunately, the technologies are improving to a level that allows real-time captioning to be both easy and financially viable in most situations. The technologies used to provide real-time captions over the web are not limited to providing those captions as an alternative to web-based multimedia only. Such caption delivery systems can also be used to provide captions for non-web-based technologies such as radio, television, video conferencing, etc. This will ensure accessibility to all forms of live, real-time multimedia. For Web Accessibility Captions Matter Real-time web accessibility multimedia captioning is not always easy. It should always be done when real-time multimedia is being delivered. Technologies are improving to soon allow real-time captioning to be both easier and more financially viable in most situations.Today's technologies are not limited to providing captions as an alternative for web-based multimedia only. These caption delivery systems can also provide captions for non-web-based technologies. This will ensure accessibility to all forms of live, real-time multimedia Read the full article

#accessibility #AccessibilityInternational #Accessible #ADAviolations #AmericanswithDisabilitiesAct #hearingdisability #UniversalDesign #UserExperienceDesign #WCAG #webaccessibility #WebAccessibilityInitiative #WebContentAccessibilityGuidelines

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altajackuniverse · 4 years

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Embracing Business Sustainability Has Challenges and Rewards

What is a Sustainable Business?

A Sustainable business or green business, is a business that has minimal negative impact on the global or local environment, community, society, or economy. A sustainable business embraces the concept of the triple bottom line approach to accounting. Many perceive the triple bottom line to create greater business value and to increase opportunities to serve those customers who lean toward environmentally sound solutions to everyday situations. Business Sustainability Criteria Many sustainable businesses embrace environmental policies. A sustainable business is considered to be green if it matches the following four criteria: A sustainable business incorporates sustainability into all facets of it's business. A sustainable business supplies environmentally friendly products or services that replace non-green products or services. A sustainable business is greener than it's non-green competition. A sustainable business commits environmental practices in it's business operations. Business Sustainability in other words, is a business that meets the needs of the present, without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. Is Sustainability Social Responsibility? Sustainability is often confused with corporate social responsibility, however the two are not the same. While ethics, morality, and other social norms permeate CSR, sustainability only obliges businesses to make trade offs to safeguard the environmental equity of future generations. Looking short term is the bane of sustainability. Green business is seen as a mediator of economic versus environmental relationships in business. Many feel that if embraced by all, sustainability would diversify our economy, even if it has little actual effect at lowering atmospheric Carbon levels. What are Green Jobs? "Green Jobs" definition is ambiguous at best, however most agree that green jobs should be linked to clean energy. Because of this connection green jobs should contribute to the reduction of greenhouse gases. Corporations can be seen as generators of not only "green energy", but as producers of new realities which result from the technologies developed and deployed by these firms.

Sustainability is Environmental

Sustainable businesses main goal is to eliminate or decrease the environmental harm caused by the production and consumption of their goods. The impact of such human activities is the greenhouse gases produced. These gases can be measured in units of carbon dioxide and is often referred to as the carbon footprint. Carbon footprint is usually defined as the total emissions caused by an individual, event, organization, or product, expressed as it's carbon dioxide equivalent. What are Green Initiatives? Businesses take a wide range of green initiatives. One of the most common examples is the act of "going paperless" or sending electronic correspondence instead of paper when possible. Examples of sustainable business practices include repurposing used products, a great example is tuning up used commercial fitness equipment for resale. Another would be revising production processes to eliminate waste, and choosing nontoxic raw materials and processes. For example, Canadian farmers found that hemp is a sustainable alternative to rapeseed in their traditional crop rotation. Hemp grown for fiber or seed requires little or no pesticides or herbicides. Sustainable business leaders also consider the "life cycle costs" for the items they produce. Input costs must be considered in regards to regulations, energy use, storage, and disposal. Designing for the Environment is also an important element of sustainable business practices. This process enables users to consider a products potential environmental impacts and the process used to make that product. The many green practices possibilities have led to considerable pressure being put upon companies from consumers, employees, government regulators and other stakeholders. If given a choice, most customers will choose the "green product" if it is economically feasible. What is Greenwashing? Some companies have resorted to "greenwashing" instead of making actual and meaningful changes. They simply market their products in ways that suggest green practices. Greenwashing is a form of spin in which green PR or green marketing is used to promote the perception that an organization's products, aims or policies are environmentally friendly. Evidence that a business is greenwashing often comes when more money or time has been spent advertising being "green", than is actually spent on environmentally sound practices. Greenwashing efforts can simply involve changing the name or label of a product evoking the environmental credibility of a product when it actually contains harmful chemicals. Or greenwashing can be a multimillion dollar marketing campaign portraying a highly polluting company as eco-friendly.

Sustainability is Social

Companies that contribute to their communities, whether through employee volunteers or through charitable donations are considered to be socially sustainable. Due to their community involvement, they are given social credibility toward being recognized as a sustainable business. Businesses are often also recognized for encouraging education by employee training, and internships to mentor other community members. These practices serve to increase education levels and quality of life in their community. However to be truly sustainable, a business must foster a reverence for our natural resources and our environment. The sustainable business reaches beyond social resources to enhance it's reputation within the community it serves. Sustainability Characteristics Innovation & Technology This inward examination of corporate sustainability practices focuses on a company's ability to change its products and services making them produce less waste and emphasize sustainable best practices during all company activities. Collaboration This examines the formation of networks and partnerships with similar or partner companies to facilitate knowledge sharing and help propel innovation to new levels of achievement. Process Improvement Ongoing surveys help create improvement in the business processes which are essential to reduction in waste. Enhanced employee awareness of your company sustainability plan further integrates the new and improved business processes. Sustainability Reporting Tracking progress made to embrace sustainability is necessary to report on company performance in achieving their goals. Corporate sustainability goals are often incorporated into the corporate mission statement to further enhance the company sustainability strategy. Greening the Supply Chain To emphasize corporate adherence to their sustainability goal, procurement is a vital component of that strategy. Sustainable procurement is a huge part of a company's environmental impact, being much larger than the impact of the products they may consume. Third party certifications, such as those given by the B Corporation (certification) model is a good example of one that encourages companies to focus on their sustainability issues and processes. Companies could also implement an internal sustainability measurement and management system which included a forum for all stakeholders to discuss their sustainability issues. Corporate Sustainability Strategies Corporate sustainability strategies take advantage of sustainable revenue opportunities, protecting the value of the business against factors such as increasing energy costs. A sound sustainability strategy also helps to mitigate the costs of meeting regulatory requirements, any changes in the way customers perceive brands and products, and the volatile price of resources. Sustainability characteristics might not all be incorporated into a company's Eco-strategy portfolio immediately. However their inclusion in your corporate sustainability strategy is very important to your corporate reputation. The widely practiced sustainability characteristics include: Innovation, Collaboration, Process Improvement, Sustainability reporting, and Greening your supply chain. Triple top-line value production Triple top-line values production establishes three requirements of sustainable business activities for companies. These activities require financial benefits for the company, natural world betterment, and social advantages for employees and members of the local community. Each of these three components is recognized as equal in status. While many businesses already embrace the triple bottom line approach to business sustainability, "triple top line" stresses the importance of initial process design and is a term attributable to McDonough and Braungart in their book Cradle to Cradle. Nature-based knowledge and technology This mimicry based principle involves the emulation of the natural world, adopting principles found in nature to help us grow our food, harness and use energy, and in building things and conducting business. The principles are also important for healing ourselves, and to help us process information and design our communities to exist in harmony with nature. Products of service or products of consumption Products of service are durable goods routinely leased by customer's, that are made of technical materials and are returned to the manufacturer and re-processed into a new generation of products when they are worn out, obsolete, or simply no longer needed. Products of consumption are shorter lived items made only of biodegradable materials. They can be broken down by organisms after the products lose their usefulness. These products are also not hazardous to humans or our environmental health. This principal requires that we manufacture only these two types of products and mandates the gradual reduction of products of service and their replacement with products of consumption as technological advancements allow us to do so. Sustainable energy This principle advocates for sustainable energy produced using solar, wind, geothermal and ocean energy that will be able to meet our future energy needs without negative polluting effects for life on earth. Local-based organizations and economies This principle envisions durable, beautiful and healthy communities, locally owned and operated businesses and locally managed non-profit organizations, partnering with regional corporations and shareholders. All of these diverse groups working together in a web of partnerships and collaborations. Continuous improvement process This principle envisions operational processes inside successful organizations which include provisions for constant advancements and upgrades as the company transacts its day-to-day business. The continuous process of monitoring, analyzing, redesigning and implementing is used to ensure the success of Triple Top Line value production as conditions change and new opportunities emerge. 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Challenges and Opportunities

Implementing sustainable business practices may have an effect on profits and a firm's financial 'bottom line'. Initially, this financial challenge might make many corporate executives cringe. However, during a time when environmental awareness is popular, green strategies are likely to be embraced by employees, consumers, and other stakeholders. Environmental Performance Affects Economic Performance In fact, according to many studies, a positive correlation exists between environmental performance and economic performance. If an organization’s current business model is inherently unsustainable, becoming a truly sustainable business requires a complete makeover of the business model. This presents a major challenge because of the differences between the old and the new model. It also requires reviewing how the respective skills, resources and infrastructure needed may change with a new business model. . A new business model can also offer major opportunities by entering or even creating new markets and reaching new customer groups. Companies leading the way in sustainable business practices are taking advantage of sustainable revenue opportunities as they move into the future. Recent surveys suggest that the demand for green products appears to be increasing, with 27% of respondents stating they are more likely to buy a sustainable product and/or service than 5 years ago. Furthermore, sustainable business practices may attract talent to your business and generate tax breaks for your business. Calculate Your Carbon Footprint If you would like to calculate your Carbon Footprint, follow the link to the free carbon footprint calculator of the United States Environmental Protection Agency. Read the full article

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altajackuniverse · 4 years

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Ensure That Sustainability is Part of Your Business Plan

Inject Sustainability into Your Business Plan

Sustainability Can’t be an Add-on Sustainability can't be an add-on or simply tacked onto your companies business plan. It needs to be infused into the core of your companies culture and central your the companies business plan.Sustainability will be handled differently for different companies. Whether your company is a startup or an established company reevaluating your business plans matters. You need to identify what the source of the problem is that you are trying to address. An established company needs to look back as far as possible to establish what should be changed as your company moves into the future. Doing this leads to a better understanding of who your stakeholders are, what compliance issues you face, and better prepare you for reporting requirements.The four key components to adding sustainability to your business plan are listed below. Your Business Problem Statement First is a problem statement. Startups or companies reevaluating their business plans should identify what the source of the problem they are trying to address is, going back as far as possible. This leads to a better understanding of who your stakeholders are, what compliance issues you need to worry about and better prepare for reporting requirements. Practice Business Environmental Stewardship Also to be added are environmental stewardship, social responsibility and reporting and metrics. Environmental stewardship is all about reducing the environmental impact through all business aspects and minimizing the use of non-renewable natural resources.Social responsibility covers internal programs and conditions for employee safety and rights, external initiatives and partnerships that better communities and supplier relationships, and business ethics to promote honesty, fair trade and integrity. Your Business Sustainability Requirements Looking at all of those issues at the same time can be overwhelming to some. In teaching sustainability at Regis University, Fell developed seven exercises to follow in order to tackle what needs to be done.Define your problem statement.Map our your stakeholders.Conduct a product life cycle assessment.Create a facilities management checklist.Develop a program to illustrate positive and safe employee treatment.Develop a program for community outreach and relationships with suppliers and vendors.Make an ethics policy. Sustainability is Your Key Business Factor Sue Kunz, CEO of BioVantage Resources, a company that creates systems that grow algae for wastewater treatment and research, explained how her company, which is the fourth startup she's been involved with, makes sustainability a key factor.For their products, they look at if components are recyclable, what their appropriate life spans should be, if they are scalable, if they work off the grid and what their water and carbon footprints are. In manufacturing and distribution, they focus on globally-available parts, local manufacturing and suppliers that are also focused on sustainability. Visit Our Web Accessibility Blog Visit Our Business Sustainability Blog

Sustainability Must be Your Business Core

Sustainability must be a common thread in your business plan inspiring all employees to also focus on it, and everyone in the company asks sustainability-related questions about products and operations. Your Employees Must Be Sustainability Focused Every company employee must embrace sustainability and be focused on developing the processes to promote sustainability in all company business practices. Read the full article

#BetterBusinessAlliance #blog #blogpost #brand #customerengagement #digitalmarketing #Digitalmarketingstrategy #eco #environment #environmental #green #reputation #SEO #socialmedia #socialmediamarketing #sustainability #sustainable #userexperience

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altajackuniverse · 4 years

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Unique Selling Proposition's Develop Personal Relationships

5 Unique Selling Propositions

Learning is often best done by example. Below I’ve highlighted a small selection of brands that use their unique selling proposition to stand out and succeed in some tough marketplaces. Read on to learn how ThinkGeek, Saddleback Leather, and other great brands set themselves apart from their competition. Each of these examples applies their unique selling proposition in a different way that differentiates them and sets them apart from their competitors. ThinkGeek Hobby stores for geeks are another example of an industry with a lingering reputation for personality defects. They are often characterized as weird and filled with snooty employees who look down on beginners. ThinkGeek, in comparison, is all about community, with unique features like customer action shots and an emphasis on novel products that build on already existing communities. As a guy who still owns a Super Nintendo, their retro gaming section is much appreciated. Take a lesson from ThinkGeek’s playbook and closely examine the needs and wants of your ideal customer. Ask yourself, “What often stops people from buying?” When you have your answer, you will find your unique selling proposition. Saddleback Leather Saddleback Leather’s company tagline is, “They’ll fight over it when you’re dead.” Combine this with an “Our Story” webpage that includes a picture of a machine gun, and no one can accuse Saddleback of being a company lacking personality. One of my favorite pages on the site is the “Our Rivals” page, where the owner invites customers to compare products with his biggest competitors: I’m so confident that you’ll find our classic look and over-engineered durability so hard to resist that I want you to shop around. Go ahead … the more you shop, the better we look.” The positioning here isn’t done for fluff. The company sells expensive leather goods. To justify these premium prices it makes sense to boldly call out your competitors. The owner wants you to see the difference in quality to showcase why that bag you covet costs $500. Saddleback isn’t all about testosterone-driven declarations. The owner also displays a very personal side with a webpage dedicated to his dog Blue. This serves as a great example of putting your personality into your business in a way that won’t lead to any Mike Jeffries comparisons. Ellusionist Can a company really make a playing card deck interesting? Ellusionist can. Their whole business is built on selling things that are different, a must given that what they sell are 52-card decks! How do they make these interesting and profitable? By appealing to a highly specific customer: magicians. One of the cardinal sins of selling physical products online is offering something that consumers can find at any ol’ store. Ellusionist countered this by offering flashy, unique decks of cards that you really can’t find anywhere else. And since they cater to those interested in showmanship via card tricks, and the occasional extravagant poker player, they’ve cornered a niche market. They own their market segment, instead of just being another producer of cheap decks of playing cards. Everlane Apparel As previously mentioned, the way you build your product and the values you stand for can be important parts of your unique selling proposition. Everlane apparel stands out from the crowd in this respect. The company culture wholeheartedly promotes what they call radical transparency. They pride themselves on a diligent, upstanding process for the manufacture of their goods, with the motto, “Know your factories. Know your costs. Always ask why.” Since Everlane sells what they call “luxury basics,” product differentiation isn’t achieved through flashiness. They excel through a sincere interest in how the company makes their goods, conducts business, and gives special attention to their craft… down to the last v-neck. Man Crates In a stellar example of machismo made fun again, Man Crates is an online store that ships “stuff guys like” in wooden crates that have to be opened with a crowbar. While their items themselves make great gifts for guys, such as customized beer mugs, grilling equipment and beef jerky. It’s the unique positioning that really sells this brand. Man Crates oozes personality at every turn, and as a customer myself I had a hearty laugh at the company’s help page, which boldly declares "try harder if you can't open your crate." Few companies could get away with a help section that tells you to try harder. However when it’s guys buying gifts for other guys, not following directions and not asking for help is simply part of their message. It's as if it was your rite of passage, just opening their package. The bravado here is welcomed and doesn’t cross over into areas where it doesn’t belong. When I contacted Man Crate’s customer service about an misdirected delivery, their customer service representative was quick, helpful and friendly. This shows that exceptional service takes priority over their brand’s image. Visit Our Web Accessibility BlogVisit Our Business Sustainability Blog

It’s Still about Selling

Just as relationship marketing is as much about the marketing as is it about the relationships. The same applies for creating a unique selling proposition. A unique selling proposition is a form of differentiation that needs to be built around actually selling more products and services. A unique selling proposition is not just to make your business into a quirky brand that stands out but can’t get traction. In the book Reality in Advertising, advertising executive Rosser Reeves lays down three rules that unique selling propositions should follow if they wish to be more than just creative branding: Each advertisement must make a proposition to the consumer not just words, product puffery, or show-window advertising. Each advertisement must say to each reader: “Buy this product, for this specific benefit.” The proposition must be one the competition cannot or does not offer. It must be unique, either in the brand or in a claim the rest of that particular advertising area does not make. The proposition must be strong enough to move the masses, by attracting new customers. Ensure that you stand out for the right reasons. Ensure that your brand’s positioning is intended to sell, not just to stand out. It's Your Turn My curiosity has gotten the best of me, I want to hear what your business does differently! Share your story in the comments below. Or, tell us about a business you love that stands out among the competition. Read the full article

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altajackuniverse · 4 years

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Web Accessibility is the Second Web Revolution!

Web Accessibility, the Second Web Revolution!

What Does Web Accessibility Mean to the Disabled? Most of us are familiar with how Accessibility applies to physical business places. Little thought has been given to how Accessibility applies to the Internet. Accessibility on the World Wide Web demands that we break down barriers and open a clear path for everyone. This means that web pages must de designed so that those with Visual, Hearing, Motor and Cognitive disabilities have an equal opportunity to navigate and access every web page. The Web Accessibility Revolution We’ve had one big revolution in web design, which was about the adoption of mobile technology. The Web Accessibility Revolution is the second revolution in web design. You may not have realized it, but we’re already in it and many are unaware of what it means. The difference between the two has to do with the forces creating the pressure for the changes, how encompassing those forces are, and the cost of ignoring those forces Mobile Technology Launched the 1st Web Revolution The world changed with the introduction of new mobile technology which made connecting to the internet using your mobile device possible. Today 50% of web search queries come from mobile devices and hardly any websites are not mobile friendly. However, even today many sites are still not Accessible for disabled individuals. The need for web designers to adapt to mobile technology came quickly through consumer demand, however, it did not happen immediately.

Consumer Demand Drove the 1st Web Revolution

New Technology Drove the First Web Revolution The demand from consumers adopting new technology to access the web, and from businesses wanting to reach those users drove the mobile revolution. The cost varied by the category and company for reaching the new mobile users. Consumers gradually embraced mobile technology and began transacting using their phones and this delayed this cost further. Demand quickly grew and was strong enough to force the change needed to support the technology.

Adopting Mobile Technology was optional, Web Accessibility isn't.

The Web is a Place of Public Accommodation People with disabilities have a civil right to access websites, however, we have to look beyond that for now. The Department Of Justice and other government authorities worldwide are decided that websites are “places of public accommodation”. As places of public accommodation websites fall within the protection of the Americans with Disabilities Act and other government Accessibility regulations. Accessibility Regulations Launch the 2nd Web Revolution Remember how physical barrier ADA cases were prominent during the 90’s. Attorneys flooded public accommodations with ‘testers” searching offices, restaurants, hotels and any other place of public accommodation to determine if they violated the appropriate ADA standards. Almost every business received this scrutiny searching for possible ADA violations. The forces of change are different from the Web Accessibility Revolution. These changes are being mandated by new regulations and are being implemented much more quickly. The new European Union GDPR regulations have tighter restrictions than ever before.

Accessibility Regulations Drive the 2nd Web Revolution

Lawyers Sue, Nobody Wins The new Web Accessibility model is the same for lawyers, but this time they are investigating the digital Web Accessibility/ADA standard. It costs them almost nothing and can be done in minutes. A quick automated scan of any website can generate a report with dozens or more ADA/Web Accessibility violations. They just paste the digital report into a demand letter template, or even a Federal complaint and out it goes landing in a business mailbox. Within days an often clueless website owner gets a rude awakening.

Lawyers Profit From Web Accessibility Uncertainty

Most Will Settle A few will fight back, however most business website owners will settle their case to avoid a court room battle.. You can’t win these Web Accessibility cases so the plaintiff firms are simply printing money. It’s a simple model, with no barrier to entry and extremely easy to mass produce. There's Money For Lawyers In Web Accessibility Litigation Bar Associations lobbied hard against the Department of Justice plans to provide clear Web Accessibility rules and regulations and succeeded. The DOJ has delayed since 2010 and has now removed any pretext of acting on the implementation of Web Accessibility regulations. We need written Web Accessibility rules and Congress could fix this. There is little to be gained politically by angering the powerful legal community anxious to make the easy money through threats of litigation over Accessibility against website owners. Its all left to the lawyers and judges and a new cottage industry is going to quickly grow from the lack of Web Accessibility laws and regulations. Web Accessibility Claims Enrich Attorneys While the Mobile Revolution was market driven and grew from the adoption of new mobile technology, the Web Accessibility Revolution is being driven by threats of legal action. Lawyers are aggressive and there is a lot of money up for grabs. Lawyers can easily file a Web Accessibility claim under the Americans with Disabilities Act, they don't even have to have an injured client to file a claim. Visit Our Better Business Blog Visit our Business Sustainability Blog

Embrace Universal Design for Web Accessibility

Universal Design Embraces Web Accessibility While some website owners will embrace Web Accessibility and Universal Design for their next website because it’s the law, it's also an opportunity to reach more customers. Most website owners will be forced to adapt their sites to be Web Accessible quickly and at a high cost.For these reasons, the Accessibility Revolution will dwarf the Mobile Revolution. Web Accessibility through Universal Design will make websites better, providing a better User Experience Design and better Search Engine Optimization. The real payoff will be for all the people who will be able to enjoy equal access to the Internet. We will all benefit from their ability to access information easily with fewer barriers. Read the full article

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altajackuniverse · 4 years

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Does Your Business Embrace the Worst Sustainable Practices

Your Worst Sustainable Business Practices

Following are several ways that businesses fail when they are attempting to conduct their business in a sustainable manner. After reading my list, can you think of any other ways that a business fails to embrace Sustainability? Single-impact-driven decisions Under pressure, some companies make decisions on just one aspect of sustainability. Animal welfare is an example. An important issue, for sure, but all factors should be considered beyond the welfare of animals, such as environmental, human health and economic considerations. Be sure you understand the tradeoffs for the longer term. Lack of robust, transparent, measurable and time-bound commitments Generalities don’t work any more. There are still many claims made by business about their sustainability with unproven, vague, unsubstantiated statements. Failure to assign a monetary value to sustainability As AT Kearney has reported (PDF) regarding supply-chain management: If companies cannot quantify the value of a sustainable supply chain, they aren’t able to justify investments. Producers and suppliers are not incentivized for sustainable production. The development of the business case is key. Your company needs to know and believe in why you're developing a sustainability strategy and also believe in its positive business outcomes. You can’t have both leadership and 100 percent risk avoidance. Smart risk is necessary.

Don't be Paralyzed to Inaction

Getting paralyzed by risk aversion Senior management often talks about leadership, then moments later talks about avoiding risk. Add in the lawyers and naysayers, and you have status quo. You can’t have both leadership and 100 percent risk avoidance. Smart risk is necessary. Letting others define your brand It’s hard to believe that companies stand by playing defense when their brand is maligned. They hope to be caught doing good. Or they decide to "tell their story more," as if pushing more information out will connect with people. "Tellling" is the opposite of what is needed. Sharing is key. It’s two-way, listening, being open. Seeing NGOs as the enemy Dismissing your critics is a missed opportunity to learn and get better, or at least get to know the other side better at a human level. Finding and collaborating with the science and solutions-based NGOs is even a better route to go.

Be Flexible in Your Actions

Picking winners and losers Don’t worry about the failures and shortcomings and write them off. After all, it’s a journey. Mistakes lead to overcoming hurdles and motivates people to try. Most stakeholders want sincere effort and recognized the effort even when you fall short. Focus on the outcomes, not the path to get there. A one-size-fits-all approach Focus on the outcomes, not the path to get there. For example, the use of innovative technologies should not be automatically accepted or rejected. Instead, the measure of success should be does it deliver a better, safer, healthier result. Plus, there is no cookie-cutter approach to achieving better sustainable progress. Take cattle, for example. Raising cattle is dramatically different in Colorado versus Argentina versus Australia. So, concocting specific global process requirement can be counterproductive. Listening without a commitment to truly understand the perspective of others Listening skills, especially for passionate sustainability advocates, can fall short. We are so into the solution as we see it, we don’t listen enough to our partners in supply chain or operations. We end up at odds with them versus serving their needs. Visit Our Web Accessibility Blog Visit Our Better Business Blog

Attack Problems Head On

Don't be Satisfied to Play Defense Some see sustainability as complicated, full of trade-offs and hard to understand and grasp by consumers and other stakeholders. So, they lay low. Stay out of trouble. Maybe get caught doing good. For those that don’t develop a positive and proactive sustainability strategy, good luck in tomorrow’s world and future bottom-line results. It is an expectation of today’s customers, consumers and your own team members. Answers are a matter of taking an honest approach to the question. It's obvious that solutions need to be reached with an open mind. Don't allow personal perceptions cloud your judgement or rush you into making a decision. The problems facing business owners today are complex and without an open and honest discussion of the possible solutions can the correct answer be chosen. Calculate Your Carbon Footprint If you would like to calculate your Carbon Footprint, follow the link to the free carbon footprint calculator of the United States Environmental Protection Agency. Read the full article

#CalculateYourCarbonFootprint #eco #ecobuilding #ecofriendly #ecotourism #ecotravel #green #greenbuilding #greentourism #greentravel #sustainability #sustainabilityinternational #sustainable

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altajackuniverse · 4 years

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Not Just the Law Web Accessibility is Good for Business

What Defines Web Accessibility?

Web accessibility is ensuring there are no barriers that prevent interaction with, or access to, websites on the Internet by anyone with disabilities. Correctly designed websites, using Universal Design principles, that are properly coded and edited, should provide all users equal access to information and functionality. Web Accessibility is About Inclusion Inclusion demands the use of Universal Design to ensure web accessibility issues are properly addressed and requires the elimination of barriers to ease accessibility for all. What Does Web Accessibility Address? When sites are built using Universal Design Principles, all users will be accommodated without lessening the website usability for non-disabled users. Web Accessibility’s goal is to address the following categories of needs: Visual: Blindness and other visual impairments, low vision variations, poor eyesight and color blindness; Motor/mobility: the inability or difficulty to use the hands, including tremors, muscle slowness, loss of fine muscle control, etc., due to conditions such as Parkinson’s disease, stroke, cerebral palsy, muscular dystrophy; Auditory: Hearing impairments or deafness, including those individuals who are hard of hearing; Seizures: Photo epileptic seizures which can be caused by flashing visual effects or visual strobe lights; Cognitive and intellectual: Learning difficulties such as dyslexia, etc. developmental disabilities and cognitive disabilities which affect memory, attention, problem solving, logic skills, and developmental disabilities. Visit Our Web Accessibility Blog Visit Our Business Sustainability Blog

The Legal Side of Web Accessibility

Plenty of legal issues are involved when it comes to web accessibility. The bottom line for web sites is that being accessible is the smart choice for any business. Unaddressed Web Accessibility Legal Issues We won't be addressing Web Accessibility legal issues or requirements here, just doing what's right. And what's a good business practice. For information about Web Accessibility legal issues check out some of my other blog posts at Accessibility International. Read the full article

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altajackuniverse · 4 years

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Not Just the Law Web Accessibility is Good for Business

What Defines Web Accessibility?

The Legal Side of Web Accessibility

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altajackuniverse · 4 years

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Memorable Remarkable and Relatable Word of Mouth Marketing

Word of Mouth Marketing Defined

According to the Business Dictionary, Word of Mouth Marketing is: "An oral or written recommendation made by a satisfied customer to the prospective customers of a good or service. Considered to be the most effective form of promotion, it is also called word of mouth advertising which is incorrect because, by definition, advertising is a paid and non-personal communication. " The Better Business Alliance Defines Word of Mouth Here at the Better Business Alliance, we define Word of Mouth Marketing a little differently: "Turning your customers into your most effective sales and marketing asset by doing something they don’t expect, thus giving them a story to tell." As a practical matter, that’s not quite nuanced enough either. Because even when you succeed in getting your customers to talk about your business, there are still two different types of word of mouth. They are reactive word of mouth, and proactive word of mouth.

Word of Mouth Creates a Conversation

To achieve either type of Word of Mouth, you need to first understand that competency doesn’t create conversation. When you do exactly what your customers expect and anticipate you will do, they do not mention that to anyone because there is no STORY there. You need to do something remarkable, unexpected, and memorable to kick off the Word of Mouth conversation that you are hoping to create. Word of Mouth is About the Extraordinary I have never said to anyone, “Hey, let me tell you about this perfectly adequate experience I had recently.” That would be a terrible story. Not interesting to tell, and not interesting to hear. Word of mouth requires story crafting. Word of Mouth is not something that can be brainstormed in a meeting. WOM will rise out of the customer experience which you create in your business. Word of Mouth is part of your customer experience, it's something your business does which will make your customers excited and they will tell their friends about it.

What's Your Story Catalyst?

Once you have a story catalyst, we call them Speech Triggers, you will prompt one or both of the two types of word of mouth. To demonstrate the difference between reactive word of mouth and proactive word of mouth, let’s use one of our favorite examples, the chocolate chip cookie at DoubleTree Hotels. Every day, for nearly 30 years, DoubleTree has given each guest a warm, chocolate chip cookie at check-in. Those cookies are GREAT. And people tell stories about those cookies constantly. Research found that 34% of DoubleTree’s guest have told a story about the cookie. That means that given that they give out 75,000 cookies each day, the story is told approximately 22,500 times every 24 hours. That’s a LOT of word of mouth. And that’s why you don’t see much advertising from DoubleTree. The cookie is the ad, and the guests are the media. Reactive Word of Mouth Definition Reactive Word of Mouth is when your customer mentions your product or service when prompted, in the midst of an offline conversation, an online exchange, or similar situation. For example, if I was with some friends at dinner and someone asked, “We’re going on a trip to Houston, any idea where we should stay?” I might chime in with “Yes! The DoubleTree at the Galleria is terrific, and the chocolate chip cookies at the front desk are the best.” I am reacting to the situation and am making a recommendation in that context. “Referrals” is what reactive word of mouth is called in some instances. Proactive Word of Mouth Definition Proactive Word of Mouth is when your customer introduces or inserts your product or service into a topically unrelated offline conversation, online exchange, or similar situation. For example, if I was at the same dinner, with the same people and someone asked, “Anyone do anything interesting lately?” I might answer “Yes! I was in Houston last week. I stayed at the DoubleTree, and you would not believe the amazing chocolate chip cookies they hand out at the front desk.” In this scenario, I am not waiting for the topic to come around to hotels before mentioning DoubleTree and their famous cookies. Instead, I am inserting the cookies into a broader conversation and turning the topic toward DoubleTree. Visit Our Web Accessibility Blog Visit Our Business Sustainability Blog

Which Word of Mouth is Best?

Both types of word of mouth are important. Because, word of mouth is the most persuasive and most common way that people are influenced to make buying decisions. However, proactive word of mouth is the more desirable type because it requires your customer to be enthralled with your product or service. They feel compelled to find a way to bring it up in conversation, even if it’s not on topic. Word of Mouth is all About Telling a Story Telling a story when asked is one thing. Telling a story without being asked is something else entirely. It requires more conviction and more passion. To make sure the word of mouth about you is proactive as much as possible, you need to make certain that your Speech Trigger is truly unique, remarkable, and memorable. You have to do something different, that your customers do not expect, and then find irresistible. Read the full article

#BetterBusinessAlliance #brand #contentmarketing #customerengagement #customerexperience #digitalmarketing #Digitalmarketingstrategy #reputation #socialmediamarketing #userexperience #Wordofmouth #WordofMouthMarketing

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altajackuniverse · 4 years

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Your Digital Marketing Strategy Builds Trust in Your Brand

7 Ways to Build Brand Trust Through Marketing

Anyone with marketing in their blood dreams of developing a brand which would have the strong name and visual recognition the original Volkswagen Beetle has around the world. Don't we all want to build a brand that our customer’s trust? Let's examine seven ways you can solidify trust in your brand, and build a strong customer base.

Why is Brand Trust so Important?

Today we're in a brand trust crisis. This is because of an unprecedented drop in the trust customers place in the companies they deal with. A study in 2018 by the Edelman Trust Barometer, found that only 48% of Americans trust businesses. That's a huge drop from the 58% brand trust posted the previous year. Over the previous decade the downward spiral was an accelerating consumer trend. This couldn't be worse news for established brands. Brand trust has been a pretty big deal when it comes to customer acquisition and loyalty. In a recent study, PwC found that more than 30% of consumers said that other than price, they ranked ‘brand trust’ among their top three reasons they decide to shop at a particular retailer. Competition has Never Been More Intense A decade ago, the brand trust number among consumers would have been much higher. Then, consumers didn’t have thousands of brands competing in the 24/7 web environment we have today. That was also before brands became more than simply merchants. Brands have morphed today into our trusted sources of information. Today consumers turn to brands to keep them up-to-date and informed. This information may come through the brand's blog content, social media interactions or YouTube channel. Today's brands are having a 24/7 conversation with the consumer's they are fighting to reach have purchase their product or service. What are you doing to develop your brand trust and compete? Todays Customer's Are Demanding Proof Before they reach a decision, today's customers are demanding proof. They have to have a solid reason to choose your brand over the others in your space. A well known name alone is no longer enough to ensure a strong customer base. Don’t believe me? Just look at how Facebook has faltered. After the Cambridge Analytica scandal broke, consumer confidence in Facebook plummeted. The once unquestioned social media giant reported a 20% decrease in their stock value. The growing distrust concerning “fake news,” has led to many wary would-be customers. Today brands are rushing to prove they can live up to their promises. Since trust takes time to build, brands can no longer afford to wait for that trust to build organically. Instead, brands must adopt a proactive strategy to more quickly develop trust among their customers.

Developing Trust Begins With Your Value Proposition

Your value proposition defines who you are as a brand. It communicates what your brand does for your customers. If your Value Proposition concise, well developed, or understood by your audience, it's impossible to build the customer relationships and brand trust which you require from the very beginning. An interesting study identifies two primary components of trust. These are competency and benevolence. Competence represents your brand’s ability to understand and deliver on your promises. Benevolence represents how your intentions and motives beneficial to consumers are accepted by them. Both of these trust components should be embodied in your value proposition. What matters most to your customers and how they should buy from you? Despite the important role that value propositions play, it's also critical that you optimize and apply your value proposition to every action you take. Your Value Proposition is Your First Promise Your value proposition is the first promise you make to your customers. You can’t break your promises. Instead, put real effort into the creation and optimization of your value proposition. Think about the specific challenges your product or service is designed to meet. How can you express that clearly and concisely to your target audience.

You Must Next Focus on Your Content

Creating and promoting high-quality, relevant content isn’t a new marketing concept. Using content to build trust is a newer focus for marketers. Content can build trust in several ways. First, you need to establish yourself as a thoughtful leader and give your audience content that addresses their problems. Your content must also offer them actual strategies and solutions to their problems. Doing this will create confidence and establish you as a valuable and expert resource. Once your audience is convinced you do know what you’re talking about, they’ll feel more confident buying from your brand. To achieve this, your content can’t come from a sales or promotional place. Your content should always be designed to establish a dialogue or conversation between your brand and your audience. It should never be "preachy in it's approach." Your Content Should Be Authentic and Educational Your content needs to be authentic and educational, focused on helping the user. It should not be about selling your product or services. Content like this is incredibly effective at building consumer trust. A study released by Conductor found that 65% of consumers feel a brand is trustworthy after they read educational content from that brand. The study also found that a week after reading a piece of educational content from a brand, there was a 9% increase in consumers who identified the brand as “trustworthy.” Incredibly, as time passed brand credibility actually increased from 65% to over 73%. Your Content Creates Your Brand Identity That's the great thing content marketing does? Your great content creates and solidifies your brand’s identity. Today's consumers want to know who you are as a brand. They want to be able to recognize the faces and voices behind the brand. Do you know what's the best way to be heard? The best way for your brand to be heard is through your content. Developing a consistent brand identity is crucial to building brand trust. Your audience should easily be able to recognize you through your content. That means you need to be creating messaging across all your channels that reinforces your core values. Ensure that your content checks all of the following boxes. Does your content mirror your company’s core values? Is your communication consistent? Do all your channels sound like you? Do your customers know what your values are? How can you be sure that they know?

Return to the Basics and Embrace Authenticity

Do yo remember the early days of social media when it was just Facebook? It was a simple time when actual conversations took place in the new and evolving text shorthand. Back then a few brands were the trailblazers. Consumers and businesses discovered that using social media put the human back into the business conversation. Social media has evolved, and brands continue to battle to be the “best.” Then it meant including the most polished images and updates. Brands Lost Their Authenticity As social media evolved, brands lost their authenticity in the transition. The ‘human’ element disappeared from social media. Instead companies focused on slick creatives and messaging and building a politically correct brand voice. That’s not the message which resonates with people. Shorthand does. A missed comma here or there does. A video from your mobile phone as you’re suddenly hit with inspiration while on a grocery run does. Consumers react positively to messages that are creative and authentic. From the heart, often speaks stronger than from the brain. Customer's Want Brand Authenticity A recent survey by Social Media Today revealed that 86% of people say authenticity is important when deciding what brands they like and support. Additionally, 90% of Millennials say brand authenticity is important. This demonstrates that younger consumers prefer ‘real and organic’ over ‘perfect and packaged’.It's all about telling your brand’s story. Origin stories are all the rage now that we inhabit the Marvel universe. People love to understand how something was born and how it’s grown. That’s true too of your brand. Your Brand Identity Matters Consider a well known brand like Ford. The company is forever tied directly to it's founder Henry Ford. Ford has found success not just because it’s a solid car manufacturer, but because people relate to the all American story of the rise of Henry Ford and his vision. While your business may not have a lengthy history, share what you can. Tell the story of how and why you started the business and the ups and downs along the way. You have to make your brand's story human at it's core, and your audience will feel more connected because of it.

Social Media and Reviews Build Your Brand

Imagine you’re planning to go out for dinner and looking for the best restaurants close to your home. Would you choose the restaurant with a line of waiting customers? Or would you choose the one with more empty tables than full? Most likely you would choose the first. Even though it’s less convenient, you would choose that one because it’s level of business indicates that it's a liked and quality place to eat. We would call that social proof. We view everything in a situation while comparing it to how we see others engaging with it. If we see a crowded restaurant with people lined up out the door, from the evidence we see, it's a great restaurant. The idea of social proof is all part of building your brand authenticity. When it comes to content, 60% of consumers say that user generated content is the most authentic form of content.That's why social shares, reviews and likes have so much weight in establishing your brand trust and credibility. If other people like your product or service, customer's naturally assume that they will too. Based on the evidence provided by your other customers.. Display Your Brand's Social Proof There are many ways that your brand can use social proof. You could display follower counts, subscribers, fans, etc. on social media. Collecting customer reviews and testimonials is another method. User generated content, and working with an influencer can also be used build your social reputation. Collecting social proof might seem like an uphill battle, especially when you’re new. Start small, with whatever you can. Get certified in whatever provides authority for your niche. If it’s Google Analytics, AdWords, etc. and display the badge prominently on your website. Look for and take some guest blogging opportunities. Once you begin building momentum, you can begin to add some more prominent publications to your rotation. Don't forget to prominently display a “featured in” section on your homepage to highlight other notices, reviews or publications where you are mentioned. Growing Social Proof Builds Brand Trust Build up social proof to increase your brand trust. Develop a strategy for collecting reviews built into your marketing plan from the beginning. Statistics suggest that 61% of consumers read reviews before they complete a purchase. People look for a reason to trust your brand, so make it easy for them to find. Include surveys with your emails to customers. Ask them to return them, this allows you to learn why they chose your business. To help make this easier, use software designed to automate the process for you. Or you can reach out individually to loyal clients and ask them for a testimonial.

Embrace Values that Set You Apart

When you think of major airlines that you actually like, what airline comes to mind? I’ll bet that Southwest Airlines is at the top of most lists. From their first day of operations, Southwest did things different than any other airline. No assigned seating, low fares, and friendly, fun employees. Even in 1967, Herb Kelleher was thinking outside the box when he founded Southwest.Guess which airline, customers and the business world were talking about. Yep, Southwest was in everyone's conversations because they were doing everything differently. Customer's Embrace Doing Things Better From their first day, customers loved Southwest's radically different policies. Southwest created their own path. As other airlines were raising their prices, Southwest consistently offered lower fares. I remember flying one way from Houston to Dallas for $19. No other airline could match that.And they did it without compromising their customer service. All the other airlines assigned seating, Southwest let you choose your own. When other airlines started charging for checked baggage, Southwest kept their bags free. This ability to defy the norm set them apart. Their willingness to adopt policies benefiting their customers, often over their business, made their customers embrace them and trust them even more. The Message is Don't be Afraid to be Different The message behind the Southwest Airlines story? Don’t be afraid to be different. And don’t be afraid to do things just for your customers. Give your customers value, don’t try to get it out of them. So when every other restaurant is charging an extra dollar to add chicken to an entree, don’t. Or when every other company charges an initial fee, offer a free consultation. Remember, little things go a long way in setting you apart from your competition. Placing the value on your customers that they deserve will help make them your strong brand ambassadors.

Embrace HTTPS and Use Trust Badges

Consumer’s faith in the safety of their information is a big deal right now. With data breaches and measures like the GDPR being enacted, it’s crucial that you do everything you can to make your users feel that their information is protected. Even if you’re only asking for an email, and especially if your site takes sensitive info like payment information, be overprepared. The best thing you can do is make sure you’ve switched over to the HTTPS protocol. Your customers expect it and it's quickly becoming a requirement that your site must offer to your customers.. Your Customer's Deserve Information Security In a recent PwC Global Study, respondents were asked how they reduce the risk of online security issues and fraud. 57% said they only use credible and legitimate websites. 51% said that they choose providers they trust when making payments. Switching to HTTPS gives you the green secure lock in the URL field and your users the peace of mind that their data is safe if they use your site. HTTPS Security Builds Brand Trust Switch to HTTPS to build brand trust. Do even more if you accept online payments, switch to HSTS. You can also add trust seals to your site. Trust Seals are proven to increase conversions, however it's important to ensure that whatever you do it is proven to be safe and effective in the protection it provides. Once you’ve decided on a badge, it’s simply a process of choosing the plan you want, letting them authenticate your website, and installing the badge on your checkout page.

Be Transparent and Over-Deliver

Bottom line, it's important that you deliver what you promise. If fact, deliver more than you promise. This all starts with your value proposition. Whatever benefits you promise? Make sure you deliver them. That PPC ad you ran advertising a low-cost solution? Deliver on your promise. Send them straight to a dedicated landing page, and don’t make them hunt to find what was promised to them. Deliver More Than You Promise If you promise in-person quarterly meetings, weekly phone calls, or daily updates. Deliver. And don’t ever be misleading. If you’re advertising a free product, don’t surprise your customers with hidden fees along the way. If you plan to increase your prices, give existing customers fair warning. Explain your reasoning and their value to you as a customer. Chances are, you're dealing with adults. Treat them like it and make sure they’re informed. This is the transparency principle, and it’s big because your customer's hate surprises. Visit Our Web Accessibility Blog Visit Our Business Sustainability Blog

Wrapping Up Brand Trust

Be transparent with your customers to build your brand trust. If something goes wrong, own it. If you make a mistake, don't dodge the issue. Step up and own any errors you make, don't try to lessen them. Most of your customers understand that people make mistakes, they're just expecting transparency and honesty.Show them you are and explain what did or what could have gone wrong. It's not about making excuses. It's about honest answers to address legitimate concerns. Customer's Expect and Respect Honesty Your customers will respect your honesty, and hopefully your attempts to right any wrongs. There’s no denying the huge impact consumer trust can have on your business. Make it a priority, and your customers will see and embrace the difference. Read the full article

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