How to measure the ROI of Website Accessibility
So you are fully aware of the importance of website accessibility, and you believe providing equality across the internet should be given a greater level of focus. You’re also a believer that a strong business case exists for the economic rationale behind ensuring websites are accessible.
We have a problem though.
The fact that you believe this doesn’t help you sell the idea to the relevant stakeholders in your business, the ones who make the decisions. You need data, and more specifically, you need ROI data to prove the time and energy required to ensure accessibility compliance is worth it.
Right, so the next step is getting this information. Easy, right? Kind of…
Note: Before I get into the nitty gritty or you dismiss the below suggestions as being ‘too hard’ it’s worth noting that most developers could implement the kind of event tracking I’m referencing inside of an hour and with minimal coding. Then it’s just a matter of spending the time to ensure your Google Analytics (GA) account is configured to show you the relevant information.
If only it was a simple as logging in to GA and filtering your website’s visitors based on the accessibility technology they use. Unfortunately this is not data that GA can track, also, not all people with accessibility issues use standard accessibility tools. For example there are some who may use a magnifying glass when reading a website and are thus nearly impossible to track.
So how do we need to think about this problem? Our suggestion… event tracking.
There are a number of key elements that are hallmarks in the way a user with accessibility issues may use your website. If we combine triggers that record an event when these elements are interacted with, then, in combination with GA’s filters and goals we can get a picture of how users with accessibility issues are interacting with our website.
It’s worth noting that the following methods aren’t fool proofed and could potentially trigger a false positive, however, it’s unlikely and in most cases what appears to be user with accessibility requirements will be exactly that.
So without further ado, here are four of the best ways you can measure how a user with accessibility requirements is interacting with your website.
The first and most obvious element...