When we talk about web design, accessibility is categorized as the ability of people with disabilities to interact with your site. Although, especially in modern times, this element should be a mandatory part of any design, accessibility is often overlooked.
The balance between looking good and being accessible is something that needs to be addressed not only in sites, but also in products. Sure, a little text added to a button will take away from its minimalism, but it will help those of us who are visually impaired understand more clearly what the button does.
Focusing on accessibility increases the likelihood that people will use your product, since it was created specifically for them (or at least with them in mind).
Hierarchy
Arranging elements so that they represent a purposeful flow of information is part of the hierarchy of information. Other approaches to achieving hierarchy are text size, boldness (or lack thereof), position (we read from left to right and top to bottom), color (if the text color is black everywhere, definitely red or blue color will help distinguish it).
In the following article, you can read more about color and font hierarchy.
Written and Visual Information
Use a combination of text, colors, and icons to communicate (convey) your message. Whatever style you choose, stick to it, as well as your chosen colors, illustrations, and photos, this will help build and maintain your brand identity.
It’s often helpful to consider whether a small visual element would help convey and capture the message you want. If so, test and see if your users perceive it the same way.
International symbols for saving, editing, and writing are the floppy disk, the pen, and a few lines in a row. These icons rarely need any explanation. Are there others you could use?
Colors
You can learn a lot more about colors in another article, but it’s good to know that some colors that look great next to each other can actually be difficult for people with visual impairments. Make sure there’s enough contrast between the elements.
You can use various online tools to determine if the colors you choose contrast enough.
Meta Descriptions
There are mixed opinions and studies in the SEO community about whether meta descriptions help with higher SERP (search engine results page) rankings. In any case, we all know that meta descriptions help visually impaired users understand what is on an image.
Interactions
How an element changes when it is hovered over, clicked, or highlighted. A visual change (darkening or adding a shadow) is one way to show users that they are interacting with an element.
Feedback when interacting with a element is useful not only for visually impaired people, but also for everyone else. It also makes the site look much more pleasant and interactive.
Accessibility across devices
The difference between the size and structure of elements should be noticeable across devices, but we should never lose the readability of text, visibility of images, interactivity, or functionality of our site.
