Bring Blind Customers to your "Sight"

Don't forget about the millions of disabled visitors

Paul Terlemezian, Vice President of Business Development for IDET Communications, speaks with definingINSIGHTS

It may sound like an ancient riddle with a modern twist: What does a blind person see when visiting your website? Of course, he or she won’t see anything, but if the visitor doesn’t hear anything, you may open yourself up to a lawsuit. More importantly, you’re putting a brick wall between your company and potential customers.

Two high-profile hospitality sites, ramada.com and priceline.com, were recently fined by the federal government for non-compliance with Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act (also known as the World Wide Web Accessibility Initiative). This law requires that all government and commercial websites be accessible to persons with disabilities.

“Compliance” is a broad term that takes into account a wide range of disabilities, some of which you may never have experienced or pondered. Think of a deaf visitor who tries to listen to streaming audio of your product launch. Do you use some sort animation on your site, even in banner ads? All that motion and dazzle is lost on a visually impaired visitor. For someone with limited hand or arm mobility, your high-tech Flash menu may be useless.

Even if you already use assistive technologies (such as screen readers for the visually impaired) to make your site accessible to anyone with almost any disability, does your site provide details about these technologies? How can you find out if it does, so that a government official looking for this information can locate it?

That’s the tedious side of government regulation—the side with endless stacks of paperwork or bureaucrats showing up at your office and wanting to look through your files. But there is a positive and very practical side. You know those slanted sidewalk edges that make it so easy for you to rollerblade into your office every morning? Okay, maybe that’s a stretch, but they do make it easier for the catering guy to roll his rack of breakfast snacks into your building. Those slanted edges to sidewalks were initially mandated by the Americans with Disabilities Act. Plenty of cities and private businesses resisted them as too expensive and unnecessary. Now they’re a very convenient and normal part of our cityscape.

Reach a relatively untapped market

Paul Terlemezian of IDET Communications takes a similar tack: Instead of trying to scare customers into using their services out of fear of not complying with the government regulations, Terlemezian strives to put a positive spin on tackling compliance. He believes that all Internet marketing can work with assistive technologies to make sites accessible to more people. Working with founder Sam Marinov, Terlemezian manages the teams at IDET Communications, Inc. to create a resource for businesses, government contractors and educational institutions to ensure web accessibility for all visitors.

Terlemezian says compliance for disabled visitors is a simple matter of mathematics. “If your web marketing is inaccessible to persons with disabilities, you are essentially slamming the door on a potential customer. The 2000 census indicated that 54 million Americans have some sort of disability. Is your business so strong that you can ignore 54 million potential customers? Creating an interface to assistive technologies ensures that your website reaches as many people as possible, opening the door to new customers.”

Take the opportunity to clarify your message

Another key to compliance rests on the art of branding and the magic of customer loyalty. Terlemezian adds, “Instead of waiting to comply with federal regulations, be an innovator in this area and then make it a selling point. Advertise the fact that your web marketing is fully accessible to anyone with any sort of disability. This is another way to make your product stand above the fray in a crowded marketplace. It also shows you’re one of the good guys in a country still wary of corporate greed.”

When you take the time to add assistive technologies and drill down into your site with this much detail, you get the opportunity to think about your message from the ground up. Clarifying your message at this most basic level allows you to obtain a uniformity of message you may not have had before. You may want to rethink certain parts of your website and get rid of ineffective portions altogether.

Before you think making your website compliant also means making it boring, think again. America Online has been fully compliant since it launched Version 6.0 (three versions ago). Has it lost any of its dazzle or uniqueness? It’s still the same product, even better in some eyes. But now it can be viewed and enjoyed by everyone.

Gain more prospects with brand loyalty

Another reason to tap into this market is the Baby Boomer generation—the ones who made the age of 50 the new 40—will soon be reaching an age where more disabilities will continue to hamper their ability to use the Internet. If you plant the seed of accessibility now, the Boomers who already have disabilities will appreciate it. More importantly, they will tell their Boomer friends who become disabled about the remarkable company with whom they’ve done business for many years.

This potential new source of brand loyalty remains relatively untapped, but is there for the taking. Opening your web marketing to persons with disabilities is not just about technical compliance, it’s about marketing to an untouched audience.

Start today

When should you start the process towards making your website compliant? Terlemezian responds, “As with any government mandate, the sooner the better. From a legal standpoint, the feds have proven to be much more lenient on companies that have made a good faith effort towards making their site compliant.” As long as you can prove you are working towards opening your site to persons with disabilities, most likely you can avoid a lawsuit or a fine.

Think back to those sidewalks. You could also picture the hands-free device on your cell phone. That device came about because someone with a disability sued Motorola and required that they create a hands-free device that would allow him to fully use his phone. Now, those devices are required by some states for cell phone use while driving.

Bringing your web marketing up to compliance with Section 508 is a necessary task required by governmental regulation. Such a tedious task, however, could be a springboard for new creative ideas about how to get your message out more clearly to all your potential customers. In the process, you could open up your business to scores of new customers. Who would have thought that a draconian word like “compliance” could actually engender so much creativity—and new business?

Paul Terlemezian is Vice President of Business Development for IDET Communications. Paul has over 30 years of business experience and nearly 20 years of alliances and direct selling experience in the high technology and training industry. He has previously worked for Digital Equipment Corporation, IBM, Sterling Software (KnowledgeWare), Achievement Plus and  Sylvan Learning companies. He is currently focused on creating relationships that enable IDET’s capabilities to be linked with organizations that have a history of creating strategic business impact. IDET Communications has partnered with Definition 6 to create new technologies that will enable further web accessibility for disabled visitors.