Disabled people

There are several considerations to take when building e-newsletters. In the planning and design stage:

• Keep your email formatting easy to read: Complex, multi-column layouts may lead to sensory overload. Single column layouts can streamline content and help reinforce hierarchy, aiding scannability in the process.
• Maintain a 60/40 text to image ratio: Having too much text vs images (or the opposite) can have a negative impact on everyone. Too many images can make navigating using a screen reader trickier while having too much text can make the email too verbose. Additionally, having a bad ratio, in either case, has the potential of triggering SPAM filters. A commonly held best practice is 60/40 (60% text, 40% image).
• Avoid overusing links: Even if they are properly labeled and descriptive, try to avoid overpopulating your text content with hyperlinks— this can lead to a poor reading experience.
• Ensure hyperlinked text provides context so people know what to expect when the link is opened: While screen readers can read a full page to a person, they may prefer to listen to a list of links. Links should be as descriptive as possible without their context. For example: ‘Post-survey’ or ‘XYZ article’ instead of ‘click here.’
• Limit use of emojis: If using emojis, ensure they are towards the end of sentences. However, be sure not to include too many as screen readers repeatedly dictate each emoji description.
• Maintain a minimum 14px font size in your email body: Anything smaller can be difficult to read. Secondary text like footers, disclaimers, T&Cs, and image captions can be smaller, while light font color text should be bigger.
• Underline or bold hyperlinked text: People who are colorblind may have difficulty recognizing when text is hyperlinked if they can’t see the color blue. Underline or bold the words to make the distinction between hyperlinked text and plain text.
• Avoid center-aligned text content when you have more than two lines of body text: People may have a harder time reading center-aligned or justified text. The start of a new line acts as an anchor for eyes when jumping around an email. It can be helpful to keep that anchor in the same place for every new line in longer bits of copy.

As you build this email marketing campaign, certain considerations can help with clarity and navigation:

• Don’t add titles to links: Avoid setting title=”” to links since some screen readers break their reading pattern to read the title, which can cause navigation and flow issues. The purpose of the link should be clear in the CTA button copy or hyperlinked text.
• Write descriptive alt text for critical, informative, or actionable images: Alt text will display for an image if the image cannot be loaded. It will also be spoken aloud for people who are using screen readers. Background images shouldn’t convey critical information. Anything with critical information should be an in-line image.
• Set the correct HTML language attribute: Always be sure to set the correct language within your email (lang="..."). This helps to ensure that the screen reader is pronouncing words the way they were intended.
• Encode your characters: Adding <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"> lets the browser or email client know which type of characters to expect in the code and avoids any accidental breakage of the reading pattern for both people with and without assistive technology-enabled.
• Set your tables to role="Presentation": Tables are commonly used in email marketing messages, but not to present data, which is their intended purpose. By setting role="Presentation," this informs the screen reader tool that this isn’t a data table and instead is a presentation table. This helps to make the content more intuitive for people who use screen readers.
• Assign accurate heading and paragraph tags: Using heading tags (<h1>, <h2>, <h3>, etc) and paragraph tags <p> allows screen readers to properly differentiate between headings and paragraphs within an email. This also allows people to quickly navigate through the content by only focusing on the headings, a common way to scroll through content.
• Include a descriptive title for the email using a <title> tag:If a person views the email as a web page, the title will display in the browser window to provide context. The title should not repeat the subject line or headline since the screen reader will also recite it. The title should summarize the email in a straightforward way and, if possible, in less than 30 characters, such as “Accessibility Newsletter May 2022”.
• Content should be readable at 200% magnification: Emails should retain their readability, functionality, and content when a person magnifies the screen up to 200%.

• Create clear, simple slides: Avoid using too many graphics, too much text, or too much animation. Visual complexity can make it harder for people to absorb information, especially people who are blind, low vision or have a cognitive disability. If your slides use animation, make sure that you don’t leave people behind by making important content disappear. If people read more slowly or rely on an interpreter, they might need a bit more time to absorb the content. Avoid using repetitive animation (flashing or flickering), since it can be distracting and even trigger seizures. Simple doesn’t mean boring, though! A simple slide can still be beautiful and informative.
• Use images carefully, and text for critical information: Main points should appear as text in slides, not in speaker notes or images. When using images or diagrams include alternative text (alt text). Charts can be difficult to decipher, especially if they use a small font in order to fit more data, or color to indicate key information. If your slide includes data-heavy charts or graphs, be sure to specify the takeaway either on the slide itself or in the speaker notes.
• Include captions for video content: Provide captions for all audio or video recordings shared. If using a YouTube video, check that the YouTube captioning is accurate.
• Use real-time captioning, if available: Along with helping deaf or hard-of-hearing audience members, real-time captioning is useful if there are diverse accents and languages in the room, or if the presenter speaks too quickly.
• Share your content in advance: If possible, send slides to your audience a few days before your presentation. This gives the audience a chance to review the content and, if needed, make arrangements to accommodate their own needs and preferences.

• First, consider accessibility within your source document: Before creating your PDF, think about accessibility in your source file. If creating this in a word-processing or page-layout software there should be a number of ways to make this more accessible. This includes adding alt text to images, applying formatting styles for headings and paragraphs.
• If required, recreate the source document: If you receive an inaccessible PDF, without tags, or correct structural elements, it is often best to return to the source document. This allows you to make the necessary repairs, and then re-create the PDF.
• Add PDF tags and set the tab order: PDF tags provide a hidden, structured representation of the PDF content that is presented to screen readers. They exist for accessibility purposes only and have no visible effect on the PDF file. Some softwares have automatic tagging however the results of this may not be fully accurate. For best results tag during your conversion to PDF from a source document, this allows the authoring application to draw from the paragraph styles or other structural information of the source document to produce a logical structure tree.
• Add structure to forms and add fillable form fields: Forms can have complex layouts compared to other documents. If creating forms include headings, instructions, and fields for people to enter data within. At a minimum each field should have a label. It is helpful to include special instructions for fields where required.
• Add alt text for images: This describes what’s depicted in the image making them accessible for people using screen readers.
• Screen readers and watermarks: To avoid any watermarks being read by screen readers as document content, add any watermarks as untagged PDFs.
• Scanned documents should be avoided: Scanning a physical document to create a PDF is never accessible. Screen readers can’t detect the text since there are no correct headings or tags, and the result is almost always at a tilt or with grainy and hard to read text.

• If you plan to lead an interactive activity, make sure it can include everyone: This applies both to the activity itself and the explanation of the activity. For example, don’t just explain the icebreaker out loud; also describe it on a slide so that it’s clear to everyone who might have difficulty hearing or understanding you. This could be someone who is hard of hearing, has a cognitive disability or simply missed the audio instruction.
• If it’s important, say it out loud: Don’t let your slides “speak for themselves.” If you show a famous quote, read it out loud. If you’re using a funny or powerful image, describe it briefly. If you’re showing a chart or diagram, explain what it means. Relying too heavily on the audience’s ability to see the screen can leave people behind; sometimes people can’t see from the back of the room, sometimes they may be away from their screen, or are blind or have low vision. Consider mentioning the slide number for people who can’t see the screen but are following along in their copy of the slides.
• Take your time: As you present, speak at a slow, conversational pace. Pausing and speaking slowly can be difficult, especially if you’re nervous, but it makes it easier for people to understand. If you’re working with a sign language interpreter, pause at the beginning of each slide so that deaf audience members can look at the slide before you start talking. Pause again if you want to draw attention to the slides so that the interpreter can wrap up your last sentence and let the audience focus return to the slides. If you ask for audience interaction, look at the interpreter to make sure he or she finished signing your question before you take responses.