Our thoughts on website accessibility
Banyan Theory websites are built and refined to be fully accessible to everyone, including people with disabilities who might be restricted to a keyboard or depend on assistive technology to navigate and utilize a website.
We design and code our templates to comply with the latest version of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), published by the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C), which documents recommendations for how to structure a website to be accessible.
What makes a website accessible
Some examples of these guidelines include ensuring a website:
Has is enough contrast between background color and foreground color (text) and between link color and text color (for colorblind users). This helps visitors read the text on the page and distinguish between linked text and non-linked text.
Can be fully navigated using only a keyboard. This helps users with limited mobility who navigate websites using a keyboard instead of a mouse.
Has forms that can be completed with the use of assistive technology.
Telling visitors how you're able to help them
Our team uses manual testing, automated testing, and website accessibility evaluation tools to ensure our templates are accessible.
We also recommend (but don't required) adding a dedicated page covering your agency's desire to support visitors, customers, and vendors with disabilities. This page should not be limited to just your website accessibility intentions, but also should cover all aspects of interaction and support, including communication (phone, email, text message, in-person visits, etc.), as well as physical accessibility accommodations at your office location(s), such as handicap parking spaces, wheelchair ramps, and elevators.
You can see our own website's accessibility info page as an example. (We don't have physical offices ourselves, so a section covering physical accommodations is absent from our page.) We also have an accessibility statement and an accessibility policy on our website, and you are welcome to do the same on your website.
If you'd like to read more about our approach, see our main website accessibility page.
Ongoing improvements
We are always eager to hear about accessibility improvements we can make on our own website and on the websites we manage. If you discover an accessibility problem or an opportunity for improvement, please let us know by sending an email to hi [at] banyantheory [dot] com.