When a company first discusses the digital accessibility of its website with us, one concern often arises: that everything will have to be overhauled all at once and that the team will be tied up for months. That is not the case. No company has to fix everything straight away. The key is to start with a clear plan.
In this guide, I’ll take you from your current situation to compliance: how to assess your website’s current status, how to draw up and prioritise a list of actions, which areas almost always fail compliance checks, when it’s worth making improvements and when a relaunch is the better option, and why you should steer clear of overlay tools. For the details, please refer to the relevant guides, such as the checklist, the question of who is affected, and the costs.
In short: seven steps to an accessible website
- Assess the current situation: scan automatically and have the results checked by people.
- Appoint someone internally to be responsible for digital accessibility.
- Draw up a list of measures and set a realistic timeframe.
- Prioritise: tackle the biggest barriers first.
- Schritt für Schritt umsetzen, im Code und in der Redaktion, auf Wunsch mit fachlicher Begleitung durch ifdb.
- Demonstrate compliance: audit, certificate and accessibility statement.
- Monitor compliance on an ongoing basis.
What makes a website accessible
An accessible website can be used by everyone, including people who use a screen reader, rely solely on a keyboard, need to zoom in significantly, or find it difficult to take in content. The benchmark for this is the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) at Level AA. You can read about the latest changes in the guide to WCAG 2.2.
Digital accessibility is so much more than you might think at first glance. It affects not only the design and the code, but also the content produced every day in the editorial office, the documents you provide, and the ways in which customers get in touch with you.
Public bodies are subject to the BITV 2.0, whilst many businesses offering services to consumers have been subject to the Accessibility Enhancement Act (BFSG) since 28 June 2025. You can find out whether your business is affected by consulting the guide on website compliance requirements.
Step 1: Assess the current situation
The first step is to assess where your website stands today. An automated scan, for example using the free Access Score tool, provides an initial overview in just a few minutes. However, automated tools only identify some of the barriers. Whether a form can be completed using a screen reader, or whether a menu works using only the keyboard, can only be determined by a human assessment – ideally carried out by users of assistive technologies. I explain how the various testing methods differ in the guide to testing.
Step 2: appoint a person in charge
Digital accessibility affects development, design, editorial, marketing and legal affairs. If everyone is responsible to some extent, ultimately no one is responsible. You should therefore appoint one person within your organisation to act as the lead stakeholder: this person will coordinate the action plan, keep track of deadlines and act as the point of contact for auditors, the agency and senior management.
Step 3: a catalogue of measures rather than doing everything at once
Our approach is to make digital accessibility accessible to all businesses. In practice, this means that we work with each business to draw up a joint catalogue of measures. No business has to rectify everything immediately or tie up resources in the process. We agree on a timeframe together and work through the items step by step.
The biggest hurdles are tackled first. Three questions help to determine the order:
- Does the barrier completely prevent a person from using the site, or does it merely make it more difficult to do so?
- Is it located within a key workflow, such as the contact form, the checkout process, the login page or the appointment booking system?
- Does it appear on many pages because it is embedded in a template or a component? If so, making a single change will resolve many errors at once.
Practical tip: Tackle errors in templates and recurring components such as navigation, headers, forms or footers first. The effort involved here is minimal, and the impact is felt across the entire website in one go.
The area that almost always fails: the editorial team
To be honest, in our audits, almost all websites fail in one area where the teams were confident: the structure of the content. This is because, alongside the actual code, there is always a content management system. Even if the development team has done a thorough job, new content is created every day by the editorial team.
Headings are a typical example. The heading level is chosen not on the basis of the structure, but on the basis of appearance. An H3 is used, even though an H5 would be more appropriate in that place, simply because it looks better in the layout. To sighted people, this looks coherent. However, anyone using a screen reader to navigate from heading to heading will encounter a structure that is incorrect.
The solution lies in two areas: the appearance of a heading should be customisable regardless of its level, and editorial staff need to understand why the level matters. You can read more about this in the guide to heading structure.
Tweaks or a relaunch?
In the vast majority of cases, I recommend making tweaks. An existing website can be made accessible step by step using a catalogue of measures, without having to rebuild it from scratch.
The situation is different if a relaunch is imminent anyway. In that case, the WCAG should be incorporated into the planning, the specifications and the acceptance process right from the start. And it’s worth thinking beyond the website itself: incorporate digital accessibility into processes outside the website too, particularly in two-way communication. If a customer gets in touch via an accessible form, the reply must also be accessible to them, whether by email, as a document or via the customer portal.
Taking a holistic approach to digital accessibility brings many benefits, both for customers and for the business: services reach more people, processes become easier for everyone, and a clean structure also helps with search engine visibility. Find out more in our guide to accessibility and SEO.
Steer clear of overlay tools
Overlay tools promise to make a website accessible with a single line of code. They sit on top of the page but do not alter the actual code. Missing labels, incorrect headings and unusable menus remain hidden beneath them. In some cases, overlays even create additional barriers, for example because they conflict with screen reader settings. There are numerous reports and warnings about this from affected users and experts. Find out why an overlay is not a solution in our guide to overlays.
Demonstrating and maintaining compliance
Once the key measures have been implemented, you should be able to provide evidence of the progress made. This includes an audit with a certificate and a statement on accessibility that honestly describes the current status. The guide to the mandatory content of the statement sets out what information should be included.
After that, the most important part begins: maintaining the standard. Every release, every new page and every piece of new content can introduce new barriers. Ongoing monitoring ensures that errors are spotted before they pile up.
How ifdb supports you in this
With Access Score, you can see where your website stands, free of charge. With Access Ready, we test your website using real users of assistive technologies, work with you to draw up a catalogue of measures and certify the level of accessibility achieved. Access Declare provides the accessibility statement based on this test, and Access Guard continuously monitors that standards are maintained. With the Access Academy, your editorial team learns how to create content correctly from the outset. For companies based in Germany, once certification has been achieved and Access Guard is active, we contractually assume liability via Access Protect. Everything integrates seamlessly into your existing processes: resource-efficient, legally compliant and cost-effective.
Frequently Asked Questions
Do I have to rectify all barriers at once?
No. By drawing up a list of measures, you set a timeframe and work through the points step by step, tackling the biggest barriers first. This makes it easier to plan, and your team isn’t tied down all at once.
Is a plugin or overlay enough to make a website accessible?
No. Overlays do not alter the code and can in some cases even create additional barriers. Audit plugins can help the editorial team find errors, but they are no substitute for a proper audit or for making changes to the code.
Who should be responsible for digital accessibility within the company?
A designated individual who acts as a stakeholder, taking responsibility and liaising between development, editorial, marketing and senior management. Without such a person, the issue is easily neglected.
My advice if you’re just starting out
“Take a holistic approach to digital accessibility. Steer clear of overlay tools – in some cases, these create more barriers, and there are plenty of reports and warnings about this. Instead, draw up an action plan and use it to create a list of priorities, and don’t try to tackle everything at once. It’s also always a good idea to appoint someone internally to act as a stakeholder responsible for this.”
