How organisations can turn conversations around digital accessibility into action

As digital teams set out their priorities for the coming year, many will be under pressure to make the user experience accessible to people with disabilities. Sure, legal risk is a motivating factor, especially in light of new regulations like the European Accessibility Act and looming deadlines for the public sector under the Americans with Disabilities Act. But so is reducing development costs, increasing market penetration, and improving customer satisfaction.

In Level Access's recent State of Digital Accessibility Report, nearly nine in 10 professionals (89%) say digital accessibility practices provide a competitive advantage.

More than just websites, brands need to ensure that their apps, kiosks, payment terminals, and other digital experiences are equally usable by disabled and non-disabled customers. Practically speaking, this starts with conforming to the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), the global benchmark for digital accessibility. 

While the task of bringing each individual experience into conformance isn't terribly technically challenging, growing digital portfolios means teams increasingly require processes for achieving, and maintaining, accessibility at scale. 

When we asked more than 1,600 digital experience leaders about their current practices and their plans for the future for this, our seventh annual report, we found that many organisations are looking to AI to help tackle this challenge. A notable 82% of organisations say they use AI tools in their accessibility strategies currently, relative to 79% last year.

Yet even with broader AI adoption, inefficient processes continue to stall progress. For example, only 28% of organisations address accessibility early, in the digital experience design phase, and just 27% do so during development. This is leading to expensive last-minute fixes after experiences are built, reducing ROI, and limiting the chances for digital accessibility to inspire new ideas in product design that lead to greater adoption for everyone, regardless of whether they identify as a disabled user.

Turning accessibility from aspiration into action requires more than awareness, and more than sophisticated AI tooling - it's a change that demands structure, authority, and integration across the product life cycle. Here are some practical steps to help teams operationalize accessibility at scale.

Empower an authoritative leader

To build sustainable and scalable practices, the first step must be to give leadership responsibility to someone capable of making executive decisions. The role of an accessibility owner isn't new, as 77% of organisations have such a leader, but too many organisations limit the effectiveness of those they hire by limiting their role and influence to one department. 

​To move digital accessibility forward, this leader needs real authority. They will need to provide strategic, cross-functional direction, own a budget, set governance standards, and make sure practices are accepted throughout the organization.

Provide education

Organisations have hosted training sessions about digital accessibility for more than two decades, but we must push ourselves to take these to the next level by providing practical, role-specific guidance. Effective enablement helps people understand how accessibility fits into their unique responsibilities and encourages the right behaviors across the organization. And it pays off: professionals with access to training they consider "highly effective" are 2.5 times as likely to say accessibility contributes to revenue improvements than those at organisations with ineffective training. 

To drive real change, accessibility training should be immediately relevant, grounded in the company's big-picture goals, and hosted by disabled users. Enablement efforts must also have strong executive backing: participants in our research who ranked their company's executives as "highly supportive" of digital accessibility, were more than seven times as likely to say digital accessibility boosts revenue…likely because they know executives track metrics that matter to the organization's bottom line.

Integrate accessibility tools early

With strong leadership and education in place, businesses can then begin to implement the practices that will support optimal outcomes. This includes embedding digital accessibility practices early in product design and development. 

Teams should aim to make their digital foundations as accessible as possible, and for most, that means their design systems. Designers can use accessible design tools like Figma plugins to test, remediate, and annotate their designs. Similarly, developers can integrate accessible coding tools and plugins into the CI/CD stack, well before shipping to production. Incorporating these tools into daily operations enables organisations to move away from after-the-fact remediation efforts that cost businesses so much time and money. 

Incorporate AI strategically 

As teams face growing pressure to adopt AI tooling, leaders must remember that AI understands patterns. According to research from WebAIM at Utah State University, the number of top homepages across the web with detectable WCAG conformance failures, representing likely accessibility barriers, has only improved by 3.1% since researchers began tracking this data in 2019. So, unless teams use AI agents trained on accessible patterns, practices, and platforms, they're bound to stay in the same break-fix loop that has plagued them to date.

Incorporating accessibility-focused AI agents through MCP servers will enable code remediation advice within developer workflows…and soon after, agents prompting other agents to address practical accessibility needs as they design and develop experiences without human intervention. This lets teams fix issues faster, speeds up release cycles, and helps them avoid costly remediation.

Relevant reporting

​For too long, digital teams have reported on accessibility with simple scoring metrics that ignore the real needs of users of assistive technology. Simple point-in-time scores also don't align easily to the business metrics that executives routinely watch - KPIs like conversion rates, retention, and revenue impact. As an example, we know of one customer who found that fixing a color contrast issue on one button in their app led to a 27% increase in order completion. Imagine how much more confident an IT manager might be meeting with their executive leader to make a case for a digital accessibility budget with that data. 

The simple fact is that data-driven storytelling unlocks the design and development budgets teams need to make progress toward better user experiences, reduced costs, and increased performance. 

Ensure your investments deliver 

Even though nine in 10 digital experience professionals (91%) connect digital accessibility with improved user experience, more than one-third (35%) say competing organizational priorities are limiting their progress. To ensure accessibility gets the focus it deserves, teams must undertake a strategic shift in their approaches.

The solution to the maturity gap limiting the full potential of digital accessibility includes strong governance, strategically implemented technology, and stakeholder support. Additionally, role-specific education and clear expectations lead to an era where accessibility is considered as the minimum viable product.

Gone are the days when accessibility can be treated as a single task bar on a Gantt chart. When inclusion becomes a necessary requirement embedded in every definition of done for every user story, organisations can capture the full benefits of enhanced, accessible digital experiences.