Don't Get Sued Because of Your Website!

Hey, everyone. Today we're talking about a very serious topic that can literally save your business hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal settlements. It is such an important topic and it's getting more important every day. I really hate doing trainings like this, but it's essential. There is so much legal activity going on around this topic and you really need to prevent this, this from happening to your business. And it's a really easy fix. So we're talking about the importance of implementing ADA compliance software on your website. Did you know that the Americans with Disabilities act requires websites to be accessible to people with disabilities? It requires it. That was not always the case. It's relatively new. It requires it. You don't have a choice. In this live training, I'm going to explain how the law affects your website, the potential consequences of not complying, and why the tool that we use and recommend and can help you with called accessibe, is the best solution to help you solve this problem quickly. So the Americans with Disabilities Act, ADA became law back in 1990, and the intent was to protect individuals with disabilities from discrimination in all areas of life, including employment, public accommodations, and telecommunications. In 2010, the Department of Justice released a new set of regulations called the ADA Standards for Accessible Design, and that included guidelines for websites. The key word there is guidelines, but that was back in 2010. And the Internet back then was not what it is today. Today everyone is online. And so now the online world is seen as equivalent from a business standpoint and accessibility standpoint to the real world, where businesses in the real world, brick and mortar, need handicap ramps and handicap accessible restrooms and all the things that we've grown accustomed to and are familiar with. This is now required online.

So the DOJ stated that websites are considered places of public accommodation and must be accessible to people with disabilities. So what does that mean for you? Well, it means a lot of things, actually. Failure to comply with ADA regulations can result in legal action for your business, which obviously can be costly and damaging in major ways. Businesses shut down because of this. I mean, seriously, that's how important it is. But there's several high profile cases that have resulted in huge settlements. And I'm just going to read off. Let me just bring this up. You recognize any of these names? These are big businesses. Okay, so Beyonce's, Parkwood Entertainment. So Beyonce was sued. Domino's Pizza, Nike, Burger King, Harvard, Amazon, Hooters, Target, the Cheesecake Factory, Winn Dixie, Hobby Lobby, CVS Five Guys, Hilton Hotels, Krispy Kreme, PayPal, Sephora, Staples, Ace Hardware, Chick Fil, a FedEx, McDonald's, Southwest Airlines, Walgreens and Wendy's. That is not a comprehensive list. It's a list of just 25 quick ones that I did research on. Now here's the thing. You're like, okay, those are big companies. They're not going to come after me. You know, I've got a little H Vac company, you know, in a small community, no one cares about me. They're not going to come after me. Wrong. All right, so here's just a list of 25 small businesses that were targeted. Sassy's right. House, Bluebird Cafe, Yumm Donuts, Liberty Tax Services, the Village of Boulder Ridge, the Cottages on Salt Spring Island, L M Healthcare Communications, Munson Healthcare, Bad River Band of Lake Superior, Foster Wheeler Corporation, Shorty's Band, Barbecue Imagine, Behavioral Health Services, Tandem Diabetes Care, Matan's Creek Winery, Exotic Motorsports, Crawford & Co. Forever Flawless, Midwest Athletics, St. Vincent's Catholic Charities, Valley Christian Center, Acoustic Material Services, RCX Solutions, Social Butterfly Expressions and Plaid Pantry. Listen, this is just a small list of 25 too. These are small businesses just like yours and just like mine. And I've got a story that I'm going to share real quick. A friend of mine, Randy, his family small business was targeted and served with a lawsuit demanding over $80,000.

What? They were shocked. They didn't know what to do. They ultimately had to settle to make it go away for $18,000. And then they had to fix their website on top so that it wouldn't happen the second time. Here's what's happening. Law firms are employing, yes, they are employing individuals with disabilities to go find websites that are targets, prime candidates. So then they're filing the lawsuits and then the owners are being forced to settle. So lawsuits against small businesses for non compliance with ADA regulations first began to rise. And this makes sense really significantly in 2017.

Now you can imagine, right, thinking back to 2017, that seems like centuries ago on the Internet. Think about how far the Internet has come and now how much more people are using it for everything. Just between getting on their desktops and searching on their phones, all the stuff, right? So in doing some research and preparation for this live, I was just looking. According to some estimates, There were over 7,000 ADA related lawsuits filed back in 2017. In 2019, another 10,000. And year over year since then, the number has increased by 12%. So it's getting worse. All right. So for me, it's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when to comply with ADA regulations. We recommend using our tool called accessibe. It's a software that overlays your website. It's an AI powered solution that we can install on your website today. It uses machine learning algorithms, right? So to make your website accessible to people with disabilities. And it has a range of features and I'm going to do a screen share and just show you what that looks like in a minute. But one of the common questions that I get is, well, wait, if this is law, why don't we just design websites that way from the get go? Well, there's a few reasons, right? So to be truly compliant natively, like just your website standalone and not having to install anything on it, you would hate your website because it would be plain Jane. It would not be appealing to the general American public that do not suffer from disabilities. It would not have all the cool stuff that you want to have on your website that does market well to the rest of the population. Secondly, if you did invest in the expensive proposition of designing a website from scratch that was natively ADA compliant, anytime you made an update to that website, whether it be you or your web designer, you run the risk of it no longer being ADA compliant. I'll give you an example. So, Randy, my friend's small business, they were targeted because several of the images on their website didn't have alt tags. Alt tags are descriptions of the image that are on the backside of the code so that screen readers can describe the image to visually impaired people who can't see the image. So if you're missing alt tags on an image, your website is not compliant. So imagine if you have a gallery on your website or portfolio on your website and you add to it or you change out images and whoever's doing that work for you, whether it be a design agency or an employee or your cousin or your nephew or your kid, and they don't put those alt tags in, you are not ADA compliant. And my friend Randy and his family business is living proof. That cost him $18,000 and it could have cost him over $80,000. This is how important it is. So the nice thing about this software is that it overlays your website and it uses AI technology to make your website accessible on the fly to the people who need it. And because it scans your website every 48 hours, when an update is made, it picks up that update and that update is factored into the compliance solution. All right, so I am just going to share my screen really quick and I'm going to show you what this Software looks like on our website on MSW Interactive Designs. So give me one second.

I wish I could do this faster, but I really can't.

Okay. All right, so I'm going to share my website here. And so I've got the website. So this is just what the general American public sees. Right? But somebody that needs ADA compliance or disabilities, has disabilities of any kind of, they are going to see this. So this pops up and this enables someone to view the website.

Regardless of their disability, however they need to. So you can have a seizure safe profile. So you can see if I, if I turn that on, the brightness of the website goes away. And if there's anything flashing on the website, it goes away. Vision impaired profile. So things get bigger, there's more contrast. ADHD friendly profile. All right, so who knew that that was actually a disability? Yes, it can be claimed as a disability. So now you have the ability to, if you have adhd, to bring focus as you're reading.

Cognitive disability. And then I'll turn that off. You can do keyword navigation, you can do, I'm sorry, keyboard navigation, blind users for screen readers. And then there's more controls. So content scaling. You can highlight titles on the website, highlight links, magnify text, adjust the size of fonts on the website so that you can read it better.

See, you can adjust line height to space the text out more and then contrast, dark, light, high saturation. You can mute sounds, hide images. All of these things are available on the fly for people with disabilities.

Now, does that mean somebody won't file a lawsuit? No, but because you can sue anybody at any time for anything. Right. But what it does do is act as a deterrent. And additionally it comes with this accessibility statement which fully explains why the website is now compliant. So if you've got attorneys looking for easy prey on the ADA compliance thing, this can help you deter people from coming after your business for this particular issue. So I am going to stop sharing my screen really quick.

And we are going to wrap this up. So here's the thing.

First, let's recap why.

From a human standpoint, it's important. Right? So I've been kind of coming at it from the angle that you need to protect your business. From a human standpoint, it's definitely the right thing to do. Because ADA compliance ensures that your website's accessible to people with all kinds of disabilities. This includes people who have visual impairments, hearing impairments, and that's normally where our brain goes. Right. But cognitive impairments and physical impairments and disabilities so by implementing this tool, it covers all of those things and makes your website accessible to everyone, regardless of what their abilities are. More importantly or equally important, for small businesses, a lawsuit of that size can absolutely destroy your business, wipe everything out. So ADA compliance is. Since it's required by law now, and now it's starting to be enforced from the standpoint that people, now attorneys are going after companies that don't have this. It is so critical for the security and longevity of your business. I cannot emphasize it enough. I really try to coach.

Clients, new clients, that this is a worthwhile investment for your website. And it's like I said earlier, it's not a matter of if, it's a matter of when this happens to you. The ADA lawsuits are on the rise and it is not going to wane. It is absolutely not going to wane. I do it myself for my own website. That should tell you everything you need to know. So using the accessibe tool, which is what we partner with because I found it to be the best, fastest and most reliable way to get this resolved quickly for your website, is what I recommend. It ensures your website stays compliant even after updates, which is important, as I described. So I am just. I hate doing fear things like this, but you really should be scared.

Again, my friend Randy, who, you know, allowed me to share that story. I mean, it. It's easy when I just read off names of companies, yeah, I've heard of them, but look, when it happens to a friend, it was devastating. It was absolutely devastating to their business. So I urge you, move on this today. We can help you. We don't have to host your website, you don't have to be an existing client, but if you are a client, please reach out to us. We can fix this for you today so that you can sleep at night and not have to think about it. Leave a message or send a DM or call 573-552-8403 and we will get this all for you. All right, have a good day, everyone. Thanks for joining.