If a high street shop is your business, then you'll know that in order to make any money, you need to get people through the door. It doesn't matter what it is that you're selling, you need to make it as easy as possible for would-be customers to come inside, find what they might like to buy, and buy it. All of which any store owner would be expected to understand.

But what if your store exists only in the online world? You no longer have a physical layout to be concerned with, no doors to get through, shelves to look along, checkouts to find - nothing like that. So, do online retailers still need to be concerned with the ease of finding and buying items? And is there actually anything that can be done?

Yes. And yes. Accessibility issues are every bit as important for online retailer, and in some cases there even exists a legal obligation to ensure that a website is accessible. However, the questions that an online accessibility strategy has to address are fundamentally different to those that a physical store will meet with, and it's important to understand what your organisation needs to provide, and how.

However, it's not important solely because there could potentially be a legal duty; it's important because your company needs customers' business, and revenue can only suffer if you don't make your online enterprise accessible to everyone who may want to make use of it.

Accessibility for different abilities and disabilities

We can group accessibility issues into two categories: those that concern an individual's physical ability to access the site in its entirety, and those that concern the limitations of their technology. We'll look at the physical side first. No element of your website should provide an obstacle to any user, whatever their abilities and disabilities. However, avoiding such obstacles is easier than you might imagine, a combination of common sense and very straightforward techniques.

Many people access the internet using text readers, a simple piece of software that turns text on a webpage into audio. This is a vital tool for blind and visually impaired users, as well as for those who have difficulties reading; consequently, it's essential that information on your site can be understood by the visitors' reader. This means always having a text description of visual content, and ensuring that text on your site entered in the body of the page, not uploaded within an image (as reading software can't detect words that appear in a picture).

It's also important that your site can be fully understood without colour, for those unable to perceive them, and that any scrolling or automatically refreshing content can be paused, to assist those who'll need longer to understand all the content.

There are also guidelines that you should follow which, as well as providing accessibility for visitors with disabilities, make the experience easier for everyone. Keep font changes and clutter to a minimum, so as not to create a confusing appearance. Be sure to always use contrasting colours, so that all your content is easy to read. And limit yourself to language your audience is likely to understand - avoid jargon and colloquial terms - keeping everything simple and making it easier for customers to find the goods and services they require.

Accessibility for technological limitations

It might not always be a visitor's own abilities and disabilities which can restrict their access to a site. The technology they're using might not be what you had in mind when designing the site, and it's essential no obstacles come between them and purchasing from your business; it may be that their software or hardware is out of date, they may be visiting your site from a more limited device (such as a mobile), or they may choose to use a less popular browser or to have certain aspects of a page disabled.

However they come to your site, they should be able to use it: a key part of this is that they should always be able to fully understand your site from plain text alone. That doesn't mean you can't use images, banners, videos, audio content and colours - all of which can be very useful in making your site distinctive and attractive - but rather that if a visitor only sees the text in black and white, they should find it just as easy to understand and use the site as someone who can see everything.

You also need to be sure that the content of your site doesn't take up too much of the screen. You might be looking at it on a high-quality monitor with an impressive resolution, but others may not have that advantage, so it's worth ensuring that the page can be viewed effectively with a resolution as low as 800x600. And if you have video or audio content, it's worth giving those users with a slower internet connection or computer the option to turn it off, to speed up their use of the site.

How users see and interact with your site will also depend on which browser they're using (including browsers for mobile devices), and there's a clear advantage in using web design software that allows you to see how your site will work on many different platforms. With Microsoft Expression Web, you can do just that, ensuring that your site appears at its best however its viewed - and all with just a couple of clicks.

Indeed, Expression Web can provide assistance and easy solutions in all aspects of accessibility, and it's certainly worth considering a short training course for yourself or your staff to make the most of the software, and fully to get to grips with key accessibility issues. And after all, you'll want to attract as many customers as possible - so there's never a good reason for not making it as easy as possible for them to give you their money.