The Americans With Disabilities Act & Your Website

There is a potential legal risk related to retail websites and compliance with the requirements of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA). ABA has been working with legal counsel to assess the risk and to advise members.

The Americans with Disability Act was passed in 1990 as the nation's first comprehensive civil rights law addressing the needs of people with disabilities, prohibiting discrimination in employment, public services, public accommodations, and telecommunications. The law came into effect when the first Internet service providers were in their infancy.

Now, 26-years later, a debate is emerging about whether the ADA should apply to online retail: Is a website a “retail establishment” subject to the ADA? The United States Department of Justice (DOJ), advocacy groups, and at least one court have answered, “yes.”

Click here to find out about ADA compliance changes that you need to make to your website and recent changes that IndieCommerce has already made to your site.

Dramatically Increase Your Email List

Over the past 5 months we've asked several IndieCommerce sites to try a little experiment. These websites were using the standard email "subscribe" box to solicit new email addresses for their mailing list. The test sites added an "interstitial" subscribe pop-up box, so that when a customer lands on a page for the first time they were asked to join the store's mailing list.

We finally have some results to share and they are dramatic: One site reported a 450% increase in new daily subscribers to its email list.

If you currently use Constant Contact or Mail Chimp as your email service provider, we can show you how to set-up a pop-up interstitial on your website. Just drop us an email at [email protected] and we will show you how to increase your email subscriber list.

For past editions of IndieCommunication, visit this page.