After an Audit Report: Next Steps
An accessibility audit report is a starting point, not a finish line. Once you receive the report, the next steps involve reviewing what was identified, prioritizing by risk, planning remediation, and establishing a cycle that keeps your site moving toward Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) conformance.
| Step | What It Means |
|---|---|
| Review the findings | Read through every identified issue, its location, and the WCAG success criterion it maps to. |
| Prioritize by impact | Rank issues by how severely they affect people using assistive technologies and by legal risk exposure. |
| Assign remediation | Route each issue to the appropriate team member or vendor with clear deadlines. |
| Verify fixes | After remediation, confirm each fix through screen reader and keyboard testing. |
| Schedule monitoring | Set up recurring scans and periodic re-evaluation to catch regressions. |
Review Every Identified Issue
A professional audit report lists each issue alongside its page location, the affected WCAG success criterion, and a description of the user impact. Start by reading the full report without skipping sections.
Pay attention to how the auditor categorized severity. Most reports distinguish between issues that block access entirely and those that create friction without preventing task completion. That distinction drives your prioritization.
Prioritize by User Impact and Legal Risk
Not every issue carries the same weight. A missing form label on a checkout page creates more risk than a decorative image with a redundant alt attribute on an archived blog post.
Two factors shape priority: how much the issue affects someone relying on assistive technology, and how much legal exposure the page carries. High-traffic pages with conversion actions (purchases, sign-ups, account access) rank higher. Issues on those pages that prevent a user from completing a task rank highest of all.
Group the issues into tiers. Address the top tier first, then work through subsequent tiers on a defined timeline.
Plan and Assign Remediation
Each issue should have an owner and a deadline. Code-level fixes go to developers. Content fixes (like missing alternative text or unclear link text) may go to content editors.
For organizations without in-house expertise, accessibility remediation services provide direct code and content fixes based on audit findings. Per-page remediation typically ranges from 250 dollars to 550 dollars depending on complexity.
Set realistic timelines. A full site remediation cycle commonly runs four to eight weeks for small to mid-size sites. Larger properties may require phased rollouts over several months.
Verify That Fixes Work
Remediation without verification is incomplete. After a fix is deployed, evaluate it using the same methods the auditor used: screen reader testing with NVDA or VoiceOver, keyboard-only navigation, and browser zoom at 200% and 400%.
Automated scans can confirm certain fixes (scans only flag approximately 25% of issues), but the remaining 75% requires human evaluation. A scan after remediation confirms the automated layer. A follow-up evaluation confirms the rest.
Establish Ongoing Monitoring
New code deploys, CMS updates, and content additions can reintroduce issues that were previously fixed. Recurring automated scans on a weekly or monthly schedule catch regressions early.
Beyond scans, periodic re-evaluation (annually or after major site changes) keeps your conformance status current. An accessibility audit is not a one-time event. It is the first step in a cycle of evaluation, remediation, verification, and monitoring.
The report tells you where you stand. What you do with it determines where you end up.