Amar Trivedi - Review & Testimonial

Amar, It's nice to have you on today, and I appreciate you're taking the time to do this. I want to ask you a few questions about your experience, about web accessibility, about your company, and of course, your experience with us, accessiBe. But before we get in, do you mind telling me a little bit more about yourself and your company AmDee?

Sure. So I have been doing web development since I would say 1996-1997. I have a lot of experience doing web development.

One of my last jobs before I started AmDee was working as a software architect of the auto project for NIST, National Institute of Standards and Technology. And I was introduced to web accessibility way back in 2008 when I worked again as a software architect for a HUD, Housing and Urban Development Department project. And then, when I started AmDee in 2009, one of our first clients was an institution or an organization that provided information for kids and youth that dealt with a disability. So one of their requirements was that their site has to be accessible since they provided information for kids with disabilities.

And then, over some time, not only that I understood what accessibility meant, but also how important it’s. And from a personal experience, when I had a tennis elbow and couldn't use a mouse, I realized that making a website accessible is extremely important because I couldn't use it. Then I couldn't use a mouse with my tennis elbow.

Oh, wow. That's precisely hitting it right on the nose. And, it seems to be that people who discover web accessibility and not coming from that world.

Right.

It seems like Pandora's box, and the plot thickens as you go into it. You understand the seriousness of the situation and how much responsibility we individually have to spread the word about its importance and what we need to do to find a solution. Right?

Sure. Everybody deserves equal access.

And I won't take that from you, and you kind of answered my question is why is it essential for you to make your clients’ websites accessible in short? But do you want to maybe elaborate on that a little bit more?

Sure. So, as I mentioned, we work with many nonprofits, and one of our biggest client bases is nonprofits that work in the education space. So a lot of them are government-funded. So from one aspect, of course, they have to be compliant.

Their website has to be accessible. But also coming from the nonprofit sector, they understand the Importance of doing the right thing. Often, even though they may not have the budget, they desire to make their website as accessible as possible. We have started doing this since 2010, having every website that we make, if it’s a brand new website or a redesigning, we include accessibility as a must, so you cannot make us create a website that’s not accessible.

So we have been doing that as part of giving back and understanding that it's an essential aspect of making a website. And like you said, as an individual, as an organization, as somebody who has been doing software development for more than 20 years, I take it as my responsibility that when we launch a website or when we publish a website, it’s as accessible as possible.

Yeah, it's a very noble cause, and we're, we're delighted to be partnered with you guys. And we don't take it for granted either. I'm sure that you and your vast experience in the web accessibility work, of course, developing this into your offering, now something that's a de facto kind of standard of onboarding new customers. With web accessibility in mind, you take it very seriously. You’ve been very diligent about who you choose to partner with.

Compared to the alternatives you've looked into, why did you choose to go with us in the end?

So, once I started looking at accessiBe, and I installed it on our website, and I was playing around with it, I was kind of checking it out, what are the features, and so on. So while I was doing that, one of our clients, and we had just a meeting, and I casually just told her that "Hey, this is a new plug-in that I've been playing with. Would you like to see a demo of it?"

She happens to be an executive director at one of the education-related nonprofits, and I showed her the capabilities of accessiBe, and she was so impressed.

She has a sibling, as well as some other people in her family, who have disabilities. So she told me, "Oh my God, this feature, Oh my.... but this person will be so happy to find this because they’re always struggling." And it's awesome.

And she said, "do you mind if I play if I show this to my family members and let them see how this can work on the website?" And I said, sure. So a day later, she sends me an email saying that "okay, how much, and how can I get this on my website? I want this right now!"

I mean, trying to find an easy solution that’s easy for us to install and easy for my clients to maintain while having all the features that somebody who has a disability. If we can cover as many as possible if I can find a solution like that, I would love to ask them. I can tell them that, “Hey, this works,” and they should try it, but when I get a testimonial from somebody dealing with a situation like this day in and day out, who loves it.

Since then, she has told many of her peers and her colleagues to install it on their website. So we have ended up installing it on five other clients, so it's not even I'm doing the marketing, but it's coming from somebody who understands. And there are features that I really

would have loved to just do it on my own, but one of the thing that I love the most is the ability to stop all the animations. That may not seem like a big deal, but somebody who deals with somebody who has ADHD or somebody who doesn't like animation because that takes so much of their attention, getting that and just clicking on one button that will stop animation on the entire site, lovely feature. So there are some features which I couldn't find that easily in other solutions. And the other big thing from our perspective is that it's effortless for us to install and get our clients started.

That's wonderful. That's such a nice story to hear; by the way, that was the best story, and it seems to be that accessiBe, you didn't find accessiBe we ended up finding you at the end.

Well, you found us, of course, but it found a place with you and kind of hit a home run, especially when he started hearing from people that have disabilities and on the front lines with

these technologies have been diligently looking for these types over the years, and finding something that fits like that makes my job very easy, and it's very nice to hear.

We wish to continue this with you guys. AmDee is such a serious company that

breeds an inclusive culture not only does the work to achieve what people want when designing their websites but beyond that.

So we're very proud to partner with you guys and thank you very much for joining me today.

Sure. And I had been doing a lot of stuff related to accessibility. I have done a lot of presentations. I have taught accessibility in the past, but getting a simple solution for people to understand and get to is awesome. So, I'm thankful to accessiBe for providing a solution that my clients are super happy with because when they’re happy, of course, they go out and tell other people, and maybe that feels, sort of saying, makes the world a better place.