Author: WP Compendium

If you do any kind of business online, you do not want to learn the hard way that you have broken the law.

As the digital realm continues growing at an overwhelming speed and the rules keep changing, it’s important that you stay on top of what’s going on and make sure that your website or blog remains compliant, especially if your digital presence plays a significant role in your overall business strategy.

New laws introduced in 2014 regulating how businesses promote advertising on their sites state that if you plan to promote anything on your website for profit, you must follow certain disclosure guidelines to prevent enforceable orders being issued against you by consumer protection departments, such as the US-based Better Business Bureau (BBB). Look up “The Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program,” which regulates behavioral advertising across the internet to learn more.

(Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program)

These laws affect various business categories, including:

• Any type of advertising, e.g. inline ads, Google Adsense, etc.
• Retarget Marketing
• Google Analytics (or other analytics software)
• Affiliate Marketers
• Product Creation
• Blogging
• etc.

If your website does not display certain pages (e.g. terms and conditions of use, privacy policy, earning disclaimers, etc.), many third-party sites like Google won’t let you advertise, sites like ClickBank or JVZoo won’t approve your digital products for sale, PayPal may shut down your account, Facebook could disapprove your web applications, and you won’t be allowed to promote most advertising and affiliate merchant networks.

Plus, you could also be inadvertently leaving yourself open and vulnerable to litigation.

In this guide, we discuss the importance of having a legally compliant website and how to quickly add legal pages to your site.

Does Your Website Or Blog Comply With The Law?

Disclaimer: Please note that we are not lawyers and we cannot offer legal advice about your website or business. As stated earlier, the aim of this article is only to make you aware that your website may be subject to certain legal policies in accordance with the laws and regulations governing business practices online and that compliance may be required with the terms of service of third-party companies whose products or services you endorse

Why It’s Important To Make Your Website Compliant

Are you at risk? Consider what the implications to your business would be if these situations were to take place:

• Someone suffers a heart attack after using your online fitness workout.
• The skin care lotion you promote as an affiliate marketer gives a number of users allergic reactions.
• Your opt-in list displays a statement informing subscribers that you won’t sell their information, but you haven’t clearly spelled out what you’ll do with the details you’ve collected.
• Someone copies content from your site and puts it up on their website.
• There is no statement on your site letting your site visitors know that you are recommending a product as an affiliate and may get paid a commission if visitors purchase it.
• You did not spell out the terms and conditions of your return policies.
• A visitor claims that your testimonials are all fake and decides to sue you.
• You didn’t disclose in a product review that you received a free copy of the product.
• Your website includes adult-related information and you did not take appropriate measures to keep underage persons from accessing it.

Consider too the documented examples of costly compliance breaches described:

• A CPA Marketer failed to provide adequate disclaimers telling online users they would have to give up personal information to complete his offer. Cost = $390,000.
• A social networking app developer copped a massive $800,000 fine for collecting personal information without users’ knowledge and consent – including storing private details about children.
• Facebook’s Terms Of Service does not allow users to scrape Users IDs. Many internet marketers took a risk and lost. Their accounts were shut down, resulting thousands of $$$ in lost revenue.
• An independent 2010 study by Brad Geddes of SearchEngineLand, showed that, of a couple of hundred websites chosen at random, more than 90% were in breach of at least one of Google’s policies, more than 65% were in violation of at least 2 of Google’s policies, and more than 40% were in breach of at least three of Google’s policies. Although the website owners could technically be sued by Google, more than likely what could happen, is that they would be issued notices or lose access to the Google program whose policies with the infringement, which could result in loss of income (e.g. AdSense or AdWords).

Can you see how easy it is to be exposed to the risks of litigation through non-compliance?

Regardless of whether you are a:

• CPA (Cost Per Action) or CPC (Cost Per Conversion) Marketer
• MLM Networker
• Affiliate Promoter
• AdSense Publisher
• Niche Marketer
• Amazon Associate
• EBay Seller
• Publisher Of Adult Content
• Provider Of Freelance, Coaching Or Consulting Services
• Seller Of Any Product Or Service Online

It’s vitally important to ensure that your digital presence stays fully compliant with the law.

Complying With 3rd-Party Services - ToS, Policies, etc.

Compliance with 3rd-party services terms and policies is important.

You are obligated to let your visitors know that your website complies will all legal requirements and professional guidelines. This not only improves consumer trust and buyer confidence in your site, it’s also required in most cases by most companies you do business with.

For example:

Google requires websites to display certain information if using many of their services or product features. This includes using features like Google Analytics …

(Google Analytics – Policy Requirements)

Monetizing your website using Google AdSense ads …

(Google AdSense advertising policy requirements)

And even promoting your products via Google AdWords …

(Google AdWords – Policy Requirements)

If you plan to sell information products with places like ClickBank, JVZoo, or other established merchant sites, you are required to add certain legal pages before they will approve your products for selling via their network …

(Policy requirements for vendors selling through ClickBank)

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) also requires you to add clear disclaimers and policies to visitors, especially when concerning the use of testimonials or product endorsements …

(FTC – consumer guidelines and regulations)

FTC Regulations – Ensuring That Your Site Is Compliant

New FTC regulations governing the conduct of doing business online were introduced in March 2012. A quick search online reveals that many business are unaware (or choose to ignore) these requirements. As documented on their website, this often prompts the FTC to make an example of businesses and prosecute companies for breaches of regulation in an effort to get other businesses to comply.

If you do any type of selling online, therefore, it’s best not to take any chances. Even if your business is not physically located in the U.S. it’s best to protect your business by making sure that your site is compliant with FTC regulations and guidelines.

A number of online business resources provide guidelines and examples for structuring disclaimers and disclosures to help you comply with FTC requirements. See the additional references and resources section at the end of this article for more information …

(Structure your disclaimers and disclosures correctly to avoid running foul of the law)

Social Media Applications Also Require Compliance

If you are planning to create social networking applications that will integrate with your site, you will also be required to provide social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, and many others with access to various legal pages …

(Facebook developer app – policy requirements)

• If you are unsure whether or not you may be breaking the law, and/or Terms of Service policies and guidelines of companies like Google, Facebook, etc., then assume that you most probably are.
• If you are considering promoting services or products online using affiliate marketing, or monetize your pages with Google AdSense, Amazon, or eBay advertising, or driving visitors to your site using Google AdWords, etc., then find out exactly what kind of legal information you are required to include on your site to comply with all Terms Of Service and policy requirements - don’t risk having your accounts shut down.
• If you have been wondering if “borrowing” a Copyright Notice is Copyright infringement, take proper precautions to avoid becoming a magnet for litigation.

(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, most third-party services require you to comply with their terms of use)

Common Legal Pages To Include In Your Website

If you suspect that your web site is falling short in areas of compliance, then you will find this section helpful.

At its most basic, adding the following legal pages to your site should help you stay out of trouble with most regulatory authorities and 3rd-party providers, and avoid possible legal issues):

• About Us Page
• Contact Us
• Privacy Statement
• Terms Of Use
• Website Disclaimer Pages
• General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) Compliance

As well as the pages above, you may want to look into implementing one or more of the following pages:

• Affiliate Disclosure (e.g. if you promote or sell affiliate products or services)
• Anti-Spam Policy
• Earnings Disclaimer
• External Links Policy
• Financial Disclaimers (e.g. if your website provides general financial advice)
• Refund Policy (if you sell products or services online)
• Audio/Video Terms (if you allow users to download videos or audio files on your site)

Disclosure Pages – Types

Adding correct disclosure information is important. For example:

• No Material Connection – Informs your visitors that you’re not being paid for writing the article.
• Affiliate Links – Discloses to readers that you will receive compensation if they act on your recommendation and purchase through an affiliate link.
• Review/Sample Copy – Informs site users that you have received a review or sample copy of the product by the author or developer.
• Sponsored Post – Discloses to readers that you have been compensated in some way to write the post.
• Third Party Advertising – Informs visitors that you’re using online behavioral tracking technology. This is required to comply with the “enhanced notice” the Better Business Bureau has been requiring website publishers to show prominently on their sites since January 1, 2014.

How To Add Legal Content To Your WordPress Site

Ideally, you will consult a lawyer and ask them to prepare the content of your legal documents. Once you have this, there are several ways to include them in your website.

Uploading Legal Pages Manually

If someone prepares and delivers the legal verbiage for you in standard web page formatting (e.g. HTML), you can simply upload these to your web server, or have someone upload these pages for you.

We recommend adding a legals directory to your server and uploading HTML pages containing your legal documentation to this folder via FTP …

(Upload legal pages to your web server using FTP)

You can then add a link to your legal pages from your WordPress site using custom links in your menu administration …

(WordPress Menu)

After uploading your legal pages, make sure that these are fully up-to-date and clearly accessible to visitors. You can insert links to your legal pages into your sidebar (or place them in the footer of your website) to ensure that visitors will be able to access legal information from all your pages …

(It’s important to display links to your legal pages on all of your website’s pages)

To learn more about displaying links to pages on your sidebar, see this step-by-step tutorial:

• Adding WordPress Widgets To Your Sidebar Navigation Section

Ready-Made Legal Templates

You can easily find attorney-drafted disclosures and downloadable forms and agreements just by searching online, or by going to websites like this one:

Find Legal Forms

(FindLegalForms.com)

More info:

• FindLegalForms.com

Alternatively, you can purchase a package of cut and paste website legal templates drafted by attorney Scott Talbert to protect businesses online …

Cut And Paste Website Legal Pages

(Scott Talbert’s Legal Forms)

Cut & Paste website templates feature less passive voice and more plain language phrasing and can be easily customized with a simple quick search and replace to insert your own business name and URL, then pasted into your web pages.

The legal templates included in Scott Talbert’s Website Legal Forms include:

• Anti-Spam Policy
• Copyright Notice
• Disclaimer
• DMCA Compliance
• Federal Trade Commission Compliance
• Privacy Policy
• ToS & Conditions of Use.

You can either create a new page for each legal form you want to add to your website, then paste the content from the templates into your pages and publish or upload these to your server as described earlier.

Go here for more details:

• Scott Talbert’s Legal Form Templates

Legal Pages – WordPress Plugins

As well as using legal templates, you can simplify things by using plugins.

Here are some great legal plugins for WordPress users worth looking into:

WP Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress

(WordPress Plugin – WP Legal Pages)

If you don’t want to bother with creating legal web pages manually, then consider installing WP Legal Pages instead …

This is not a free plugin, but it’s a low-priced and well-supported premium WordPress plugin that will simplify the job of creating and implementing legal pages on your website and save you time.

Here are just some of the benefits of using the WP Legal Pages plugin:

• Pre-written Templates – The plugin gives you access to over 20 built-in legal templates created by a team of professional lawyers.
• Very Quick And Easy To Use – Set up most of your basic legal pages in a few minutes with a few clicks of the mouse.
• Fully Customizable Pages – The plugin includes fully customizable and editable legal form templates (e.g. Terms Of Service, Disclaimer, Earnings Disclaimer, Privacy Policy and more!)
• Editable Pages – Content editor lets you edit legal pages like any WP page.
• Custom Shortcodes Integration – Add shortcodes to your website or blog pages and the information will then be automatically inserted into your pages when you publish.
• Exclude pages. Exclude pages from menus with a simple checkbox and delete and manage these like every other page on your website.
• Forced Options – Force page lock down. When users agree to your terms, the page unlocks, giving them access.
• Additional Features – New plugin features get added when new versions are released.

After installing WordPress Legal Pages, a menu item is added to your main WP dashboard menu section …

(WP Legal Pages – Menu)

This lets you create, edit and view your legal pages from the admin area …

(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin – Settings Area)

The plugin gives you the option of creating legal pages for different types of sites, such as business websites with products, affiliate websites, Amazon sites, etc …

(WP Legal Pages – Page Type)

You can also select from various pre-written legal templates …

(WP Legal Pages – Built-In Legal Templates)

Legal page templates include:

• Terms of Use (Users are forced to agree to Terms and Conditions before using site)
• Linking Policy
• External Links Policy
• Terms and Conditions
• Refund Policy
• Affiliate Disclosure
• Privacy Policy
• Affiliate Agreement
• Facebook Privacy Policy
• Earnings Disclaimer
• Antispam Policy
• DoubleClick DART Cookies Policy
• Disclaimer Template
• FTC Disclosure Statement Template
• Medical Disclaimer Template
• Testimonials Disclosure – As per FTC guidelines
• Amazon Affiliate Disclosure Template
• DMCA Policy Template
• California Privacy Rights Policy Template
• Digital Goods Refund Policy Template
• COPPA – Children’s Online Privacy Policy Template
• Blog Comments Policy Template
• Newsletter Subscription Policy and Disclaimer Template
• FTC Disclaimer Widget

To learn more about this plugin, go here:

• WP Legal Pages

Compliance Bar – WP Compliance Plugin

Compliance Bar Plugin is a total compliance & disclaimer solution for your online presence …

For more details, visit the plugin site here:

• Compliance Bar Plugin – WordPress Plugin For Website Compliance

Legal Suite Pro Plugin

(Legal Suite Pro)

Legal Suite Pro Plugin lets you easily install professionally-written legal pages such as:

• Anti-Spam Policy
• Copyright Notice
• DMCA Compliance
• FTC Compliance
• Privacy Policy
• Social Media Disclosure
• Medical Disclaimer
• Terms of Service
• Earnings Disclaimer

(Legal Suite Pro – Professionally-written legal forms)

Additionally:

• Drag & Drop FTC Disclaimer Widget: Add an FTC Disclaimer to any WordPress sidebar or widget area.
• Customizable EU Cookie Compliance Bar: Display an EU cookie compliance bar if you are getting traffic from the EU and your sites use cookies.

With just one-click you can install almost all of the legal pages your site needs and these professionally written legal pages can be created in your theme and/or as a standalone page outside of your theme.

The plugin developers secured rights to high quality, professionally written legal disclaimers and packaged them into a plugin that can be installed quickly on any WordPress powered site. You can have legal pages installed and set up on your site in one minute or less and the plugin licensing is flexible, allowing you to install and use this plugin on all of your sites.

For more details, go here:

• Legal Suite Pro Plugin

If using the services of lawyers to create your legal documentation is currently out of your budget, consider implementing some basic kind of legal protection on your site until you can afford legal services.

We want your site to be safe!

Download the Legal Pages Generator tool below (for FREE!), or choose one of the better solutions we discuss in this article, such as using ready-made legal templates, or a legal pages plugin - see section below.

(Legal Pages Generator Software)

Legal Pages Generator Software quickly generates necessary legal documents for your website including ToS, Privacy Statement, Copyright Notice, Website Disclaimer and optional Earnings Disclaimer.

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As we’ve previously pointed out, if you engage in any form of business online, it’s important that your site stays compliant with regulatory agencies and the guidelines and terms of service for 3rd-party sites that you may decide to promote or sell online. Your internet presence must comply with a wide range of regulations, some of which you may not be aware of.

Being non-compliant puts you at risk of suffering both financial losses and the loss of your reputation. Why risk your money and reputation, when you can protect yourself so inexpensively?

Disclaimer: Once again, please note that we are not lawyers and we are not offering legal advice on our website. We strongly advise you to do your own due diligence and consult a legal expert to ensure that your website fully complies with all legal requirements concerning your specific business.

Resources

Below is a useful list of sites we recommend you visit to help you better understand what may be required of your website to remain compliant and meet legal obligations:

• Federal Trade Commission Latest List Of Rules & Regulations
• FTC Advertising & Marketing Rules Of the Road
• FTC Advertising And Marketing On The Internet
• Better Business Bureau – Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program
• Dot Com Disclosures: Information About Online Advertising
• Restore Online Shoppers’ Confidence Act
• CAN-SPAM Act Guide
• Children’s Online Privacy Protection Rule
• FTC Regulatory Review Web Page
• FTC Rules and Guides Currently Under Review
• The Department of Commerce Internet Policy Task Force – Commercial Data Privacy and Innovation in the Internet Economy: A Dynamic Policy Framework
• FTC Staff Report: Self-Regulatory Principles for Online Behavioral Advertising
• FTC Final Guides Governing Endorsements and Testimonials
• United States Patent and Trademark Office
• United States Copyright Office

See Also …

• Analytics Help – Policy requirements for Google Analytics Advertising Features
• Google AdSense Program Policies Explained
• Google AdSense Help – Required Content
• Google AdWords – Information Collection And Use
• Google AdWords Help – What to include in your privacy policy for remarketing
• ClickBank – Creating Your First Product
• Facebook Platform Policies

We hope you have found this article useful and that it has helped you understand why it’s important to have a compliant website. Use the information above to quickly and easily add essential legal pages to your WordPress site using simple resources and solutions.

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