One of the worst predicaments a business owner can find themselves in is to be on the wrong side of the law.
Internet laws and regulations were designed to protect the rights of consumers and apply to anyone who markets, sells or promotes products or services online. Anyone who owns a website risks being sued for not following compliance laws. Feigning ignorance about legal requirements will not protect someone from taking legal action against your business.
Recent laws introduced in 2014 that regulate how businesses promote advertising on their sites state that if you promote anything on your site for profit, then you must follow certain principles of disclosure to prevent enforceable orders being issued against you by regulatory departments, such as the US-based Better Business Bureau (BBB). Search online for information about “The Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program,” which regulates behavioral advertising across the internet for more details.
(Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program – BBB)
These laws has consequences for various online business categories, including:
- Any form of advertising, e.g. Google AdSense
- Retarget Marketing
- Google Analytics (or other analytics software)
- Affiliate Marketing
- Product Creation
- Bloggers
- etc.
If your site does not display certain legal pages to visitors (e.g. terms and conditions of use, privacy policy, earning disclaimers, etc.), many sites like Google won’t let you advertise, online merchants like ClickBank will not allow you to list digital products on their network, PayPal could shut down your account and withhold payment of your funds, Facebook will suspend your web applications, and you won’t be allowed to promote a range of advertising and affiliate marketing networks.
If you are not compliant, you could face a whole range of penalties, including fines, having your website shut down, even jail time!
The purpose of this guide is to help make you aware that your website are required to comply with legal requirements in accordance with the laws that govern businesses online, the importance of being compliant with the terms of service of external providers whose services or products you may be recommending on your site, and that there are plugins for WordPress website owners that can help your sites become fully compliant, such as the plugins listed further below.
Does Your Site Comply With All Legal Requirements?
Disclaimer: Please note that we are not lawyers and we cannot offer legal advice. As previously stated, the purpose of this article is only to make you aware that your website may be subject to certain legal policies in accordance with federal, regional or local laws governing business online and that you may be required to comply with the terms of service of providers whose products or services you recommend
The Importance Of Making Your Website Compliant
Is your business at risk? Consider for a minute what the implications to your business would be if the situations below were to take place:
- A user has a heart attack after purchasing your online fitness workout.
- The skin care products you promote as an affiliate marketer gives people allergic reactions.
- You’ve told your subscribers that you will not sell their information, but you have not clearly spelled out what you plan to do with their details.
- Someone copies content from your site and puts it up on their website.
- You have not divulged to your site users that you are marketing a product as an affiliate that you may receive financial benefits if they buy it.
- You have not spelled out the terms and conditions of your return policies.
- Someone claims that the testimonials on your site are all fake and decides to sue you as a result.
- You didn’t disclose in a product review that you were given a free copy of the product.
- Your site contains adult-related information and you didn’t take sufficient measures to keep underage persons from accessing it.
Consider now the real case studies of costly compliance breaches described:
- A CPA Marketer failed to provide adequate disclaimers telling online users they would be required to give up their personal information (including credit card details to complete his offer. Cost = $390,000.
- A social networking app developer was slapped with a massive $800,000 fine for collecting personal information without users’ knowledge and consent – including storing private information about children.
- Facebook’s Terms Of Service prohibits using software that scrapes UIDs. Many internet marketers took a risk and lost. Their accounts were shut down, costing them thousands of dollars in lost revenue.
- An independently-conducted 2010 study by Brad Geddes of SearchEngineLand, showed that, of a couple of hundred randomly-picked websites, more than 90% had infringed at least one of Google’s policies, more than 65% had broken at least two of Google’s policies, and more than 40% had infringed at least 3 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 cautions or lose access entirely to the Google program whose policies with the violation, which could result in loss of income (e.g. AdSense or AdWords).
Can you see how a business owner can easily be exposed to the risk of non-compliance?
Regardless of whether you are a:
- CPA, CPC or PPA Marketer
- Multilevel Marketer
- Affiliate Product Promoter
- AdSense Publisher
- Niche Marketer
- Amazon Affiliate
- e-Commerce Store Owner
- Adult Content Publisher
- Freelancer, Coach or Consultant
- Online Seller Of Any Product Or Service
It’s imperative to ensure that your website complies with all laws and regulations governing the use of your site, wherever you are located.
Complying With 3rd-Party Companies
Leading online companies and government trade regulatory agencies emphasize the need and importance of complying with the terms and policies of 3rd-party service providers.
You are expected to let your visitors know that your business complies will all legal requirements and recommended guidelines. This not only increases consumer trust and confidence in your business, it’s also required in most cases by most companies you will do business with online.
Here are just some examples:
Google requires your site to display certain information if using their services. This includes using Google Analytics …
(Google Analytics – Policy Requirements)
Making money online with your website with Google AdSense …
(Google AdSense ads - policy requirements)
Or promoting your services or products via Google AdWords …
(Policy requirements for using Google AdWords)
If you plan to sell information-based products using merchants like ClickBank, JVZoo, or other established merchant sites, you will need to add various legal pages before they will approve your products for selling via their network …
(Policy requirements for vendors selling through ClickBank)
The Federal Trade Commission also requires that you display clear disclaimers and statements on your website, especially if you plan to sell products using product testimonials or endorsements …
(FTC – consumer policies and regulations)
FTC Regulations – Ensuring That Your Site Is Compliant
New FTC regulations governing the conduct of businesses online were introduced in March 2012. Search online and you will see that many business are still unaware (or choose to flaunt) these requirements. As is already the case, this often results in the FTC making an example of businesses and prosecuting 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 does not operate in the U.S. we strongly recommend protecting your business by making sure that your site is compliant with all FTC regulations.
Many online business resources provide guidelines and examples for structuring disclaimers and disclosures to help you meet FTC requirements. See the resources section at the end of this article for more information …
(It’s important to structure your disclaimers and disclosures correctly to avoid running foul of the law)
Social Media Apps Also Have Compliance Requirements
If you plan to create apps for your site users, you will also be required to provide social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, and many others with information about your legal pages …
(Facebook developer app – policy requirements)
- If you are unsure as to whether or not you may be breaking the law, and/or Terms of Service policies and guidelines of companies like Google, Facebook, etc., then you most probably are.
- If you are considering promoting products or services on your site using affiliate marketing, or making money online with Google AdSense, ads for Amazon or eBay products, or driving visitors to your site with Google AdWords, etc., then find out exactly what kind of legal information you need to display on your site to comply with all Terms Of Service and policy requirements to avoid having your accounts shut down.
- If you’ve ever wondered whether “borrowing” a Copyright Notice is Copyright infringement, take proper precautions to avoid becoming a magnet for litigation.
(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, almost all third-party services require you to comply with their policies and guidelines)
Common Legal Pages To Include In Your Website
If your web site falls short in aspects of compliance, then you will find this section helpful.
Adding the following compliance pages to your website will keep you out of trouble with most regulatory authorities and third-party service providers, and even help to avoid potential legal issues or even threats of legal action (e.g. “takedown” notices):
- About Us
- Contact Page
- Privacy Statement
- Terms Of Use
- Disclaimer Pages
- General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) Compliance
As well as the above pages, you may want to consider including one or more of the following pages where applicable:
- Affiliate Disclosure (if you sell or promote affiliate products or services)
- Anti-Spam Policy
- Earnings Disclaimer
- External Links Policy
- Financial Disclaimers (if your website or blog provides money-making advice)
- Refund Policy (if you sell products or services online)
- Use Of Media (e.g. if you provide users with access to download media on your site)
Types Of Disclosure Pages
It’s important to add correct disclosure information to your website. For example:
- No Material Connection – Lets readers be aware that you are not receiving compensation for writing the post.
- Affiliate Links – Lets your readers know that you may derive some form of financial or similar type of benefit if they purchase through your affiliate link.
- Sample/Review Copy – Explains to site users that you have been given a review or sample copy of the product or service.
- Sponsored Post – Disclosure that lets readers know that you have been compensated in some form to write the content.
- Third Party Advertising – Informs users that you’re using online behavioral tracking technology. This is required to satisfy the “enhanced notice” the Better Business Bureau has been requiring website publishers to show prominently on their sites since January 1, 2014.
Adding Legal Content To Your Website
Ideally, you should consult a lawyer or a legal firm and ask them to prepare the content of your legal documents. Once you have this completed, there are several ways to include them in your website.
Uploading Legal Pages To Your Website
If someone prepares the legal content for you as standard web pages (e.g. HTML), you can simply upload these to your server, or have someone upload them for you.
We recommend creating a legals folder on your server and uploading HTML pages containing your legal documentation to this directory (e.g. via FTP) …
(Upload legal pages to your web server using FTP)
You can then add links to these legal pages from your WordPress site using a custom WordPress menu …
(Custom WordPress Menu Feature)
Displaying Legal Web Pages On Your Site
Make sure that your legal pages are fully up-to-date and clearly accessible to all visitors. You can insert these into the sidebar (or place them in the footer of your website) so that visitors have access to the information from all your pages …
(Display links to your legal information on all of your site’s pages)
We have created a detailed tutorial on adding links to pages on your sidebar or footer using widgets here:
Use Store-Bought Legal Templates
You can find attorney-prepared downloadable internet forms and agreements by searching online, or visiting websites like this one:
Find Legal Forms
(Find Legal Forms)
More information:
Alternatively, you can download a set of cut & paste legal templates drafted by legal attorney Scott Talbert to help businesses protect themselves online …
Cut & Paste Website Legal Pages
(Website Legal Pages)
Cut & Paste website legal pages feature less passive voice and more plain language phrasing and can be customized with a simple quick search and replace to add your own business details, then pasted into your pages.
The legal templates included in Scott Talbert’s Legal Page Templates include:
- Anti-Spam Policy
- Copyright Notice
- Disclaimer: multi-discipline professional disclaimers
- DMCA Compliance
- Federal Trade Commission Compliance
- Privacy Policy: Google, DoubleClick DART, etc.
- Terms of Service & Conditions of Use: includes inter- & intra-page redundancy, Contra Proferentem provision, reservation of rights, and exclusive social media admonition.
You can either create a new page on your website for every legal form you want to add to your website, then paste the content from the templates into your web pages and publish or upload these to your server as described previously.
To learn more, go here:
Legal Page Plugins
In addition to using legal templates, another option for adding legal pages to your site is to use WordPress plugins.
Here are some great plugins for WordPress-driven websites and blogs worth looking into:
WP Legal Pages
(WP Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress)
If manually creating legal pages for your site seems too time-consuming for you, then consider choosing WordPress Legal Pages instead …
WP Legal Pages is not a free plugin, but it’s a very low-priced and well-supported premium plugin that will help simplify the job of creating and implementing legal pages on your website and save you many headaches.
Some of the benefits of using WP Legal Pages plugin are:
- Pre-written Legal Templates – Includes over 20 built-in legal page templates created by a team of professional lawyers.
- Quick And Easy To Use – Set up most of the basic legal pages you will need in a few minutes with a few clicks of the mouse.
- Fully Customizable Pages – Includes customizable and editable legal form templates (e.g. ToS, Disclaimer, Privacy Policy, Earnings Disclaimer and more!)
- Editable Pages – Content editor lets you edit legal pages just like every other page on your website.
- Shortcodes – Add shortcodes to any of your website or blog pages and the information will 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 new menu feature will appear in your WP dashboard section …
(WordPress Legal Pages – Legal Pages Menu)
This lets you view, create and edit legal pages from your admin area …
(WP Legal Pages Plugin – Settings Area)
The plugin gives you the option of creating legal pages for different types of websites, such as business websites, review sites, Amazon sites, etc …
(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin – Page type dropdown menu)
You can also select from several pre-configured legal templates …
(WP Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress – Built-In 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
Visit the plugin website to learn more about this powerful plugin:
Compliance Bar – WordPress Plugin For Website Compliance
total website compliance & disclaimer solution …
Learn more about the plugin here:
Legal Suite Pro
(Legal Suite Pro Plugin For WordPress)
Legal Suite Pro 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 Use
- Earnings Disclaimer
(Legal Suite Pro For WordPress – 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 site. Your legal pages can be installed and set up on your site in one minute or less and the plugin licensing is flexible, allowing you to install and use the plugin on all of your websites.
For more details, visit this site:
If hiring legal experts to create your legal pages is currently out of your budget, then consider implementing at least some basic type of legal protection on your site until you can afford to hire a legal expert.
We want your business to be safe!
Download the Legal Pages Generator software below (for FREE!), or choose one of the better solutions we discuss in this article, such as using legal forms, or a WordPress plugin as described in the section below.
(Legal Pages Generator)
Legal Pages Generator Software quickly generates necessary legal documents for your website including ToS, Privacy Statement, Copyright Notice, Website Disclaimer and Earnings Disclaimer.
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As stated earlier, if you do any kind of business online (or are planning to), it’s important that your site is found to comply with regulatory agencies and the terms of service (TOS) and guidelines for 3rd-party services and products that you may be promoting or advertising online. If your website doesn’t comply with laws designed to protect consumers, you’re breaking the law.
Non-compliance 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 cannot provide legal advice in this article. You are strongly advised to do your own due diligence and consult a legal expert to ensure that your website is compliant with the law pertaining to your business.
Additional Resources
Below is a time-saving list of sites we suggest you visit to better understand what your business requires to remain compliant and meet legal requirements and guidelines:
- FTC Latest List Of Rules & Regulations
- Federal Trade Commission 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
Also …
- Google Analytics Help – Policy requirements for Google Analytics Advertising Features
- Google AdSense Program Policies Explained
- AdSense Help – Required Content
- Google AdWords – Information Collection And Use
- 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 provided above to quickly add essential legal pages to your site using inexpensive resources and solutions.
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"This is AMAZING! I had learnt about how to use WordPress previously, but this covers absolutely everything and more!! Incredible value! Thank you!" - Monique, Warrior Forum