One of the worst situations you can find yourself in as a website owner is to suddenly discover that you have broken the law.
If your website doesn’t comply with laws intended to protect the rights of consumers, you’re breaking the law.
Being non-compliant not only puts you at risk of incurring significant financial losses, but also the loss of your reputation. Why risk your money and reputation, when you can protect yourself so inexpensively?
In this post, we look at a simple and very inexpensive WordPress solution that can help make your website legally compliant just minutes.
Does Your Website Comply With All Legal Requirements?
As the digital business realm continues growing at an extraordinary rate and the rules keep changing, it’s important to stay informed about what’s happening and to make sure that your website remains compliant, especially if your digital presence is a significant part of your overall business strategy.
If there are no legal pages on your site (e.g. terms and conditions of use, privacy policy, legal disclaimers, etc.), many third-party sites like Google won’t let you advertise, digital marketplaces like ClickBank will not approve your digital products for sale, PayPal could close down your account and freeze your funds, Facebook and many other social networks will suspend your web applications, and you won’t be allowed into a number of advertising and merchant networks.
You could also be inadvertently leaving yourself open and vulnerable to being exploited by opportunistic people or organizations.
At the very least, if you don’t make it clear to your visitors that your web properties comply with legal requirements and regulatory guidelines, it could impact on your visitors trust and confidence about doing future business with you.
(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, almost all 3rd-party websites require you to comply with their terms of use and policies!)
Disclaimer: Please note that we are not lawyers and we cannot offer legal advice here.
The purpose of this article is to make you aware that:
- Your website may be subject to certain legal requirements in accordance with the laws and regulations that govern your business,
- How important it is to comply with the terms of service of third-party providers whose products or services you are offering or endorsing online, and
- There are cost-effective plugins for WordPress site owners that can help your business become compliant, such as the tool that we review in this article.
In this article, we review a simple plugin for WordPress users that provides a total compliance & disclaimer solution for your website.
Introducing …
Compliance Bar – WordPress Legal Plugin
Plugin Description
Compliance Bar is an easy-to-use plugin for WordPress users containing over twenty customizable compliance templates for your web presence …
More info: Compliance Bar
Plugin Benefits
Below are just some of the many benefits and advantages of using Compliance Bar to make your site instantly compliant:
Quick And Easy To Install And Set Up. Ready To Go To Work In Minutes.
Compliance Bar Plugin installs like every WP plugin. Just upload a zip folder containing the plugin to your Plugin folder via your WP admin login and activate.
Easy-To-Edit Templates
Easily make changes to the pre-built templates inside Compliance Bar from the settings menu with the WYSIWYG editor.
24/7 Support
The plugin developers provide dedicated support to help you if you experience any issues.
Additional benefits of using the plugin include the following:
- Customized Compliance Page Templates: Compliance Bar will create your legal pages in seconds and customizes them to your business and website.
- Video Training Library: Compliance Bar is not difficult to use - an entire library of training videos is available.
- Can Be Used In Every Country: As long as you consult someone who is qualified to give you legal advice to make sure that the built-in templates provided with the plugin are suitable and satisfactory for your business, country and website, you can use the plugin anywhere in the world.
- Use For All Website Purposes: As long as your website is built with WordPress, you can use the plugin for all website purposes. Select only the types of disclaimers which pertain to your specific business model (e.g. affiliate or CPA marketing, services, AdSense, AdWords, adult, medical, etc) and leave out any templates that are not necessary.
Features
Compliance Bar Plugin provides a number of features to WordPress users. Here are just some:
- Fast and simple to install and implement. Ready to start using in no time.
- Display Attractive Icons – The plugin will display links to your compliance pages using attractive icons that can be placed anywhere in your page. You can also upload your own icons.
- Show Restricted Content – If you plan to show content that should be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. content related to alcohol, ecigs, adult, etc.), you can display popups that force users to accept your website’s terms or disclaimers.
- EU User Cookie Compliance – If you are based in the EU or display your content to EU visitors, you need to be aware of EU compliance requirements. Compliance Bar displays an attractive bar notifying users and covering you from non-compliance issues.
- Record And Store IP Addresses – The plugin records the IP addresses of your visitors for reference, just in case a visitor accepts your terms or disclaimers and then claims they haven’t.
- Shortcode Driven – Compliance Bar uses shortcodes that automatically populate templates with your personal information. These shortcodes also allow you to place information anywhere on your website, (even in the popups).
- Mobile Friendly – Compliance Bar has individual settings for displaying on mobile devices or tablets and displays mobile optimized icons automatically based on the mobile browser being used.
Compliance Bar Features – Details
Once the Compliance Bar plugin is installed, users will then get access to various sections where you can configure the plugin’s settings.
Let’s briefly review these …
User Profile
There are a number of default categories in this screen where your business information can be entered (e.g. “Website URL,” “Registered Company Address,” “Location Details,” “Refund Period,” etc.). Not all categories are compulsory, but some are (e.g. “Business Name,” “Support Email,” etc.)
(Compliance Bar User Profile Page – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
The plugin uses dynamic shortcodes to insert the information in your page templates …
(Compliance Bar User Profile Page: Shortcodes – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Once the minimum required (i.e. compulsory) data has been entered into the user profile fields, users can then access the other plugin section.
Compliance Pages
The “Compliance Pages” screen contains all of the plugin’s compliance template pages …
(Compliance Bar: Legal Page Templates – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
When we last checked the Compliance Bar plugin website, there were over 20 compliance templates available:
- About Us
- AdSense Disclaimer
- Affiliate Agreements
- Affiliate Disclosure
- Amazon Affiliate Disclaimer
- Anti-Spam Policy
- Contact Us
- Copyright/DCMA Notice
- Disclaimer
- Double Dart Cookies
- Earnings Disclaimer
- External Links Policy
- FTC Statement
- Legal Disclaimer
- Linking Policy
- Medical Disclaimer
- Privacy Policy
- Returns/Refund Policy
- Support
- Terms
- Terms & Conditions
- Testimonial Disclosure
- Adult Content Disclosure
Creating legal pages for your blog or website is a simple process. Just select the checkboxes next to the pages you want to create and click the “Save” button on the “Compliance Pages” section …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Legal Page Templates – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Your legal pages will then be created and added under the “Pages” section of your site.
Compliance Bar Icons
The plugin is installed with a default set of attractive icons for referencing your legal pages …
Icons can be changed. You can purchase an additional set of icons from the plugin developer, or create/upload your own to match the style of your site’s design …
(Compliance Bar: Compliance Page Template Icons – Image source: plugin documentation)
Edit / Delete Legal Templates
You can easily edit and delete the legal templates from the “Compliance Pages” screen, just as you would any other page in WordPress …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Edit Compliance Page Templates – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Notes
- Customizing is recommended, as the pages contain generic content.
- The plugin will notify you if it detects existing similar pages on your site (e.g. pages created before you installed the plugin).
Compliance Bar
The plugin offers various options to customize the Compliance Bar, including position, displaying links or icon images, background colors and images, image size, selecting which pages to include an icon for in the Compliance Bar, whether or not to display the Compliance bar on your home page, which pages the Compliance Bar will display in, mobile settings, and offset distance …
(Compliance Bar Screen: Create Bar – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Notes:
- You can create more than one Compliance Bar to show different icons on different pages, or to cover different uses in other sections of your site.
- The plugin lets you display a Compliance Bar on the front page of your website, even if you are using particular WordPress themes (like Genesis, Thesis or Woo), where the home page is specifically configured through the theme itself as a built-in template, and not as a “regular” page.
- Due to the smaller size of mobile screens, there is a limit to the number of page icons you can display if you turn Mobile Settings “on.”
Once you have specified your Compliance Bar settings, it displays links to your compliance pages using dynamic icon bar on your site …
You have complete control over the location on your pages where you would like to feature the compliance bar …
PopUps
If you plan to publish content that may be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. information related to alcohol, tobacco, dating, etc.), Compliance Bar can display popups that restricts access to visitors who do not accept your terms and disclaimers.
The “Create Pop Up” tab gives you complete control over the settings and customization of your pop ups …
(Pop Ups Section: Create Pop Up – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
You can create more than one Pop Up for different pages, or to cover various uses throughout your site …
You can also set a delay time if you don’t want the Pop Ups to display as soon as visitors arrive, set a cookie duration to prevent Pop Ups from displaying again within a specific time period, and record the IP addresses of visitors who accept your terms and disclaimers for future reference …
(Pop Ups Screen: IP Log Details – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
EU Cookies
If your business is based in the EU or display your content to EU visitors, you must make users aware of your user cookies and notify them of how you use them …
The plugin lets you edit the settings for compliance with EU Cookies requirements, including the wording of your notification message and link text in the “EU Cookies” screen …
(EU Cookies Screen: Manage Settings – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Compliance Bar has a non-intrusive way of notifying your visitors and covering you from non-compliance.
Page Templates
The “Page Templates” screen, lists all of your compliance templates and shortcodes, and lets you modify their content …
General Settings
The “General Settings” screen, gives you access to general information, such as promoting and sharing the plugin and getting plugin updates …
User Feedback
Below are a few of the testimonials and feedback that plugin users have published about Compliance Bar:
”When I got my hands on Compliance Bar, I knew I needed help to be compliant, but I had no idea how much danger I was in, nor did I know all of the different things I needed to be compliant. Once I installed Compliance Bar, I was able to very quickly add all the items I needed to ensure I didn’t end up getting fined by various agencies, or have my site pulled from Google. The best part is that getting it all set up took only minutes, and I know that I am far safer than I was. Compliance Bar is one of the best plugins I have used in a long time.” Ray Lane – (The Video Guy)
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”Truly Amazing Product!” Patrick Mauchant – PT Enviromate Technology
Compliance Bar Plugin Tips
Here are some extra ways to use Compliance Bar:
- Protecting against content theft by spelling out your website’s terms of use.
- Display compliance icons on specific pages only.
- Ending refund disputes by clearly spelling out your refund terms before customers purchase.
- If you include content that is inappropriate for underaged viewers on your site, you can force visitors to click to confirm that they are of legal age to access your content.
Compliance Bar Product Support
Compliance Bar provides users with a dedicated team to assist users if they experience any issues. You also have access to full video training manuals.
Additionally, your purchase is backed by a no-risk, 30 day, 200% money-back guarantee. If your edition of Compliance Bar does not work within 30 days of purchase and it cannot be fixed within 48 hours (Monday to Friday), the plugin developers will refund twice your purchase price.
Product Cost
- Single License Edition – Install the plugin on a single domain. Price = $47 (Normally $127)
- Business Licensing – Can be installed on 25 of your own domains. Cost = $67.00 (Normally $197).
- Developer License Edition – Can be installed on multiple of your own sites. Install the plugin on any client site as part of a paid service. Cost = $97.00.
Note: The cost to purchase the Compliance Bar product can vary, depending on whether there are any promotions or limited-time special offers. When we last checked, the plugin retails for the amounts shown above. This may or may not be the actual price charged by the software developer when you visit the product website and there may be additional upsells or one-time offers after you’ve purchased.
Check the plugin’s website for the current pricing here: Compliance Bar Plugin
Additional Plugin Info
Legal Page Templates Approved By Lawyers – The plugin developers assure users on their website that all legal templates have been reviewed and approved by lawyers. Nonetheless, we highly recommend that you get professional advice from a qualified legal expert in your area for your own peace of mind.
For a demo video of the plugin in action, including help documentation and tutorials, FAQs, customer helpdesk, contact details and more, visit the Compliance Bar website.
The Bottom Line
Compliance Bar is an easy-to-use, simple and cost-effective solution for WordPress sites. We recommend downloading and installing this plugin for WordPress users if you want immediate peace of mind and legal protection.
For complete details, visit the plugin website here: Compliance Bar Plugin – Compliance Bar – WordPress Website Compliance Plugin
Important: Once again, please note that we are not lawyers and we are not offering legal advice here. You must do your own due diligence and consult a legal expert about the best way to ensure that your website is compliant with the law wherever your business is based.
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