Category: Management Plugins

If you plan to grow a successful business online, the last thing you want is to learn the hard way that you have broken the law.

Online laws, regulations, and guidelines were designed to protect consumers and apply to anyone who sells, markets or promotes goods or services online. Anyone who owns a website risks being sued for not following compliance laws. Feigning ignorance about the law will not excuse someone from taking legal action against your business.

Recent laws introduced in 2014 to regulate how businesses promote advertising on their sites state that if you promote anything on your site for profit, then you will need to follow certain disclosure guidelines to prevent enforceable orders being issued against you by consumer protection agencies, such as the Better Business Bureau (BBB). Search online for information about “The Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program,” which regulates behavioral advertising across the internet to learn more.

(Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program)

The introduction of these laws has ramifications for various online business categories, including:

• Any form of advertising, like pay-per-click advertising
• Retarget Marketing
• Google Analytics (or other analytics software)
• Affiliate Marketing
• Product Creators
• Bloggers
• etc.

If your site does not display certain legal pages (e.g. terms and conditions of use, privacy statement, financial disclaimers, etc.), many third-party sites such as Google won’t let you advertise, sites like ClickBank or JVZoo won’t allow you to list digital products, PayPal could shut down your account and withhold payment of your funds, Facebook could reject your web applications, and you won’t be accepted into a number of advertising and affiliate merchant networks.

If your digital presence is not in compliance, you could also face a multitude of penalties, including fines, having your website shut down, even jail time!

In this guide, we look at the importance of having a compliant website and how to quickly add legal pages to your website using simple methods and resources.

Is Your Website Breaking Rules Or Regulations?

Disclaimer: Please note that we are not lawyers and we are not offering legal advice. As previously stated, this article is designed only to make you aware that your website may be subject to certain legal requirements in accordance with federal, regional or local laws and regulations governing business online and that compliance may be required with the terms of service of 3rd-party companies whose products or services you use

Why It’s Important To Make Your Website Compliant

Is your business at risk? Consider for one minute what could happen to your business in the following scenarios:

• A customer suffers a cardiac arrest after purchasing your online fitness program.
• The skin care lotion you sell as an affiliate gives someone allergic reactions.
• You’ve let your subscribers know that you won’t sell their information, but you have not described exactly what you will do with their details.
• Someone copies content from your website and puts it up on their own website.
• There is no statement on your site making your site users aware that you’re an affiliate for the product you’re recommending and may receive a financial benefit if visitors buy it.
• You have not spelled out the terms and conditions of your refund policies.
• Online visitors claim the testimonials on your site are fake and decide to sue you.
• You didn’t disclose in a product review that you received a free copy of the product.
• Your website contains adult-related information and you didn’t take appropriate measures to restrict access by underaged persons.

Consider also these actual examples of costly compliance breaches:

• A CPA Marketer failed to provide adequate disclaimers telling visitors they would have to give up personal information (including credit card details to complete an offer they were promoting. Cost = $390,000.
• A social networking app developer copped a whopping $800,000 fine for collecting personal information without users’ knowledge and consent – including storing children’s private information.
• Facebook’s Terms Of Service does not allow users to scrape Users IDs. Many internet marketers gambled that they could get away with it and lost. Their accounts were shut down, resulting thousands of $$$ in lost revenue.
• An independently-conducted 2010 study by Brad Geddes of SearchEngineLand, showed that, of a couple of hundred randomly-chosen websites, more than 90% were breaking at least one of Google’s policies, more than 65% had broken 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 cautions or lose access 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 litigation through non-compliance?

Regardless of whether you are a:

• PPA (Pay Per Action) Marketer
• Network Marketer
• Affiliate Product Marketer
• AdSense Publisher
• Niche Publisher
• Amazon Affiliate
• e-Commerce Store Owner
• Adult Content Publisher
• Provider Of Freelance, Consulting Or Coaching Services
• Seller Of Any Service Or Product Online

You need to ensure that your website or blog remains fully compliant with the law.

Complying With Third-Party Companies

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

You are expected to let your site users know that your business complies with legal requirements and recommended guidelines. This not only increases trust and buyer confidence in your website, it’s also required in many cases by most companies you will interact with.

Let’s take a look at some examples:

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

(Google Analytics – Policy Requirements)

Generating revenue with your websites with Google AdSense …

(Google AdSense ads - policy requirements)

And even promoting your products using Google AdWords …

(Google AdWords – Policy Requirements)

If you sell digital products with places such as ClickBank, JVZoo, or other established merchant networks, you will need to add a number of legal pages to your site before they will approve your products for sale …

(Policy requirements for ClickBank product vendors)

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

(FTC – consumer policies and regulations)

FTC Regulations – Ensure That Your Website Is Compliant

New FTC regulations governing how business is conducted online were introduced in March 2012. A quick search online will easily reveal that many websites are unaware (or choose to ignore) these requirements. As has already been the case, this often prompts the FTC to make an example of businesses and prosecute site owners in an effort to get other businesses to comply.

If you do any type of money-making activity online, therefore, it’s best not to take chances. Even if your business is not located in the U.S. we strongly recommend protecting your business by making sure that your website is compliant with all FTC guidelines and regulations.

Various resources online provide guidelines for structuring disclaimers and disclosures to help your site meet FTC requirements. We provide additional references at the end of this article …

(Structure your disclaimers and disclosures correctly to avoid running foul of laws and regulations)

Don’t Forget Social Media Apps

If you plan to develop social networking applications that integrate with your site, social networking sites like Facebook, Twitter, and many others will require you to provide 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 service providers like Google, Facebook, etc., then assume that you most probably are.
• If you plan to promote services or products on your site via affiliate marketing, or monetize your pages with Google AdSense, Amazon, or eBay ads, or using Google AdWords to drive visitors to your pages, 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 - don’t risk having your accounts shut down.
• If you’ve been wondering if “borrowing” a Copyright Notice is Copyright infringement, take proper precautions to protect yourself and your business interests.

(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, almost all third-party websites require you to comply with their terms of use and policies)

What Legal Information Should You Add To Your Website To Be Legally Compliant?

If your website falls short in areas of compliance, then you will find this section helpful.

Adding the following compliance pages to your website should keep your business out of trouble with most consumer protection authorities and third-party providers, and even help to avoid potential legal issues):

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

Additionally, you may want to consider implementing one or more of the pages listed below if applicable:

• Affiliate Disclosure (if you sell or promote affiliate products or services)
• Anti-Spam Policy
• Compensation Disclosure
• External Linking Policy
• Financial Disclaimers (if your website provides advice about financial areas or income opportunities)
• Refund Policy (if you sell products or services online)
• Video/Audio Terms Of Use (if you provide users with access to videos or audio files on your site)

Types Of Disclosure Pages

It’s important to add correct disclosure information to your site. For example:

• No Material Connection – Lets site users be aware that you’re not receiving compensation for writing the article.
• Affiliate Links – Lets your visitors know that you will receive compensation if they act on your recommendation and buy through your affiliate links.
• Sample Or review Copy – Lets your visitors know that you have received a review or sample copy of the product or service by the author or product developer.
• Sponsored Post – Informs visitors that you have been compensated in some form to write the article.
• Third Party Advertising – Informs your 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 display prominently on their sites since January 1, 2014.

Adding Legal Pages To Your Website

Ideally, you should have a lawyer prepare the content of your legal documents. Once you have this completed, there are several ways to add them to your website.

Uploading Legal Pages Manually

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

We recommend creating a legal folder on your web server and uploading HTML pages containing your legal documentation to this directory via FTP …

(Upload legal pages to your web server via FTP)

You can then add a link to your 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 visible to all site visitors. You can insert links to your legal pages into the sidebar menu (or the footer of your website or blog) to ensure that users can access the information from every web page …

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

For a detailed tutorial about displaying links to pages on your sidebar and footer, refer to this tutorial:

• How To Add And Configure WordPress Widgets In Your Sidebar

Ready-Made Legal Templates

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

Find Legal Forms

(Find Legal Forms)

Visit this website for more information:

• Find Legal Forms

Alternatively, you can purchase a package of cut & paste legal templates drafted by legal attorney Scott Talbert …

Cut And Paste Website Legal Pages

(Scott Talbert’s Legal Page Templates)

Cut & Paste website legal templates were created by an attorney and feature less passive voice and more plain language phrasing and can be customized with simple 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
• Terms of Service & Conditions of Use.

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

Go here for more details:

• Cut And Paste Website Legal Pages – Website Legal Pages

Legal Page Plugins

In addition to using templates, you can simplify things using plugins.

Here are some legal WordPress plugins worth looking into:

WordPress Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress

(WordPress Legal Pages)

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

This plugin is not free, but it’s a low-priced and well-supported premium plugin that will make the task of creating and implementing legal pages on your website much easier and save you a great deal of time.

Some of the benefits of using WordPress Legal Pages plugin are:

• Built-in Legal Templates – Includes over 20 built-in legal page templates created by professional lawyers.
• Very Quick And Easy To Use – Set up most of your basic legal pages in around 3 minutes with a few clicks of the mouse.
• Fully Customizable Pages – The plugin includes fully customizable and completely editable legal form templates (e.g. Terms of Use, Disclaimer, Privacy Policy, Earnings Disclaimer and more!)
• Editable Pages – Full WYSIWYG editor lets you edit legal pages just like any page on your website.
• Shortcodes – Add shortcodes to your website or blog pages and the information is then automatically inserted into your pages when you publish.
• Exclude pages. The plugin lets you exclude pages from menus with a simple checkbox and delete and manage these like any WP page.
• Forced Options – Force page or post lockdown. When the user agrees to your legal terms, the page unlocks, giving them access.
• New Features – More features get added to this plugin with every new version.

After installing WordPress Legal Pages, a menu feature will be added to your main dashboard area …

(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin – Menu)

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

(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress – Settings Screen)

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

(WP Legal Pages – Type of Site dropdown menu)

Choose from a number of built-in legal templates …

(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress – Pre-configured 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 the benefits of using this WordPress plugin, visit the plugin website:

• WordPress Legal Pages

Compliance Bar – WordPress Plugin For Website Compliance

The Compliance Bar WordPress Plugin is a complete compliance and disclaimer solution for your site …

Learn more here:

• Compliance Bar – Compliance Plugin For WordPress

Legal Suite Pro Plugin

(Legal Suite Pro Plugin)

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 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 have packaged high quality, professionally written legal disclaimers into a plugin that can be installed quickly on any WordPress powered site. Your legal pages can be installed and set up on your site in less than one minute and the plugin licensing is flexible, allowing you to install and use the plugin on all of your websites (even sites that you decide to sell or flip).

Go here for more details:

• Legal Suite Pro

If hiring a lawyer to create your legal pages is out of your budget, then at least consider implementing some basic kind of legal protection on your site until you can afford a solicitor.

We want your website to be protected!

Download the FREE Legal Pages Generator software below, or use one of the better solutions we discuss in this article, such as using legal content, or a plugin as described in the section below.

(Legal Pages Generator Software)

Legal Pages Generator Software allows you to easily generate necessary legal documents for your website including Terms of Service, Privacy Statement, Copyright Notice, Website Disclaimer and optional Earnings Disclaimer.

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As we’ve previously pointed out, if you make money online, it’s important that your website is compliant with legal requirements of government agencies that regulate online business practices and any guidelines and terms of service for third-party sites that you may decide to promote or sell online. If your website isn’t compliant with laws intended 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?

Legal Disclaimer: Once again, we are not lawyers and we are not offering legal advice. Do your own due diligence and consult legal experts to ensure that your website fully complies with the law in your country or region.

Additional Resources

Below is a useful list of additional sites we suggest you visit to better understand what your business requires to remain compliant and meet its 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
• Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program – BBB
• 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
• US Patent and Trademark Office
• US Copyright Office

In Addition …

• 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
• 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 the importance of having a legally compliant website. Use the information presented above to quickly add essential legal pages to your WordPress site.

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