One of the worst predicaments you can find yourself in as a website owner is to receive a notice of legal action as a result of breaking the law.
Your website or blog has to comply with a whole range of laws and regulatory guidelines, some of which you may probably not even be aware of.
Being non-compliant puts you at risk of incurring both financial losses and the loss of your reputation. Why risk your money and your good reputation, when you can protect yourself so inexpensively?
In this post, we look at a simple and inexpensive solution for WordPress users that can help make your website compliant in minutes.
Is Your Website Or Blog Legally Compliant?
As the cybersphere continues to grow at an extraordinary rate and the rules constantly change, it’s vital that you stay informed about what’s happening and to make sure that your website remains compliant with all laws and regulations, especially if your web presence is an integral aspect of your business strategy.
Without legal pages on your web site (e.g. terms and conditions of use, privacy statement, financial disclaimers, etc.), many third-party sites such as Google won’t let you advertise, digital marketplaces like ClickBank won’t let you list your digital products for sale, PayPal could shut down your account and freeze your funds, Facebook will suspend your web apps, and you won’t be allowed into various leading advertising or affiliate marketing networks.
If your digital presence is not compliant, you could face a number of penalties, including fines, having your website shut down, even jail time!
At the very least, without making it clear to your visitors that your digital properties comply with legal requirements and guidelines, expect visitor trust and confidence in your business to seriously diminish.
(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, almost all third-party services require you to comply with their policies and guidelines!)
Legal Disclaimer: We are not lawyers and we cannot offer legal advice in this article.
The purpose of this article is to make you aware that:
- Your website may be subject to numerous legal requirements in accordance with compulsory laws and regulations that govern your business (some of which you may not even be aware of),
- The importance of maintaining compliance with the terms of service of third-party providers whose products or services you may be promoting or endorsing online, and
- There are solutions that can help your site become compliant, such as the tool that we discuss below.
If you suspect that your web site falls short in terms of compliance, below we review a simple WordPress plugin you should know more about.
Let’s Review …
Compliance Bar Plugin – WordPress Legal Plugin
Plugin Description
Compliance Bar is a simple and easy-to-use WordPress plugin that includes over twenty customizable compliance disclaimers for your site …
For more details, visit the plugin site here: Compliance Bar
Benefits
Below are just some of the many benefits and advantages of using Compliance Bar Plugin to instantly make your website compliant:
Ready To Start Using In Very Little Time
Compliance Bar Plugin is very easy to install. Simply upload it to your Plugins folder via your WordPress administrator account and activate.
Templates Are Really Easy To Edit
Easily make changes to the built-in compliance templates inside the plugin from the settings menu with the WYSIWYG content editor.
Dedicated Plugin Support
The plugin developers provide a dedicated support team to assist users if they experience any problems.
Some additional benefits of using this 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.
- Full Video Training Manuals: Compliance Bar is not complicated to use - an entire library of training videos is available if you need assistance.
- Use In Every Country: As long as you consult a qualified legal representative to make sure that the legal templates provided with the plugin are suitable and satisfactory for your business, country and website, you can use the plugin anywhere in the world.
- Can Be Used In All Niches: As long as your site is driven by WordPress, you can use the plugin for every website purpose. Just select the pages you need to include in your site and leave out any irrelevant pages.
Compliance Bar Plugin Features
Compliance Bar provides many features to web site owners. Here are just a few:
- Fast and simple to install and set up. Ready to go to work in minutes.
- Display Attractive Icon Bar – Display links to your compliance pages using attractive icons that can be placed on different locations on your pages. You can also upload your own icons.
- Show Restricted Content – If you plan to display content that may be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. information related to alcohol, tobacco, adult content, etc.), the plugin can display popups that require users to accept your website’s terms and disclaimers.
- EU User Cookie Compliance – If you do business in the EU or display your content to visitors in the EU, you need to be aware of EU Cookie law. Compliance Bar displays an attractive bar notifying your users and covering you from non-compliance.
- Record & 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 didn’t.
- Shortcodes – The plugin is integrated with shortcodes to automatically populate legal pages with your personal information. These shortcodes also allow you to place information anywhere on your website, (including the popups).
- Compatible With Mobile Devices – Compliance Bar has individual settings for displaying on mobile devices or tablets and displays mobile optimized icons automatically based on visitor web browsers.
Features – Details
After installing and activating the Compliance Bar plugin, you will then get access to various settings.
Let’s review these settings briefly …
User Profile
There are a number of default fields in this section where you can input your business details into entered (e.g. “Contact Name,” “Support Email,” “Company Phone Number,” “Market Niche,” etc.). Not all categories are required, but some are (e.g. “Contact Name,” “Support Email,” etc.)
(Compliance Bar User Profile Screen – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Compliance Bar uses dynamic shortcodes to dynamically populate and display the information entered into your User Profile fields into your legal pages …
(Compliance Bar Plugin User Profile Section: Shortcodes – Image source: plugin documentation)
Once the minimum required information has been input into the profile fields, you can then access the other sections of the plugin.
Compliance Pages
The “Compliance Pages” area includes a list of all of the page templates …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Legal Page Templates – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Last time we checked the Compliance Bar plugin website, there were over 20 compliance page templates available for complying with online business laws and regulations:
- About Us
- AdSense Disclaimer
- Affiliate Agreements
- Affiliate Disclosure Statement
- 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
- XXX Disclosure
Creating compliance pages for your blog or website is a simple process. Just select the checkboxes next to the pages you want to create and click ”Save” at the bottom of the “Create Pages” section …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Compliance Page Templates – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Your legal pages will then be created and added inside your “Pages” section.
Compliance Bar Icons
The plugin comes with a default set of icons for referencing your legal pages …
The Compliance Bar icons are customizable. You can purchase additional icons from the plugin developer, or create/upload your own to match the style of your theme …
(Compliance Bar: Legal Page Icons – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Edit / Delete Compliance Page Templates
You can easily edit and delete your compliance templates from the “Compliance Pages” screen, just like any other page in WordPress …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Edit Legal Pages – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Notes
- Customizing your legal pages is recommended, as the pages contain generic content.
- The plugin indicates if it detects existing similar pages on your site (e.g. pages created before you installed the plugin).
Compliance Bar
The plugin settings area provides various options to customize the Compliance Bar, including where to position the bar, whether to show links or icon images, background colors and images, icon size, selecting which pages to include an icon for in the Compliance Bar, whether or not to display the Compliance bar on your front page, which pages the Compliance Bar will display in, mobile settings, and more …
(Compliance Bar Section: Create Bar – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Notes:
- You can create an unlimited number of Compliance Bars to show different icons on different pages, or to cover a range of uses in other areas of your website.
- The plugin allows you to display a Compliance Bar on the home page of your site, even if you are using particular premium theme frameworks (like Genesis, Thesis or Woo), where the home page is configured through the theme itself as a built-in template, and not as a “regular” WordPress page.
- Due to the smaller size of mobile devices, there is a limit to the number of page icons you can display if you turn Mobile Settings “on.”
Once you have configured your Compliance Bar settings, it will display links to your compliance pages using dynamic icon bar on your site …
You have full control over the location on your pages where you would like your compliance icons to show …
PopUps
If your website contains content that may be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. information related to alcohol, ecigs, adult, etc.), Compliance Bar can display popups that force users to accept your site’s terms or disclaimers.
The “Create Pop Up” screen lets you fully customize your pop ups …
(Pop Ups Section: Create Pop Up – Image source: plugin documentation)
You can create unlimited customized Pop Ups displaying on different pages, or to cover a range of uses throughout your website …
You can also specify a delay time to prevent Pop Ups from displaying immediately, set cookie durations to prevent Pop Ups from appearing again within a specific time interval, and even record the IP addresses of visitors who accept your terms and disclaimers for future reference …
(Pop Ups Section: IP Log Details – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
EU Cookies
If your business is based in the EU or display your content to EU visitors, you need to be aware of EU Cookie law …
Compliance Bar lets you customize the settings for compliance with EU Cookies requirements, including the wording of your notification message and link text in the “EU Cookies” section …
(EU Cookies Section: 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” tab, lists all of your compliance disclaimer templates and shortcodes, and lets you modify the page content …
General Settings
The “General Settings” tab, gives you access to general information, such as promoting and sharing the plugin and getting plugin updates …
Testimonials
Below are a few of the testimonials and feedback that users have submitted for the Compliance Bar Plugin plugin:
”One of the Best Plugins I Have Used” Ray Lane – (The Video Guy)
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”I wanted to reach out & say Compliance Bar is a truly amazing product for keeping my online marketing efforts on the right side of the internet laws. Not only does it look fantastic on my sites, it is also intuitive and robustly powerful. It is packed full of features to allow me the flexibility to control exactly what my visitors need to see and know” Patrick Mauchant – PT Enviromate Technology
Compliance Bar – Useful Tips
Below are some additional ways to use Compliance Bar:
- Protect against content theft by spelling out your website’s terms of use.
- Display compliance icons only on specific pages of your website.
- Ending refund disputes by clearly spelling out your refund terms before customers purchase.
- If you have content that is deemed inappropriate for persons below a certain age on your site, you can force visitors to click to confirm that they are of legal age to access your content.
Support
Compliance Bar provides users with dedicated support to assist you if you experience any difficulties. You also get access to a complete library of training videos.
Additionally, your purchase is backed by a risk-free, 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 (M – F), your purchase price will be refunded in double.
Software Cost
- Single User License – Install the plugin on a single domain. Price = $37 (Normally $127)
- Business Edition – Install the plugin on up to twenty-five of your own sites. Cost = $67.00 (Normally $197).
- Developer Edition – Install the plugin on all as many of your own sites as you need. Install the plugin on any client site for payment or as part of a paid service. Price = $97.00.
Please Note: Price details for this product can vary, depending on whether there are any promotions or limited-time special offers. The above reflects the current pricing when this review was published. This may not be the actual price set by the product seller when you visit the product website and you may be shown additional upsells or one-time offers after purchasing.
Check the plugin’s website for current pricing details: Compliance Bar Plugin – WordPress Plugin For Website Compliance
Additional Plugin Info
Legal Page Templates Reviewed By Lawyers – The plugin developers assure users on their website that all legal page templates have been reviewed and approved by a lawyer. Nonetheless, we strongly recommend that you get advice from a qualified legal expert in your area to ensure that your site is fully compliant.
For ”how to” videos showing how the software works, including help documentation and tutorials, FAQs, support help desk, contact details and more, visit the Compliance Bar Plugin website.
Get This Plugin
Compliance Bar is an easy-to-use, simple and cost-effective solution for WordPress websites and blogs. We recommend downloading and installing this WordPress plugin if you want immediate peace of mind and legal protection.
For complete details, check out the plugin here: Compliance Bar Plugin – Compliance Bar Plugin – Website Compliance Plugin For WordPress
Legal Disclaimer: Once again, please note that we are not lawyers and we offer no legal advice in this article. Do your own due diligence and consult a legal expert about the best way of ensuring that your website fully complies with the law wherever your business is based.
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