One of the worst things that can happen to you as a website owner is to suddenly discover that you have broken the law.
Your digital presence must comply with a number of laws and regulatory guidelines, many of which you are probably not even aware of.
Being non-compliant puts you at risk of suffering significant financial losses and the loss of your reputation. Why risk your money and your business reputation, when you can protect yourself so easily and inexpensively?
In this post, we review a simple and inexpensive solution for WordPress users that can help make your site legally compliant in minutes.
Does Your Website Comply With All Legal Requirements?
As the cybersphere continues growing at an extraordinary rate and the rules of the game are constantly changing, it’s vital that you stay informed about what’s happening and to make sure that your website or blog remains compliant, especially if your digital presence is an essential component of your business strategy.
If there are no legal pages on your website (e.g. terms of service, privacy policy, financial disclaimers, etc.), many sites like Google won’t let you advertise, sites like ClickBank will not approve your digital products on their network, PayPal may shut down your account and freeze your funds, Facebook and many other social networks could suspend your web applications, and you will not be accepted into a number of leading advertising and affiliate marketing networks.
Plus, you could also be inadvertently leaving yourself open and vulnerable to being slapped with a lawsuit.
At the very least, without making it clear to your visitors that your website complies with all legal requirements and regulations, visitors may lose trust and confidence in your business.
(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, most third-party services require you to comply with their terms of use and policies!)
Disclaimer: Please note that we are not lawyers and we offer no 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 federal, state or local 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 cost-effective solutions for WordPress site owners that can help your business become compliant, such as the plugin that we discuss below.
In this article, we review a total compliance and disclaimer plugin for your WordPress-based digital business.
Today We Review …
Compliance Bar – WordPress Website Compliance Plugin
Plugin Description
Compliance Bar Plugin is a complete compliance and disclaimer solution for your digital presence …
To learn more about this plugin go here: Compliance Bar Plugin
Plugin Benefits
Here we have listed just a few of the benefits and advantages of using Compliance Bar to make your web site instantly compliant:
Fast And Easy To Install And Implement. Ready To Go To Work In No Time.
Compliance Bar Plugin installs just like every WordPress plugin. Just upload a zip folder containing the plugin files to your Plugin folder via your WP admin section and activate.
Templates Are Really Easy To Edit
You can easily make changes to the prebuilt templates inside the plugin from the settings menu using the WYSIWYG editor.
Dedicated Plugin Support
Compliance Bar plugin provides a dedicated plugin support team to assist users with anything they need.
Some additional benefits and advantages include the following:
- Customized Compliance Templates: The plugin creates your legal pages in seconds and customizes them to your business and website.
- Video Training: Compliance Bar is not difficult to use and a complete library of training videos is provided if you need help.
- Can Be Used Anywhere In The World: As long as you consult someone who is qualified to give you legal advice to ascertain if the templates provided in the plugin are suitable and satisfactory for your business, country and website, you can use the plugin anywhere in the world.
- Can Be Used For Any Website Purpose: If your website or blog is driven by WordPress, you can use the plugin for every website purpose. Just select the pages you want to add to your site and ignore all other irrelevant pages.
Plugin Features
Compliance Bar provides many features to web site owners. Here are just some of these features:
- Fast and easy to install and use. Be up and running in minutes.
- Show Visually Appealing Icon Bar – Display links to your legal pages in the form of attractive icons that can be placed on different locations on your pages. You can also upload your own icons.
- Show Restricted Information – If your site includes content that should be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. information related to alcohol, ecigs, adult, etc.), the plugin can display pop-ups that force users to accept your terms and disclaimers.
- EU Cookie Compliance – If your business is based in Europe or display your content to EU visitors, you must make users aware of your user cookies and notify them of how you use them. Compliance Bar displays an attractive bar that notifies your users and protects your business from non-compliance.
- Record And Store IP Addresses – Compliance Bar can record your visitors’ IP address for reference, just in case a visitor accepts your terms or disclaimers and then claims they didn’t.
- Shortcode Driven – Compliance Bar is integrated with shortcodes to automatically populate the templates with your personal information. These shortcodes also allow you to place information anywhere on your website, (even in the pop-ups).
- Works On All Mobile Devices – The plugin has settings for displaying on mobile devices and displays mobile optimized icons automatically depending on visitor browsers.
Compliance Bar Plugin Features – Details
After installing and activating the Compliance Bar plugin, a section where the plugin’s settings can be configured is added to your WordPress backend.
Let’s briefly review these …
User Profile
There are a number of default fields in this screen where you can enter your information into input (e.g. “Contact Name,” “Support Email,” “Contact Phone,” “Niche Market,” etc.). Not all categories are required, but some are (e.g. “Contact Name,” “Registered Business Address,” etc.)
(Compliance Bar Plugin User Profile Screen – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
The plugin uses dynamic shortcodes to populate the information entered into your User Profile inside your page templates …
(Compliance Bar User Profile Section: Shortcodes – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Once the minimum required (i.e. compulsory) information has been input into the profile fields, users can then access the other plugin section.
Compliance Pages
The “Compliance Pages” section includes a list of all of the legal page templates …
(Compliance Bar: Legal Templates – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Last time we checked the plugin website, there were over 22 compliance 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
You can easily create compliance pages for your website by simply selecting check boxes and clicking the “Save” button at the bottom of the “Compliance Pages” screen …
(Compliance Bar: Legal Pages – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Your legal pages will then be created and added to the “Pages” section of your site.
Compliance Bar Icons
The plugin comes with a default set of icons for referencing your legal pages …
The icons are customizable. You can purchase additional icons from the plugin developer, or create/upload your own to match the style of your site’s design …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Legal Template Icons – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Edit / Delete Legal Page Templates
You can edit and delete the compliance disclaimers from the “Compliance Pages” screen, just like any typical WordPress page …
(Compliance Bar: Edit Compliance Templates – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Notes
- Editing the legal pages is recommended, as the pages contain generic content.
- The plugin will notify you if it detects existing similar pages on your site (e.g. legal pages created before installing the plugin).
Compliance Bar
The plugin offers many options to customize the Compliance Bar, including where to position the bar, whether to show links or icon images, background colors and images, image size, specifying which pages should be included 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 – Image source: plugin documentation)
Notes:
- You can create unlimited Compliance Bars to display different disclaimers on different pages, or to cover a multitude of uses in other sections of your website.
- The plugin allows you to display the Compliance Bar on the front page of your website, even if you are using a specific theme (e.g. Genesis, Thesis or WooThemes), where the home page is specifically configured through the theme settings as a built-in template, and not as a “regular” WordPress page.
- Due to the smaller size of mobile device screens, you can only select up to a certain number of page icons to display if you turn Mobile Settings “on.”
Once you have configured your Compliance Bar settings, it will display links to your compliance pages using a visually attractive icon bar on your site …
You have full control over the location on your pages where you would like your compliance bar to display …
PopUps
If you plan to publish content that needs to be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. content related to alcohol, ecigs, adult content, etc.), the plugin can display popups that force users to accept your site’s terms or disclaimers.
The “Create Pop Up” section lets you fully customize your pop ups …
(Pop Ups Screen: Create Pop Up – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
You can create an unlimited number of Pop Ups for different pages, or to cover a multitude of uses throughout your website …
You can also specify a delay time to prevent a Pop Up from displaying immediately, set cookie durations to prevent Pop Ups from appearing again within a specific time period, and record the IP addresses of visitors who accept your terms and disclaimers for future reference …
(Pop Ups Section: IP Log Details – Image source: plugin documentation)
EU Cookies
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 …
The Compliance Bar plugin 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” area …
(EU Cookies Section: Manage Settings – Screenshot source: 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 legal 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 receiving plugin update notifications …
User Feedback
Here are just a few of the testimonials that customers have written about the Compliance Bar Plugin plugin:
”WOW” Shon Chris – Director (JV Peer Group)
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“Don’t Risk Your Online Business” Mike Thomas (The Mike From Maine Show)
Compliance Bar – Useful Tips
Below are some extra ways to use The Compliance Bar Plugin:
- Protection against content theft by spelling out your website’s terms of use.
- Displaying compliance icons only on specific pages of your site.
- Minimize refund disputes by clearly spelling out your refund terms before purchase.
- If you have content for adult viewers on your website, you can force visitors to click to confirm that they are of legal age to view your content.
Product Support
Plugin Developers provide users with dedicated 24/7 plugin support to help users. You also get access to video training.
Additionally, your purchase is backed by a no-risk, 30 day, 200% refund guarantee. If your version of Compliance Bar does not work within 30 days of purchase and it cannot be fixed within 48 hrs (Monday to Friday), the plugin developers will refund twice the amount of the purchasing price.
Plugin Pricing
- Single User Licensing – Install the plugin on a single domain. Cost = $37 (Normally $127)
- Business – Can be installed on up to twenty-five sites that you own. Price = $67.00 (Normally $197).
- Developer – Install the plugin on all as many of your own domains as you need. Install the plugin on all client sites for payment or part of a paid service. Cost = $97.00.
Note: The cost of purchasing the Compliance Bar Plugin plugin depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time specials being offered. Presently, the plugin sells for the amounts shown above. This may or may not be the actual price charged by the product developer when you visit the product website and there may be additional upsells or one-time offers after your purchase.
Check the plugin’s website for current pricing details: Compliance Bar Plugin
Additional Plugin Information
Legal Templates Approved By Lawyers – The plugin developers state on their website that all legal templates have been reviewed and approved by lawyers. 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 a demo video showing how the plugin works, including help documentation and tutorials, FAQs, support helpdesk, contact details and more, visit the Compliance Bar website.
In Conclusion
Compliance Bar is an easy-to-use, simple and cost-effective solution for WordPress-powered websites. We recommend installing this WordPress plugin if you want immediate peace of mind and legal protection.
For more information, visit the plugin website: Compliance Bar – 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 on this website. 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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