One of the worst things that can happen to you as a website owner is to receive a notice of legal action as a result of having broken the law.
Your internet presence must comply with various laws, some of which you may not be aware of.
Being non-compliant puts you at risk of incurring serious financial losses and the cost to your reputation. Why risk your money and reputation, when you can protect yourself so inexpensively?
In this post, we review a simple and cost-effective solution for WordPress users that can help make your website legally compliant in minutes.
Does Your Website Or Blog Comply With The Law?
As the digital business realm continues to grow at an extraordinary rate and the rules of the game keep changing, it’s vital that you stay informed about what’s happening and to make sure that your site remains compliant with all laws and regulations, especially if your online presence is a fundamental aspect of your overall business strategy.
If you do not display certain legal pages on your site (e.g. terms and conditions of use, privacy statement, legal disclaimers, etc.), many third-party sites such as Google won’t let you advertise, digital marketplaces like ClickBank will not allow you to list your digital products on their network, PayPal may close down your account and withhold payment of your funds, Facebook and other social networks will suspend your web apps, and you will not be allowed into a range of other advertising or affiliate merchant networks.
Plus, you could also be inadvertently leaving yourself open and vulnerable to expensive litigation.
At the very least, if you don’t make it clear to your visitors that your online properties comply with all legal requirements and regulatory guidelines, trust and confidence in your business may be irrepairably.
(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, almost all 3rd-party websites require you to comply with their terms of use!)
Legal Disclaimer: Please note that we are not lawyers and we are not offering legal advice on our website.
The purpose of this post is to make you aware that:
- Your website could be subject to numerous legal requirements in accordance with the laws that govern your business,
- How important it is to maintain compliance with the terms of service of third-party providers whose products or services you are promoting or endorsing online, and
- There are inexpensive plugins for WordPress site owners that can help your site become more compliant, such as the solution that we discuss below.
In this article, you will learn about a total compliance & disclaimer plugin for your site.
Let’s Review …
Compliance Bar Plugin – WordPress Website Compliance Plugin
Plugin Description
The Compliance Bar WordPress Plugin is a complete compliance & disclaimer solution for your online presence …
For more details, visit the plugin site here: Compliance Bar Plugin
Benefits
Below we have listed just a few of the benefits of using Compliance Bar Plugin to instantly make your site legally compliant:
Quick And Simple To Install And Use. Be Up And Running In Very Little Time.
Compliance Bar is quite easy to install. Just upload a zip folder that contains the plugin to your Plugins folder via your WP dashboard and activate.
Easily Editable Compliance Page Templates
You can easily make changes to the built-in templates inside Compliance Bar from the settings menu using the WordPress WYSIWYG editor.
Dedicated Plugin Support Team
Compliance Bar plugin provides dedicated 24/7 plugin support to assist you.
Some additional benefits of using this plugin include:
- Customized Legal Pages: The Compliance Bar plugin will create your legal pages in seconds and customizes them to your business and website.
- Video Training: Compliance Bar is not complicated to use and a complete library of training videos is provided.
- Can Be Used Anywhere In The World: As long as you consult a qualified legal representative to ascertain if the default legal page 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 On All WordPress Sites: If your site is driven by WordPress, you can use the plugin for every website purpose. Select only the types of disclaimers that suit your specific business model (e.g. affiliate or CPA marketing, business services, AdSense, AdWords, adult, medical, etc) and leave out any templates that are unnecessary.
Features
Compliance Bar offers a number of features to WordPress users. Below we have listed just some:
- Quick and easy to install and use. Ready to go to work in very little time.
- Display Visually Appealing Icons – Display links to your legal pages using attractive icons that can be placed anywhere in your page. You can also upload your own icons.
- Show Sensitive Content – If your website publishes content that needs to be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. information related to alcohol, tobacco, dating, etc.), you can display pop-ups that force users to accept your site’s terms or disclaimers.
- EU User Cookie Compliance – If you are based in Europe or display your content to visitors in the EU, you must be aware of EU compliance laws. Compliance Bar displays an attractive bar that notifies your visitors and protects you from non-compliance.
- Record And Store IP Acceptance – The plugin records and stores your visitors’ IP address for future reference, just in case a visitor accepts your terms or disclaimers and then claims they haven’t.
- Shortcodes – The plugin 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 pop-ups).
- Mobile Friendly – The plugin has settings for displaying on mobile devices and tablets and will display mobile optimized icons automatically depending on visitor browsers.
Using Compliance Bar Plugin
After installing and activating the Compliance Bar plugin, you have access to a section where the plugin’s settings can be configured.
Let’s briefly review these …
User Profile
There are a number of default categories in this section where your business details can be input (e.g. “Website URL,” “Support Email,” “Location Details,” “Niche Market,” etc.). Not all categories are required, but some are (e.g. “Business Name,” “Company Phone Number,” etc.)
(Compliance Bar Plugin User Profile Section – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Compliance Bar uses shortcodes to populate the information inside your legal pages …
(Compliance Bar User Profile Section: Shortcodes – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Once the minimum required information has been entered into the user profile fields, you can then access the other sections of the plugin.
Compliance Pages
The “Compliance Pages” screen lists all of the plugin’s templates …
(Compliance Bar: Compliance Pages – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Below is the full list of template pages made available by the plugin last time we checked their site:
- 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 create compliance pages for your website quickly and easily by simply selecting check boxes and clicking the “Save” button in the “Create Pages” section …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Legal Pages – Image source: plugin documentation)
Your legal pages will then be created and added inside your “Pages” section.
Compliance Bar Icons
The plugin is installed with a built-in set of icons for referencing your legal pages …
The icons are customizable. 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 Plugin: Legal Page Icons – Image source: plugin documentation)
Edit / Delete Legal Page Templates
You can easily edit and delete the compliance templates from the “Compliance Pages” screen, just like any other WordPress page …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Edit Legal Pages – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Notes
- Customizing is recommended, as the pages contain generic content.
- The plugin indicates if it detects existing similar pages on your site (e.g. compliance pages created before installing the plugin).
Compliance Bar
The plugin offers various options to customize the Compliance Bar, including position, whether to display 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 home page, which pages the Compliance Bar will display in, mobile settings, etc. …
(Compliance Bar Screen: Create Bar – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Notes:
- You can create more than one Compliance Bar to display different icons on different pages, or to cover different uses in different areas of your site.
- The plugin lets you display the Compliance Bar on the home page of your website, even if you are using particular 3rd-party theme frameworks (e.g. Genesis, Thesis or WooThemes), where the home page is configured through the theme settings as a built-in template, and not as a normal “static” page.
- Due to the smaller size of mobile device 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 a visually appealing icon bar on your site …
You have full control over the location on your pages where you would like to feature your compliance icons …
PopUps
If your site publishes content that may be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. information related to alcohol, tobacco, adult, etc.), Compliance Bar can display popups that blocks access to users who do not accept your terms and disclaimers.
The “Create Pop Up” section gives you full control over the settings and wordings of your pop ups …
(Pop Ups Screen: Create Pop Up – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
You can create more than one Pop Up for different pages, or to cover a multitude of uses in other sections of your site …
You can also specify a delay time to prevent a Pop Up from displaying as soon as visitors arrive, 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 Europe or display your content to visitors in the EU, you must be aware of EU compliance requirements …
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” area, lists all of your compliance page templates and shortcodes, and lets you edit the page content …
General Settings
The “General Settings” section, gives you access to general information, such as promoting and sharing the plugin and getting plugin update notifications …
Feedback From Users
Here are a couple of the testimonials that plugin customers have written about Compliance Bar Plugin:
”I got a chance to review the Compliance Bar plugin…WOW!! I have to say that its definitely one of the most NECESSARY, yet easiest to use plugin’s to hit the scene in a while. Very Solid Product. Great job Anton & team!” Shon Chris – Director (JV Peer Group)
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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 a few useful ways to use Compliance Bar:
- Protect against content theft by spelling out your website’s terms of use.
- Display compliance icons on specific pages of your website only.
- End refund disputes by clearly spelling out refund terms before purchase.
- If your site published content that is considered inappropriate for persons below a certain age, you can force visitors to click to confirm that they are of legal age to access your content.
Plugin Support
Compliance Bar provides users with a dedicated team to help users if they experience any issues. Users also get access to a complete library of training videos.
Additionally, your purchase is backed by a no-risk, 30 day, 200% money-back 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 double the cost of purchasing.
Plugin Cost
- Single – Install the plugin on 1 of your own domains. Cost = $37 (Normally $127)
- Business License – Install the plugin on up to 25 of your own domains. Price = $67.00 (Normally $197).
- Professional License Edition – Install the plugin on all domains that you own. Can be installed on all client sites for payment or part of a paid service. Cost = $97.00.
Note: Pricing for Compliance Bar can vary, depending on whether there are any promotions or limited-time specials being offered. The above reflects the current price at the time this article was published. This may or may not be the actual pricing charged by the software seller when you visit the plugin website and you may be shown additional upsells or one-time offers after your purchase.
Check the plugin’s website for the current pricing details here: Compliance Bar Plugin – Website Compliance Plugin For WordPress
Additional Information
Legal Pages Reviewed By Lawyers – The plugin developers assert on their website that all legal templates have been reviewed and approved by a leading lawyer. Nonetheless, we highly recommend that you get legal advice from a qualified legal expert in your area for peace of mind.
For a demo video showing how the software works, including installation instructions and tutorials, FAQs, customer help desk, contact details and more, visit the Compliance Bar Plugin website.
Install The Plugin
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.
To learn more, visit the plugin website: Compliance Bar – Compliance Bar Plugin – WordPress Plugin For Website Compliance
Note: Once again, 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 is compliant with the law wherever your business is based.
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