One of the worst situations 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 internet presence must comply with numerous laws, some of which you may not even be aware of.
Being non-compliant not only puts you at risk of incurring serious financial loss, but also the loss of your reputation. Why risk your money and your business reputation, when you can protect yourself so inexpensively?
In this post, we review a simple and easy-to-install WordPress solution that can help make your website compliant in minutes.
Is Your Site Legally Compliant?
As the internet continues growing at breakneck speed and rules are constantly changing, it’s vitally important to stay informed about what’s going on and to make sure that your website or blog remains compliant with all laws and regulations, especially if your digital presence is an integral aspect of your business strategy.
If you do not display certain legal pages on your web site (e.g. terms and conditions of use, privacy statement, financial disclaimers, etc.), many third-party sites like Google won’t let you advertise, digital marketplaces like ClickBank won’t approve your digital products for sale, PayPal may close down your account and withhold payment of your funds, Facebook and many other social sites could suspend your applications, and you will not be accepted into various leading advertising and merchant networks.
You may also be inadvertently leaving yourself open and vulnerable to being exploited by opportunistic online users.
At the very least, if your website is not compliant, trust and confidence in your business may be damaged.
(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, most third-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 post is to make you aware that:
- Your website could be subject to a number of legal requirements in accordance with compulsory laws and regulations that govern your business (some of which you may not even be aware of),
- How important it is to comply with the terms of service of third-party providers whose products or services you are promoting or using on your website, and
- There are cost-effective solutions for WordPress users that can help your site become compliant, such as the solution that we review below.
If your website lacks in areas of compliance, below we discuss a simple WordPress plugin that you will probably be very interested in using.
Let’s Review …
Compliance Bar Plugin – WordPress Plugin For Website Compliance
Plugin Description
Compliance Bar is a simple and easy-to-use plugin for WordPress websites containing over 20 customizable compliance pages for your online presence …
Learn more here: Compliance Bar Plugin
Benefits Of Using Compliance Bar Plugin
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 Use. Ready To Go To Work In Very Little Time.
Compliance Bar Plugin is very easy to install. Simply upload a zip file containing the plugin files to your Plugin folder via your dashboard and activate.
Easy To Edit Templates
You can easily edit the default templates inside the plugin from the settings menu with the WordPress visual editor.
24/7 Plugin Support
The plugin developers provide a dedicated support team to assist users with anything they need.
Some additional benefits and advantages include:
- Customized Compliance Page Templates: The Compliance Bar plugin creates your legal pages in seconds and customizes them to your business and website.
- Full Video Training Manuals: Compliance Bar is not difficult to use and a complete library of training videos is available.
- Can Be Used Anywhere In The World: As long as you consult a qualified legal representative to make sure that 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.
- Can Be Used For Any Website Purpose: If your site is driven by WordPress, you can use the plugin for any website purpose. Select only the types of disclaimers that pertain to your particular business model (e.g. affiliate or CPA marketing, business services, AdSense, AdWords, adult, medical, etc) and ignore any pages that you don’t require.
Plugin Features
Compliance Bar Plugin provides many features to website owners. Below we have listed just a few:
- Quick and easy to install and configure. Ready to use in minutes.
- Display Attractive Icons – Display links to your legal pages in the form of attractive icons that can be placed anywhere in your page. You can also upload your own icons.
- Show Sensitive Content – If your website contains content that may be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. information related to alcohol, ecigs, adult-related, etc.), the plugin can display popups that require users to accept your terms or disclaimers.
- EU Cookie Compliance – If you are based in Europe or display your content to EU visitors, you need to be aware of EU Cookie law. The plugin displays an attractive bar that notifies your users and protects your business from non-compliance.
- Record And Store IP Addresses – The plugin can record your visitors’ IP address for reference, just in case a user accepts your terms or disclaimers and then claims they haven’t.
- Shortcode Driven – The plugin uses shortcodes that populate the templates with your personal information. These shortcodes also allow you to place information anywhere on your website, (even in the pop-ups).
- Compatible With Mobile Devices – The plugin has individual settings for displaying on mobile devices and displays mobile optimized icons automatically based on the web browser being used.
Plugin Features – Details
After installing and activating the plugin, the plugin’s “Settings” area gets added to your WordPress admin area.
Let’s briefly review these …
User Profile
There are a number of default fields in this screen where your information can be entered (e.g. “Contact Name,” “Support Email,” “Contact Phone,” “Refund Period,” etc.). Not all categories are required, but some are (e.g. “Contact Name,” “Support Desk URL,” etc.)
(Compliance Bar Plugin User Profile Section – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Compliance Bar uses dynamic shortcodes to populate the information from your User Profile inside your legal templates …
(Compliance Bar User Profile Section: Shortcodes – Image source: plugin documentation)
Once the minimum required information has been input into the plugin settings fields, users can then access the other areas of the plugin.
Compliance Pages
The “Compliance Pages” area lists all of the plugin’s legal templates …
(Compliance Bar: Legal Templates – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
When we last checked the plugin website, there were over 20 legal templates made 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
- XXX Disclosure
You can easily create compliance pages for your website or blog by simply selecting checkboxes and clicking the “Save” button on the “Compliance Pages” area …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Compliance Pages – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Your legal pages will then be created and added inside your “Pages” section.
Compliance Bar Icons
The plugin comes with a built-in 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 theme …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Compliance Template Icons – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Edit / Delete Compliance Page Templates
You can edit and delete the compliance disclaimers from the “Compliance Pages” section, just like any other WordPress page …
(Compliance Bar: Edit Legal Page Templates – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Notes
- Editing the legal templates is recommended, as the pages contain generic content.
- The plugin indicates if it detects existing similar pages on your site (e.g. legal pages created before you installed the plugin).
Compliance Bar
You have many options to customize the Compliance Bar, including position, displaying links or icon images, background colors and images, image size, specifying which pages to include an icon for in the Compliance Bar, whether or not to display the Compliance bar on your main page, which pages the Compliance Bar will display in, mobile settings, and offset distance …
(Compliance Bar Section: Create Bar – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Notes:
- You can create more than one Compliance Bar to show different icons on different pages, or to cover a multitude of uses in other sections of your site.
- The plugin allows you to display the Compliance Bar on the front page of your site, even if you are using particular WordPress themes (like Genesis, Thesis or WooThemes), where the home page is 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 legal through a visually attractive icon bar on your site …
You have complete control over the location on your pages where you would like to display your compliance bar …
PopUps
If you plan to publish content that needs to be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. information related to alcohol, tobacco, dating, etc.), the plugin can display pop-ups that restricts access to visitors who do not accept your website’s terms or disclaimers.
The “Create Pop Up” section gives you full control over the settings and customization of your pop ups …
(Pop Ups Screen: Create Pop Up – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
You can create multiple customized Pop Ups displaying on different pages, or to cover a multitude of uses throughout your website …
You can also specify a delay time if you don’t want a Pop Up to display immediately, set a cookie duration 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 Screen: 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 make users aware of your user cookies and notify them of how you use them …
The Compliance Bar plugin lets you manage 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 Screen: 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” section, lists all of your legal disclaimer templates and shortcodes, and lets you modify their content …
General Settings
The “General Settings” area, lets you access general information, such as promoting and sharing the plugin and receiving plugin updates …
Feedback From Users
Below are a few of the testimonials that users have submitted regarding the Compliance Bar Plugin plugin:
”One of the Best Plugins I Have Used” Ray Lane – (The Video Guy)
***
”You wouldn’t drive a car around without insurance…so don’t RISK your online business by neglecting a simple, but important detail: website compliance. Grab your copy of Compliance Bar & protect yourself today!” Mike Thomas (The Mike From Maine Show)
Compliance Bar Plugin Tips
Here are some additional ways to use Compliance Bar:
- Protecting against content theft by spelling out your website’s terms of use.
- Display compliance icons only on specific pages.
- Minimize refund disputes by clearly spelling out refund terms before purchase.
- If you have adult content on your site, you can force visitors to click to confirm that they are of legal age to access your content.
Support
Plugin Developers provide users with a dedicated team to assist users if they experience any problems. You also have access to video training.
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 hours (Monday to Friday), your cost of purchase will be refunded in double.
Software Pricing
- Single – Install the plugin on 1 domain that you own. Cost = $37 (Normally $127)
- Business License – Can be installed on up to twenty-five of your own domains. Cost = $67.00 (Normally $197).
- Developer – Install the plugin on all of your own sites. Can be installed on any client site as part of a paid service. Cost = $97.00.
Please Note: Current pricing for the Compliance Bar Plugin software depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time special offers. The pricing shown above was current at the time this article was written. This may not be the actual pricing charged by the software author when you visit the plugin site and you may be shown additional upsells or one-time offers after you’ve purchased.
Check the plugin’s website for current pricing details: Compliance Bar Plugin – WordPress Plugin For Website Compliance
Additional Information
Legal Templates Approved By Lawyers – The plugin developers assert on their website that all legal page templates have already been reviewed and approved by lawyers. Nonetheless, we highly recommend that you get professional advice from a qualified legal expert in your area to ensure that your site is fully compliant.
For ”how-to” videos showing plugin usage, including help documentation and tutorials, FAQs, support helpdesk, 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-driven websites. We recommend 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 – Compliance Bar Plugin – WordPress Compliance Plugin
Disclaimer: Once again, please note that we are not lawyers and we offer no legal advice on this website. You must do your own due diligence and consult a legal expert about the best way of ensuring that your website fully complies with all legal requirements wherever your business is based.
***