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 having broken the law.
Your website or blog needs to comply with numerous laws and regulatory guidelines, many of which you are probably not even aware of.
Being non-compliant not only puts you at risk of incurring financial costs, but also the loss of your reputation. Why risk your money and reputation, when you can protect yourself so easily and inexpensively?
In this article, we look at a simple and cost-effective solution for WordPress users that can help make your website legally compliant in minutes.
Is Your Website Or Blog Legally Compliant?
As the cybersphere continues to grow at breakneck speed and the rules constantly change, it’s important that you stay on top of what’s going on and to make sure that your website remains legally compliant, especially if your digital presence is a significant 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 policy, earning disclaimers, etc.), many sites like Google won’t let you advertise, sites like ClickBank will not allow you to list your digital products on their network, PayPal could shut down your account and withhold payment of your funds, Facebook could suspend your web apps, and you won’t be allowed into various advertising or affiliate marketing networks.
If your business online is not compliant, you could also end up facing a number of penalties, including fines, having your website shut down, even jail time!
At the very least, if your website is not compliant, it could affect your visitors trust and confidence about doing any business with you in the future.
(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, almost all third-party websites require you to comply with their policies and guidelines!)
Disclaimer: We are not lawyers and we are not offering legal advice here.
The purpose of this post is to make you aware that:
- Your website could be subject to certain legal requirements in accordance with mandatory laws that govern your business (some of which you may not even be aware of),
- The importance of being compliant with the terms of service of third-party providers whose products or services you are offering or endorsing in your website, and
- There are easy-to-install solutions that can help your website become more compliant, such as the tool that we discuss in this article.
If your web site falls short in areas of compliance, below we review a simple plugin for WordPress users you should know more about.
Let’s Review …
Compliance Bar – Compliance Plugin For WordPress
Plugin Description
Compliance Bar is a simple plugin for WordPress users containing over 20 customizable compliance disclaimer templates for your online presence …
For more details, visit the plugin site here: Compliance Bar Plugin
Benefits
Below are just a few of the benefits of using Compliance Bar Plugin to instantly make your website compliant:
Ready To Start Using In No Time
Compliance Bar is very easy to install. Simply upload a zip file containing the plugin files to your Plugins folder via your dashboard and activate.
Easily Editable Templates
Easily make changes to the built-in compliance templates inside Compliance Bar from the settings menu using the WYSIWYG editor.
Dedicated Support
The plugin developers provide dedicated plugin support to assist you with anything you need.
Additional benefits and advantages include:
- Customized Compliance Pages: 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 - a complete library of training videos is provided.
- Use In All Countries: As long as you consult someone who is qualified to give you legal advice to make sure that the built-in templates provided in Compliance Bar are suitable and satisfactory for your business, country and website, you can use the plugin anywhere in the world.
- Can Be Used For All Niches: As long as your site is built with WordPress, you can use the plugin for all kinds of websites. Just select the pages you want to add to your site and ignore any irrelevant pages.
Plugin Features
Compliance Bar provides a number of great features to WP users. Below we have listed just some of these features:
- Quick and easy to install and implement. Be up and running in minutes.
- Show Attractive Icon Bar – Display links to your legal pages using attractive icons that can be placed anywhere on your pages. You can also upload icons of your choice.
- Show Sensitive Content – If your site includes content that may be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. information related to alcohol, ecigs, dating, etc.), the plugin can display popups that force users to accept your website’s terms or disclaimers.
- EU Cookie Compliance – If you are based in the EU or display your content to EU visitors, you must make users aware of your user cookies and notify them of how you use them. The plugin displays an attractive bar that notifies users and covers your website from non-compliance.
- Records & Stores IP Acceptance – The plugin can record the IP address of your visitors for reference, just in case someone accepts your terms or disclaimers and then claims otherwise.
- Shortcode Driven – Compliance Bar uses shortcodes that populate templates with your personal information. These shortcodes also allow you to place information anywhere on your site, (including the pop-ups).
- Mobile Friendly – The plugin has individual settings for displaying on mobile devices and will display mobile optimized icons automatically based on visitor mobile browsers.
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 admin area.
Let’s briefly review these …
User Profile
There are a number of default categories in this area where your business details can be input (e.g. “Website URL,” “Registered Business Address,” “Company Phone Number,” “Market Niche,” etc.). Not all categories are required, but some are (e.g. “Website URL,” “Support Email,” etc.)
(Compliance Bar User Profile Screen – Image source: plugin documentation)
The Compliance Bar Plugin uses dynamic shortcodes to insert the information into your legal pages …
(Compliance Bar Plugin User Profile Page: Shortcodes – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Once the minimum required data has been input into the user profile fields, you can then access the other plugin section.
Compliance Pages
The “Compliance Pages” screen contains all of the compliance templates …
(Compliance Bar: Legal Pages – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Last time we checked the plugin website, there were over 22 legal page templates available to plugin users:
- 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
- Adult Content Disclosure
Creating compliance pages for your website can be easily done. Just select the check boxes next to the pages you want to create and click ”Save” in the “Compliance Pages” screen …
(Compliance Bar: Legal Templates – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Your legal pages will then be created and added to your “Pages” section.
Compliance Bar Icons
The plugin is installed with a built-in set of attractive icons for referencing your legal pages …
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: Legal Page Template Icons – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Edit / Delete Legal Templates
You can modify and delete your compliance disclaimer templates from the “Compliance Pages” area, just like any other page in WordPress …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Edit Legal Templates – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Tips
- Editing your legal pages is recommended, as the pages contain generic content.
- The plugin notifies you if it detects existing similar pages on your site (e.g. compliance pages created before installing the plugin).
Compliance Bar
The plugin settings area provides various options to customize the Compliance Bar, including where to position the bar, displaying links or icon images, background colors and images, icon 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, etc. …
(Compliance Bar Section: Create Bar – Image source: plugin documentation)
Notes:
- You can create more than one Compliance Bar to display different icons on different pages, or to cover a multitude of uses throughout your site.
- The plugin allows you to display the Compliance Bar on the front page of your website, even if you are using particular themes (like Genesis, Thesis or WooThemes), where the home page is specifically 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 legal through dynamic icon bar on your site …
You have complete control over the location on your pages where you would like to feature the compliance bar …
PopUps
If you plan to show content that should 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 site’s terms and 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 an unlimited number of Pop Ups for different pages, or to cover a multitude of uses throughout your website …
You can also set a delay time to prevent Pop Ups from displaying immediately, set a cookie duration to prevent Pop Ups from appearing again within a specific time period, and even record the IP addresses of visitors who accept your terms and disclaimers for future reference …
(Pop Ups Screen: IP Log Details – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
EU Cookies
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 lets you edit the settings for compliance with EU Cookies requirements, including the wording of your notification message and link text in the “EU Cookies” screen …
(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” screen, lists all of your compliance page templates and shortcodes, and lets you edit the page content …
General Settings
The “General Settings” menu, gives you access to general information, such as promoting and sharing the plugin and getting plugin update notifications …
Feedback From Users
Here are some of the testimonials customers have submitted for Compliance Bar Plugin:
“1000% Highly Recommend This” Anthony La Rocca – Founder (Hustle Marketing)
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”If you are like me, you maybe have quite a few WordPress sites, all needing attention and most importantly, all needing to be on the right side of the law! I’ve tried several legal pages plugins and in pretty much every case, they let me down. They simply cause more work than they solve.To me, the answer should be simple. It should work and it should let me get on with building my site. After all, I know I NEED to do this stuff, but hey, I don’t really WANT to! So, for me, I don’t want those plugins that cause more work than they solve. Simple eh? Well now it is because Anton & John have just created this baby that is the answer to my needs. The Compliance Bar Plugin does what I need it to do then lets me get on with my empire building…Perfect!” Tony Grant (Portfolio Sports)
Compliance Bar Plugin Tips
Below are some useful ways you can use Compliance Bar:
- Protection against content theft by spelling out your website’s terms of use.
- Display compliance icons on specific pages of your website only.
- Ending refund disputes by clearly spelling out your refund terms before purchase.
- If you publish adult content 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 a dedicated support team to help users if they experience any issues. You also have access to an entire set of training videos.
Additionally, your purchase is backed by a no-risk, thirty 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 double the amount of the purchase price.
Product Pricing
- Single Site Personal License – Install the plugin on a single site. Cost = $47 (Normally $127)
- Business Edition – Can be installed on up to 25 domains that you own. Cost = $67.00 (Normally $197).
- Developer License Edition – Can be installed on all domains that you own. Install the plugin on all client sites for payment or part of a paid service. Cost = $97.00.
Please Note: Pricing details of the Compliance Bar Plugin product can vary, depending on whether there are any promotions or limited-time special offers. The price above was correct at the time this content was written. This may or may not be the actual price set by the plugin author when you visit the site and there may be additional upsells or one-time offers after purchasing.
Check the plugin’s website for the current price: Compliance Bar Plugin
Compliance Bar – Additional Info
Legal Page Templates Reviewed By Lawyers – The plugin developers claim on their website that all legal templates have been reviewed and approved by lawyers. Nonetheless, we highly 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 plugin usage, including installation instructions and tutorials, FAQs, customer helpdesk, contact details and more, visit the Compliance Bar Plugin website.
Download The Plugin
Compliance Bar is an easy-to-use, simple and cost-effective solution for WordPress-powered sites. We recommend downloading and installing this WordPress plugin if you want immediate peace of mind and legal protection.
For more information, visit the plugin website: Compliance Bar Plugin – Compliance Bar Plugin – WordPress Website Compliance Plugin
Important: Once again, we are not lawyers and we offer no legal advice here. 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 in your country or region.
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