Tag: Legal Pages

One of the worst things that can happen to you as a website owner is to be on the wrong side of the law.

Internet laws are designed to protect the rights of consumers and apply to anyone who sells, markets or promotes goods and services online. Anyone who owns a website risks being sued for not following compliance laws. Feigning ignorance about legal requirements will not excuse you from being slapped with a legal notice.

New laws introduced in 2014 regulating how businesses promote advertising on their websites clearly state that if you plan to promote anything on your site for material gain, then you will need to follow certain principles of disclosure to prevent enforceable orders being issued against you by regulatory agencies, such as the (US based) Better Business Bureau (BBB). Search online for information about “The Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program,” which regulates behavioral advertising across the internet for more details.

(Better Business Bureau Website)

These laws affect several business activities, including:

• Any form of advertising, including contextual advertising
• Retarget Marketing
• Google Analytics (or other analytics software)
• Affiliate Marketers
• Product Creation
• Blogging
• etc.

Without legal pages on your web site (e.g. terms and conditions of use, privacy policy, earning disclaimers, etc.), many third-party sites such as Google won’t let you advertise, digital marketplaces like ClickBank will not let you list your digital products for sale, PayPal may shut down your account and freeze your funds, Facebook will disapprove your web applications, and you will not be accepted into various advertising and online marketing networks.

If you are not compliant, you could also face a number of penalties, including fines, having your website shut down, even jail time!

The purpose of this article is to help make you aware that your website are required to comply with certain legalities, the importance of maintaining compliance with the terms of service of external providers whose products or services you may be advertising on your website, and that there are plugins for WordPress website owners that can help your sites become more compliant, such as the tools listed further below.

Is Your Site Breaking The Law?

Legal Disclaimer: Please note that we are not lawyers and we do not provide legal advice. You must do your own due diligence and we recommend consulting a legal expert about the best way of ensuring that your website is compliant with all laws and regulations wherever your business is based.

Why It’s Important To Make Your Website Compliant

Consider for one moment what the implications to your business would be if any of these scenarios were to take place:

• Someone suffers a heart attack after purchasing your online fitness program.
• The skin care creams you promote as an affiliate gives someone who purchases from your link allergic reactions.
• You’ve let your subscribers know that you will not sell their information, but you haven’t described exactly what you’ll do with their details.
• Someone steals your content and publishes it on their website.
• You haven’t advised visitors that you are an affiliate for the product you are endorsing that you will receive a commission if they end up buying using your affiliate link.
• You don’t spell out the terms and conditions of your refund/return policies.
• Online visitors claim your testimonials are all fake and decide to sue you.
• You haven’t disclosed in a product review that you were given a free copy of the product.
• Your site publishes adult-related content and you have not taken sufficient measures to restrict access by underage children.

Consider also these real case studies of costly compliance breaches:

• A CPA Marketer failed to provide adequate disclaimers telling online users they would be required to give up personal information to complete an offer they were promoting. Cost = $390,000.
• A social networking app developer received a whopping $800,000 fine for collecting personal information from mobile device address books without the owners’ knowledge and consent – including storing children’s private information.
• Facebook’s Terms Of Service prohibits users from scraping UIDs. Many internet marketers took a risk and lost. Their accounts were shut down, costing them thousands of $$$ in lost revenue.
• An independent study by Brad Geddes of SearchEngineLand, showed that, of a couple of hundred websites chosen at random, more than 90% were in breach of at least one of Google’s policies, more than 65% were breaking at least two of Google’s policies, and more than 40% had infringed at least 3 of Google’s policies. Although the website owners could technically be sued by Google, more than likely what could happen, is that they would be issued cautions or lose access to the Google program they had violated, which could result in loss of income (e.g. AdSense or AdWords).

Can you see how easy it is to risk being targeted for litigation?

Regardless of whether you are a:

• CPA (Cost Per Action) or PPA (Pay Per Action) Marketer
• MLM Networker
• Affiliate Promoter
• AdWords Advertiser
• Product Publisher
• Amazon Affiliate
• EBay Seller
• Publisher Of Adult Content
• Freelancer, Consultant Or Coach
• Seller Of Any Product Or Service Online

It’s vitally important to do whatever is necessary to make sure that your website or blog complies with all laws governing the use of your site, wherever you are located.

Compliance With 3rd-Party Services - ToS, Policies, etc.

Leading online companies and government agencies that regulate trade in many countries emphasize the importance of observing the terms and policies of 3rd-party service providers.

You must let your site visitors know that your website complies will all laws and professional guidelines. This not only increases trust and buyer confidence in your site, it’s also a requirement of many companies you will engage with.

For example:

Google requires you to display legal information when using many of their services. This includes using features such as Google Analytics …

(Policy requirements for using Google Analytics)

Generating revenue online with your WordPress sites using Google AdSense display advertising …

(Google AdSense display advertising policy requirements)

And even promoting your site using Google AdWords …

(Google AdWords – Policy Requirements)

If you plan to sell digital products using places such as ClickBank, JVZoo, or other established online merchant sites, you will need to add legal pages to your website before your products can be approved for sale in their networks …

(ClickBank – policy requirements for product sellers)

The FTC (Federal Trade Commission) also requires that you display clear disclaimers and policies on your site, especially if you plan to use testimonials or product endorsements …

(FTC – consumer guidelines and regulations)

New FTC Regulations Require Your Site To Comply

New FTC regulations governing how business is conducted online were introduced in March 2012. A quick search online will easily reveal that many sites are still unaware (or choose to flaunt) these requirements. As is already the case, this typically results in the FTC making an example of businesses and prosecuting website owners for breaches of regulation in an effort to get other businesses to comply.

If you plan to do any kind of business online, therefore, it’s best not to take chances. Even if your business does not operate in the U.S. we strongly recommend protecting your business by ensuring that your site complies with all FTC guidelines and regulations.

A number of business resources provide guidelines and examples on how to structure disclaimers and disclosures to help you comply with FTC requirements. We provide references to a number of these at the end of this article …

(Wording your disclaimers and disclosures correctly is important to avoid running foul of laws and regulations)

Don’t Forget Social Media Applications

If you plan to create applications that integrate with your site, sites like Twitter, Facebook, and many others require you to provide access to various legal pages …

(Apps that integrate with social networks also require compliance)

• If you are unsure whether you are breaking the law, and/or Terms of Service policies and guidelines of websites like Google, Facebook, etc., then you most probably are.
• If you are considering promoting services or products online via affiliate marketing, or make money online with Google AdSense, eBay or Amazon ads, or use Google AdWords to drive visitors to your pages, etc., then find out exactly what kind of legal information you are required to include on your site to comply with all Terms Of Service and policy requirements - don’t risk having your accounts suspended.
• If you’ve been wondering whether “borrowing” a Copyright Notice is Copyright infringement, take proper precautions to protect yourself and your website.

(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, almost all 3rd-party services require you to comply with their policies and guidelines)

What Compliance Pages Do I Need To Add To My Website To Be Covered Against Legal Compliance Issues?

If your website or blog is lacking in terms of compliance, then this section will help you.

At its most basic, adding the following legal pages to your website will help your business stay out of trouble with most regulatory agencies and 3rd-party service providers, and even help you avoid potential legal issues):

• About Us
• Contact Us
• Privacy Policy
• Terms Of Use
• Disclaimer Pages
• General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) Compliance

Additionally, you may want to consider adding any of the following pages:

• Affiliate Disclosure (if you promote or sell affiliate products or services)
• Anti-Spam Policy
• Compensation Disclosure
• External Links Policy
• Financial Disclaimers (e.g. if your website provides advice about financial areas or money-making opportunities)
• Refund Policy (if you sell products or services online)
• Media Terms Of Use (e.g. if you allow users to download videos or audio files on your site)

Types Of Disclosure Pages

Adding the correct type of web content disclosure is important. For example:

• No Material Connection – This lets your visitors be aware that you will not receive for writing the content.
• Affiliate Links – Lets visitors be aware that you will receive compensation if they act on your recommendation and buy through your affiliate links.
• Sample Or review Copy – Lets visitors be aware that you have received a sample or review copy of the product or service by the author or product developer.
• Sponsored Post – Disclosure that lets your readers be aware that you were compensated in some form to write the post.
• Third Party Advertising – Lets users know that you’re using online behavioral tracking technology. This is required to comply with the “enhanced notice” the Better Business Bureau has been requiring website publishers to show prominently on their sites since January 1, 2014.

Adding Legal Pages Content To Your WordPress Website

Ideally, you will have a lawyer prepare the verbiage of your legal documents. Once this has been done, there are several ways to add them to your website.

Uploading Legal Web Pages Manually

If someone prepares the legal content for you in typical web page formatting (e.g. HTML), you can simply upload these to your server, or have someone upload them for you.

We recommend adding a legals folder to your web server and uploading your legal pages to this directory (e.g. using FTP) …

(Create a ‘legals’ folder in your web server and upload pages via FTP)

You can then easily add links to these pages from your WordPress site using custom links in your menu administration …

(Custom WordPress Menu)

Where To Display Legal Web Pages On Your Site

After uploading your legal pages, make sure that these are kept up-to-date and clearly visible to your visitors. You can add these to your sidebar menu (or place them in the footer of your site) so that users have access to legal information from every page …

(Display legal pages to users on all of your website’s pages)

To learn more about adding links to pages on your sidebar, refer to this tutorial:

• How To Add Widgets To Your WordPress Sidebar Section

Using Ready-Made Legal Templates

You can find downloadable attorney-drafted forms and agreements by searching online, or by going to sites like this one:

Find Legal Forms

(FindLegalForms.com – Legal forms)

Visit this website to learn more:

• FindLegalForms.com – Legal forms

Alternatively, you can download a set of legal templates designed by attorney Scott Talbert …

Cut & Paste Website Legal Pages

(Website Legal Pages)

Cut & Paste website templates were written by an attorney and feature less passive voice and more plain language phrasing and can be customized with a simple quick search and replace to add your own business details, then pasted into your web pages.

The legal templates included in Scott Talbert’s Legal Page Templates include:

• Anti-Spam Policy
• Copyright Notice
• Disclaimer
• DMCA Compliance
• Federal Trade Commission Compliance
• Privacy Policy
• Terms of Service & Conditions of Use.

You can either create a new page for every legal form you want to add to your site, then paste the content from the templates into your web pages and publish or upload these to your server as described previously.

Go here for more information:

• Website Legal Pages

WordPress Legal Plugins

As well as using legal templates, you can keep things really simple by using plugins.

Here are some great WordPress plugins worth looking into:

WordPress Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress

(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress)

If you don’t want to spend time creating legal pages manually, then consider installing a plugin like WP Legal Pages …

This plugin is not free, but it’s a reasonably low-priced and well-supported premium WordPress plugin that will help simplify the job of creating and implementing legal pages on your site and save you a great deal of time.

Here are just some of the benefits of using WP Legal Pages:

• Pre-written Templates – Over 20 built-in legal page templates created by a team of professional lawyers.
• Quick And Easy To Use – You can set up most of the legal pages you will need in around 3 minutes with just a few mouse clicks.
• Fully Customizable Pages – The plugin includes fully customizable and easily editable legal form templates (e.g. Terms Of Service, Disclaimer, Earnings Disclaimer, Privacy Policy and more!)
• Easy To Edit Pages – WYSIWYG editor lets you edit all legal pages like every other page on your site.
• Shortcodes – You can add shortcodes to your pages and the information will be automatically inserted into your pages when you publish.
• Exclude pages. The plugin lets you exclude pages from menus with a simple check box and delete and manage these like any other page on your website.
• Forced Options – Force page or post lock down. Page unlocks and can be accessed only when user agrees to your legal terms.
• Additional Features – More features are being added to this plugin with every new version.

After installing WordPress Legal Pages, a new menu item will display inside your navigation area …

(WP Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress – Legal Pages Menu)

This lets you create, view and edit legal pages from your admin area …

(WP Legal Pages Plugin – Settings)

The plugin gives you the option to create legal pages for different types of sites, such as business websites with products, affiliate/review sites, e-commerce sites, etc …

(WP Legal Pages Plugin – Page Type)

Select from various built-in legal templates …

(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress – Legal Templates)

Legal page templates include:

• Terms of Use (Users are forced to agree to Terms and Conditions before using site)
• Linking Policy
• External Links Policy
• Terms and Conditions
• Refund Policy
• Affiliate Disclosure
• Privacy Policy
• Affiliate Agreement
• Facebook Privacy Policy
• Earnings Disclaimer
• Antispam Policy
• DoubleClick DART Cookies Policy
• Disclaimer Template
• FTC Disclosure Statement Template
• Medical Disclaimer Template
• Testimonials Disclosure – As per FTC guidelines
• Amazon Affiliate Disclosure Template
• DMCA Policy Template
• California Privacy Rights Policy Template
• Digital Goods Refund Policy Template
• COPPA – Children’s Online Privacy Policy Template
• Blog Comments Policy Template
• Newsletter Subscription Policy and Disclaimer Template
• FTC Disclaimer Widget

To learn more this great plugin, go here:

• WP Legal Pages

Compliance Bar – WP Website Compliance Plugin

The Compliance Bar Plugin For WordPress is a total compliance and disclaimer solution for your digital business …

More info:

• Compliance Bar Plugin – WordPress Website Compliance Plugin

Legal Suite Pro Plugin

(Legal Suite Pro Plugin)

Legal Suite Pro Plugin lets you easily install professionally-written legal pages such as:

• Anti-Spam Policy
• Copyright Notice
• DMCA Compliance
• FTC Compliance
• Privacy Policy
• Social Media Disclosure
• Medical Disclaimer
• Terms of Use
• Earnings Disclaimer

(Legal Suite Pro – Professionally-written legal forms)

Additionally:

• Drag & Drop FTC Disclaimer Widget: Add an FTC Disclaimer to any WordPress sidebar or widget area.
• Customizable EU Cookie Compliance Bar: Display an EU cookie compliance bar if you are getting traffic from the EU and your sites use cookies.

With just one-click you can install almost all of the legal pages your site needs and these professionally written legal pages can be created in your theme and/or as a standalone page outside of your theme.

The plugin developers secured rights to high quality, professionally written legal disclaimers and packaged them into a plugin that can be installed quickly on any WordPress site. Your legal pages can be installed and set up on your site in less than one minute and the plugin licensing is very flexible, allowing you to install and use the plugin on all of your sites (even sites that you decide to sell).

Go here to learn more:

• Legal Suite Pro

If hiring a lawyer to create your legal documentation is currently out of your budget, then consider implementing at least some basic type of legal protection on your website until you can afford legal services.

We want your business to be legally safe!

Download the Legal Pages Generator software below (it’s FREE!), or choose one of the better solutions we discuss in this article, such as using legal content, or a plugin as described in the section below.

(Legal Pages Generator)

Legal Pages Generator allows you to easily generate necessary legal documents for your website including Terms of Service, Privacy Statement, Copyright Notice, Website Disclaimer and Earnings Disclaimer.

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As we’ve previously pointed out, if you do any kind of business online, it’s important that your website stays compliant with regulatory agencies and any guidelines and terms of service of third-party services and products that you may decide to promote or endorse online. Your website must comply with various regulations, many of which you may not be aware of.

Non-compliance puts you at risk of suffering both financial losses and the loss of your reputation. Why risk your money and reputation, when you can protect yourself so inexpensively?

Legal Disclaimer: Once again, we are not lawyers and we do not provide legal advice. You must do your own due diligence and consult a legal expert to ensure that your website fully complies with all legal requirements concerning your specific business.

Additional Legal Information

Below is a useful list of additional sites we recommend you visit to better understand what your website may require to comply and meet legal obligations:

• Federal Trade Commission Latest List Of Rules & Regulations
• Federal Trade Commission Advertising & Marketing Rules Of the Road
• FTC Advertising And Marketing On The Internet
• Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program
• Dot Com Disclosures: Information About Online Advertising
• Restore Online Shoppers’ Confidence Act
• CAN-SPAM Act Guide
• Children’s Online Privacy Protection Rule
• FTC Regulatory Review Web Page
• FTC Rules and Guides Currently Under Review
• The Department of Commerce Internet Policy Task Force – Commercial Data Privacy and Innovation in the Internet Economy: A Dynamic Policy Framework
• FTC Staff Report: Self-Regulatory Principles for Online Behavioral Advertising
• FTC Final Guides Governing Endorsements and Testimonials
• US Patent and Trademark Office
• US Copyright Office

See Also …

• Analytics Help – Policy requirements for Google Analytics Advertising Features
• Google AdSense Program Policies Explained
• Google AdSense Help – Required Content
• Google AdWords – Information Collection And Use
• AdWords Help – What to include in your privacy policy for remarketing
• ClickBank – Creating Your First Product
• Facebook Platform Policies

We hope you have found this article useful and that it has helped you understand the importance of having a compliant website. Use the information provided above to quickly add legal pages to your website or blog.

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