Is your WordPress website legally compliant? Do you know if your site is breaking any laws, or breaching the Terms of Service (TOS) of any companies whose products or services you are promoting or using?
As the cybersphere continues to grow at breakneck speed and the rules of the game keep changing, it’s important that you try to stay on top of what’s going on and ensure that your website remains compliant with all laws and regulations, especially if your digital presence is important in the success of your overall business strategy.
Recent laws introduced in 2014 regulating how businesses promote advertising on their websites state that if you plan to promote anything on your website for commercial gain, then you must follow certain principles of disclosure to prevent enforceable orders being issued against you by regulatory agencies, such as the Better Business Bureau (BBB). Do a search online for “The Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program,” which regulates behavioral advertising across the internet for more details.
(Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program)
These laws affect several online business activities, including:
- Any form of advertising, e.g. contextual ads
- Retarget Marketing
- Google Analytics (or other analytics software)
- Affiliate Marketers
- Product Creation
- Blogging
- etc.
Without legal pages on your website (e.g. terms and conditions of use, privacy policy, legal disclaimers, etc.), many third-party sites like Google won’t let you advertise, sites like ClickBank will not allow you to list digital products, PayPal may close down your account, Facebook could suspend your applications, and you won’t be allowed to enroll in most advertising and affiliate merchant networks.
If your digital presence is not in compliance, you could face a multitude of penalties, including fines, having your website shut down, even jail time!
The purpose of this guide is to make you aware that your site(s) may be required to comply with certain legalities, the importance of being compliant with the terms of service of 3rd-party providers whose products or services you may be recommending online, and that there are solutions for WordPress that can help your sites become more compliant, such as the plugins listed further below.
Does Your Site Comply With The Law?
Disclaimer: Please note that we are not lawyers and we are not offering legal advice in this article. As stated earlier, the purpose of this article is only to help make you aware that your website may be subject to certain legal requirements in accordance with federal, regional or local laws and regulations that govern online business practices and that compliance may be required with the terms of service of providers whose services or products you use on your website or blog
Why Making Your Website Compliant Is Important
Consider what the implications to your business would be if these scenarios were to occur:
- A user suffers a cardiac arrest after purchasing your online fitness workout.
- The skin care products you sell as an affiliate gives someone skin rashes.
- You’ve let your subscribers know that you will not sell their information, but you have not informed them exactly what you’ll do with the information you have collected.
- Someone copies content from your website and publishes it on their site.
- There is no statement on your site letting your site users know that you are promoting a product as an affiliate that you will derive a commission if they buy it.
- You didn’t spell out the terms and conditions of your refund/return policies.
- Someone claims that your testimonials are false and tries to sue you as a result.
- You haven’t disclosed in a product review that you were given a free copy of the product.
- Your website includes adult information and you haven’t taken appropriate measures to restrict access by underage persons.
Consider also these real examples of costly compliance breaches:
- A CPA Marketer failed to provide adequate disclaimers telling online users they would be required to give up personal information (including credit card details to complete a debt reduction offer. Cost = $390,000.
- A social networking app developer copped 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 details.
- Facebook’s Terms Of Service prohibits users from scraping Users IDs. 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% had breached at least one of Google’s policies, more than 65% had infringed at least two of Google’s policies, and more than 40% had broken 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 be exposed to the risks of litigation through non-compliance?
Regardless of whether you are a:
- CPC (Cost Per Conversion) Marketer
- Multilevel Marketer
- Affiliate Product Promoter
- AdSense Publisher
- Product Marketer
- Amazon Associate
- EBay Seller
- Publisher Of Adult Content
- Provider Of Freelance, Consulting Or Coaching Services
- Online Seller Of Any Service Or Product
It’s imperative to make sure that your digital presence stays legally compliant.
Complying With Third-Party Services
All the big websites and government trade regulatory agencies emphasize the importance of observing the terms and policies of 3rd-party service providers.
You are expected to let your site visitors know that your business complies with all necessary legal requirements and professional guidelines. This not only improves consumer trust and buyer confidence in your business, it’s also a requirement of many companies you do business with.
For example:
Google requires websites to display certain information if using their services. This includes using features such as Google Analytics …
(Google Analytics – Policy Requirements)
Earning revenue online with your site using Google AdSense online advertising …
(Google AdSense advertising policy requirements)
And even promoting your site using Google AdWords …
(Policy requirements for using Google AdWords)
If you sell information products using merchants such as ClickBank, JVZoo, or other established merchant sites, you will need to add legal pages to your site before your products can be approved for sale …
(Policy requirements for selling via ClickBank)
The FTC (Federal Trade Commission) also requires you to display clear disclaimers and disclosures to visitors, especially when concerning the use of product testimonials or endorsements …
(Federal Trade Commission – consumer guidelines and regulations)
FTC Regulations Require Your Website To Be Compliant
New FTC regulations governing the conduct of businesses online were introduced in March 2012. A quick search online will easily reveal that many websites are still unaware (or choose to ignore) these requirements. As documented on their website, this typically results in the FTC making an example of businesses and prosecuting companies in an effort to get other businesses to comply.
If you plan to do any type of business online, therefore, it’s best not to take chances. Even if your business is not physically located in the U.S. you should protect your business by ensuring that your website is compliant with all FTC guidelines.
A number of business resource sites provide guidelines on how to structure disclaimers and disclosures to help your site comply with FTC requirements. We provide references and links to resources to a number of these at the end of this article …
(It’s important to structure your disclaimers and disclosures correctly to avoid running foul of the law)
Social Media Applications - Don’t Forget These
If you are planning to develop applications for your site users, you will also be required to provide sites like Twitter, Facebook, and others with information about various legal pages …
(Facebook apps also require compliance)
- If you are unsure whether or not you may be breaking the law, and/or Terms of Service policies and guidelines of sites like Google, Facebook, etc., then you most probably are.
- If you plan to promote products or services on your site as an affiliate marketer, or generate revenue with Google AdSense, Amazon, or eBay ads, or driving visitors to your website using Google AdWords, etc., then find out exactly what kind of legal information you are required to provide on your site to comply with all Terms Of Service and policy requirements to avoid having your accounts shut down.
- If you’ve ever wondered 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 third-party websites require you to comply with their policies and guidelines)
What Compliance Pages Do I Need To Add To My Site To Be Covered Against Legal Compliance Issues?
If you suspect that your website or blog is lacking in terms of compliance, then this section will help you.
Adding the following compliance pages to your site will help your business keep out of trouble with most regulatory authorities and third-party service providers, and avoid possible legal issues or even threats of legal action (e.g. “takedown” notices):
- About Us
- Contact Page
- Privacy Policy
- Terms & Conditions
- Disclaimer Pages
- General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) Compliance
In addition to the above, you may want to consider implementing any of these legal pages:
- Affiliate Disclosure (if you promote or sell affiliate products and services)
- Anti-Spam Policy
- Earnings Disclaimer
- External Links Policy
- Financial Disclaimers (if your website provides general information about financial areas or money-making opportunities)
- Refund Policy (if you run an e-commerce site)
- Video/Audio Terms (if you allow users to download media on your site)
Disclosure Pages – Types
Adding the right type of disclosure to your website is important. For example:
- No Material Connection – This lets your readers be aware that you will not receive compensation for writing the content.
- Affiliate Links – Notifies your readers that you may benefit financially if they act on your recommendation and buy through affiliate links on your site.
- Review Or Sample Copy – Lets site users know that you have received a sample or review copy of the product or service.
- Sponsored Post – Informs readers that you have been compensated in some way to write the post.
- Third Party Advertising – Informs visitors that you’re using online behavioral tracking technology. This is required to comply with the “enhanced notice” the Better Business Bureau has been requiring online publishers to show prominently on their sites since January 1, 2014.
How To Add Legal Pages Content To Your WordPress Website
Ideally, you will consult lawyers or a legal firm and ask them to prepare the content of your legal documents. Once this has been created, there are several ways to add them to your website.
Upload Legal Web Pages Manually
If someone prepares the legal verbiage for you in typical web page format (e.g. HTML), you can simply upload these to your web server, or have someone upload them for you.
We recommend creating a legal directory on your web server and uploading your legal pages to this directory (e.g. using FTP) …
(Upload legal pages to your server via FTP)
You can then easily add a link to these legal pages in WordPress using a custom WordPress menu …
(Custom WordPress Menu)
Make sure that your legal pages are kept up-to-date and clearly visible to all site visitors. You can insert links to your legal pages into the WordPress sidebar (or the footer section of your website or blog) so that visitors can access legal information from every page …
(It’s important to display links to legal pages to users on all of your website’s pages)
For a detailed step-by-step tutorial about displaying links to pages on your sidebar and footer in WordPress using widgets, see this step-by-step tutorial:
Legal Templates
You can easily find downloadable attorney-prepared forms and agreements by searching online, or by visiting websites like the ones listed below:
Find Legal Forms
Go here for more details:
Another option is to purchase a set of cut and paste website legal templates created by attorney Scott Talbert …
Cut & Paste Website Legal Pages
(Cut And Paste Website Legal Pages)
These legal pages were written by an attorney and feature less passive voice and more plain language phrasing and can be customized with a quick search and replace to add your own details, then pasted into your pages.
The legal forms included in Scott Talbert’s Legal Page Templates include:
- Anti-Spam Policy
- Copyright Notice
- Disclaimer: multi-discipline professional disclaimers
- DMCA Compliance
- FTC Compliance (This proprietary FTC page accommodates Federal Trade Commission regulations and guidelines brought into effect in 2012)
- Privacy Policy: Google & DoubleClick DART, etc.
- ToS & Conditions of Use: with inter- & intra-page redundancy, Contra Proferentem provision, reservation of rights, and exclusive social media admonition.
You can either create a new page for every legal form you want added to your website, then paste the content from the templates into your pages and publish or upload these to your web server as described earlier.
For more details, go here:
WordPress Legal Page Plugins
In addition to using legal templates, another option is to use WordPress plugins.
Here are some legal plugins for WordPress-powered websites and blogs worth looking into:
WordPress Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress
(WP Legal Pages Plugin)
If you don’t want to spend time creating legal pages manually, then consider installing a plugin like WordPress Legal Pages instead …
This is not a free plugin, but it’s a very low-priced and well-supported premium plugin that will help simplify the job of creating and implementing legal pages on your website and save you time.
Here are just some of the benefits of using WP Legal Pages:
- Pre-written Templates – The plugin gives you access to over 20 built-in legal templates created by professional lawyers.
- Very Quick And Easy To Use – You can set up most of your basic legal pages in a few minutes with just a few clicks of the mouse.
- Fully Customizable Pages – Includes customizable and easily editable legal form templates (e.g. Terms of Use, Disclaimer, Privacy Policy, Earnings Disclaimer and more!)
- Editable Pages – WordPress content editor lets you edit legal pages like every other WordPress page.
- Custom Shortcodes Integration – Add shortcodes to your website or blog pages and the information will then be automatically inserted into your content when you publish.
- Exclude pages. Exclude pages from menus with a simple checkbox and delete and manage these like any other WP page.
- Forced Options – Force page or post lock down. When users agree to your terms, the page unlocks.
- Additional Features – More features get added to this plugin with every new version.
When you install WordPress Legal Pages, a new menu item will display inside your WordPress dashboard section …
(WP Legal Pages Plugin – Menu)
This allows you to create, view and edit your legal pages from the admin area …
(WP Legal Pages – Settings Area)
You can easily create legal pages for different types of sites, such as business websites, review sites, medical sites, etc …
(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin – Create different legal pages)
You can also choose from several pre-written legal templates …
(WP Legal Pages – Built-In 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
For more details about using this plugin, go here:
Compliance Bar – Website Compliance Plugin For WordPress
Compliance Bar is a simple plugin for WordPress sites with over 20 customizable compliance page templates for your site …
Learn more here:
Legal Suite Pro
(Legal Suite Pro For WordPress)
This 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 And Conditions
- Earnings Disclaimer
(Legal Suite Pro For WordPress – 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 have packaged high quality, professionally written legal disclaimers into a plugin that can be installed quickly on any WordPress powered site. You can have legal pages installed and set up on your site in one minute or less and the license allows you to install and use the plugin on all of your sites.
For more details, go here:
If hiring legal experts to create your legal documentation is currently out of your budget, consider implementing at least some type of legal protection on your website until you can afford a solicitor.
We want your site to be protected!
Download the FREE Legal Pages Generator software below, or use one of the better solutions we discuss in this article, such as using attorney-prepared legal content, or a plugin - see section below.
(Legal Pages Generator Software)
Legal Pages Generator Software lets you easily generate basic 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 type of business online (or are planning to), it’s important that your site remains compliant with regulatory agencies and the guidelines and terms of service (TOS) provided by 3rd-party sites that you may decide to promote or sell online. If your website doesn’t comply with laws designed to protect consumers, you’re breaking the law.
Being non-compliant 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, please note that we are not lawyers and we are not offering legal advice on our website. You are strongly advised to do your own due diligence and consult legal experts to ensure that your website fully complies with all legal requirements in your country or region.
Legal Information
Here is a time-saving list of additional sites we recommend you visit to better understand what may be required of your site to stay compliant and meet legal requirements and guidelines:
- FTC Latest List Of Rules & Regulations
- FTC Advertising & Marketing Rules Of the Road
- FTC Advertising And Marketing On The Internet
- Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program – BBB
- 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
- United States Copyright Office
And …
- 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
- Google AdWords Help – What to include in your privacy policy for remarketing
- ClickBank – Creating Your First Product
- Facebook Platform Policies
Hopefully, this article has helped you understand why it’s important to have a compliant website. Use the information presented above to quickly and easily add legal pages to your WordPress website.
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