Tag: Make WordPress Site Legally Compliant

If you do any kind of business online, you do not want to find yourself on the wrong side of the law.

As the cybersphere continues to grow at breakneck speed and rules keep changing, it’s important that you try to stay informed about what’s happening and ensure that your website or blog remains legally compliant, especially if your digital presence plays a significant role in your overall business strategy.

New laws introduced in 2014 to regulate how businesses promote advertising on their sites state that if you plan to promote anything on your website for profit, then you will need to follow certain principles of disclosure to prevent enforceable orders being issued against you by regulatory departments, such as the Better Business Bureau, also known as 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 – BBB)

The introduction of new laws has legal ramifications for several business categories, including:

• Any type of advertising, e.g. contextual ads
• Retarget Marketing
• Google Analytics (or other analytics software)
• Affiliate Marketing
• Product Creation
• Bloggers
• etc.

If you do not display certain legal pages on your site (e.g. terms and conditions of use, privacy policy, legal disclaimers, etc.), many sites such as Google won’t let you advertise, online merchants like ClickBank or JVZoo won’t allow you to sell digital products, PayPal may close down your account and withhold payment of your funds, Facebook could reject web applications, and you will not be allowed to participate in a range of advertising or online 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 article is to make you aware that your website may be required to comply with various legalities, the importance of maintaining compliance with the terms of service of external providers whose products or services you may be using on your site, and that there are solutions that can help your sites become fully compliant, such as the tools listed further below.

Does Your Website Or Blog Comply With All Legal Requirements?

Legal Disclaimer: Please note that we are not lawyers and we cannot provide legal advice about your website or business. As previously stated, this article is designed only to make you aware that your website may be subject to certain legal policies in accordance with the laws that govern business and that you may be required to comply with the terms of service of companies whose products or services you endorse

Why It’s Important To Make Your Website Compliant

Consider what would happen to your business in the following scenarios:

• Someone has a heart attack after they use your online fitness workout.
• The skin care creams you sell as an affiliate gives someone who purchases from your link an allergic reaction.
• Your opt-in list provides a statement that lets subscribers know that you will not sell their information, but you haven’t defined what you’ll do with the details you’ve collected.
• Someone steals your content and puts it up on their own website.
• There is no statement on your website letting visitors know that you’re an affiliate for the product you are marketing and may derive a financial benefit if they purchase via your affiliate link.
• You didn’t spell out the terms of your return policies.
• Your visitors claim that your testimonials are false and try to sue you as a result.
• You haven’t disclosed that you were given a free copy in your product review.
• Your site contains adult content and you didn’t take sufficient measures to keep underage persons from accessing it.

Consider too the documented case studies of costly compliance breaches listed below:

• A CPA Marketer failed to provide adequate disclaimers telling online users they would have to give up their personal information to complete his offer. Cost = $390,000.
• A social networking app developer was slapped with a whopping $800,000 fine for collecting personal information from mobile device address books without the owners’ knowledge and consent – including storing private details about children.
• Facebook’s Terms Of Service prohibits users from scraping Users IDs. Many marketers gambled that they could get away with it and lost. Their accounts were shut down, resulting 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% were in breach of at least two of Google’s policies, and more than 40% had breached 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 with warnings 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 exposed to litigation?

Regardless of whether you are a:

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

You need to do whatever is necessary to make sure that your website or blog has the right legal pages and information displayed to your site visitors.

Compliance With 3rd-Party Services

Leading online companies and government regulatory agencies emphasize the need and importance of observing the terms and policies of service providers.

You must let your visitors know that your website complies with legal requirements and professional guidelines. This not only increases trust and confidence in your business, it’s also required by most companies you will do business with online.

Here are just some examples:

Google requires your site to display legal information if using their products. This includes using features like Google Analytics …

(Google Analytics – Policy Requirements)

Monetizing your site using Google AdSense advertising …

(Google AdSense - policy requirements)

Or promoting your products or services through Google AdWords …

(Policy requirements for using Google AdWords)

If you sell information products through places such as ClickBank, JVZoo, or other established merchant sites, you are required to add certain legal pages before your products are approved for sale in their network …

(ClickBank – policy requirements for sellers)

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) also requires that you add clear disclaimers and policy statements on your site, especially 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 how business is conducted online were introduced in March 2012. Search online and you will see that many websites are still unaware (or choose to ignore) these requirements. As has happened in the past, this often results in the FTC making an example of businesses and prosecuting companies 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. it’s best to protect your business interests by making sure that your website is compliant with all FTC regulations and guidelines.

A number of resources online provide guidelines and examples for structuring disclaimers and disclosures to help your site meet FTC requirements. See the additional resources section at the end of this article for more information …

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

Don’t Forget Social Media Apps

If you are planning to create applications for your site users, you will also be required to provide sites like Facebook, Twitter, and many others with access to various legal pages …

(Facebook developer app – policy requirements)

• If you are not sure whether or not you are breaking the law, and/or Terms of Service policies and guidelines of sites like Google, Facebook, etc., then it’s best to assume that you most probably are.
• If you plan to promote products or services on your site as an affiliate marketer, or generating revenue online with Google AdSense, eBay or Amazon advertising, or use Google AdWords pay-per-click ads to drive visitors to your pages, etc., then find out exactly what kind of legal information you are required to display on your site to comply with their Terms Of Service and policy requirements - don’t risk having your accounts suspended.
• If you have been wondering whether “borrowing” a Copyright Notice is Copyright infringement, then it’s best to act now and take proper precautions to protect yourself and your business.

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

Essential Legal Pages To Include In Your Website To Ensure Compliance

If you suspect that your website or blog lacks in terms of compliance, then you will find this section helpful.

Adding the following legal pages to your site will help your business keep out of trouble with most regulatory authorities and external providers, and avoid possible legal issues or even threats of legal action (e.g. “cease and desist” notices):

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

In addition to the above, you may want to look into implementing any of these compliance pages:

• Affiliate Disclosure (if you sell or promote affiliate products or services)
• Anti-Spam Policy
• Earnings Disclaimer
• External Links Policy
• Health Disclaimers (if your website provides content about health or medical areas)
• Refund Policy (if you sell products or services online)
• Media Terms Of Use (if you allow media downloads on your site)

Disclosure Pages – Types

It’s important to add the right disclosure information to your website. For example:

• No Material Connection – This lets users be aware that you will not receive for writing the content.
• Affiliate Links – Lets users be aware that you will derive some form of financial or similar form of benefit if they purchase through affiliate links on your site.
• Review/Sample Copy – Discloses to visitors that you have been given a sample or review copy of the product by the author or developer.
• Sponsored Post – Lets site users know that you were compensated in some way to write the content.
• Third Party Advertising – Lets users know that you’re using online behavioral tracking technology. This is required to satisfy 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 have your lawyer prepare the verbiage of your legal documents. Once these have been done, there are several ways to add them to your website.

Upload Legal Web Pages Manually

If someone prepares and delivers the legal content for you as standard web pages (e.g. HTML), you can simply upload these to your site, or have someone upload them for you.

We recommend adding a legal folder to your web server and uploading HTML pages containing your legal documentation to this folder (e.g. via FTP) …

(Upload legal pages to your server via FTP)

You can then add links to your legal pages in WordPress using custom links in your menu admin area …

(WordPress Menu)

Make sure that your legal pages are fully up-to-date and display clearly to visitors. You can insert these into the sidebar menu (or place them in the footer section of your website) to ensure that visitors will be able to access legal information from all pages …

(It’s important to display links to your legal pages to users on all of your site’s pages)

We have created a detailed tutorial on displaying links to pages on your sidebar menu and footer in WordPress using widgets here:

• How To Add And Configure WordPress Widgets In The Sidebar Area

Ready-Made Legal Templates

You can find attorney-drafted disclosures and downloadable internet forms and agreements just by searching online, or by visiting websites like the ones listed below:

Find Legal Forms

(FindLegalForms.com – Attorney-drafted legal forms)

Visit this site to learn more:

• Find Legal Forms

Another option is to purchase a package of legal templates drafted by legal attorney Scott Talbert to protect businesses online …

Cut And Paste Website Legal Pages

(Website Legal Pages)

These legal pages feature less passive voice and more plain language phrasing and can be easily customized with simple 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
• FTC Compliance (This proprietary FTC page reflects new Federal Trade Commission guidelines that came into effect in March 2012)
• Privacy Policy
• ToS & Conditions of Use.

You can either create a new WordPress 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 your legal pages to your web server as previously described.

Go here for more details:

• Scott Talbert’s Website Legal Templates

Legal Pages – Plugins

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

Here are some great legal plugins for WordPress-powered sites worth looking into:

WordPress Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress

(WP Legal Pages Plugin)

If the idea of manually setting up legal pages for your website seems too time-consuming for you, then consider using a plugin like WordPress Legal Pages …

The WP Legal Pages plugin is not free, but it’s a very low-priced and well-supported plugin that will help make the job of creating and implementing legal pages on your website much easier and save you time.

Some of the reasons to consider using WordPress Legal Pages plugin are:

• Built-in Legal Templates – Includes over 20 built-in legal templates created by a team of professional lawyers.
• Very Quick And Easy To Use – Set up most of the legal pages you need in around 3 minutes with just a few mouse clicks.
• Customizable Pages – Includes customizable and easy to edit legal form templates (e.g. ToS, Disclaimer, Privacy Policy, Earnings Disclaimer and more!)
• Easy To Edit Pages – WordPress content editor lets you edit all legal pages just like every other WP page.
• Shortcodes – You can add shortcodes to your pages and the information will then be automatically inserted into your content when published.
• Exclude pages. The plugin lets you exclude pages from menus with a simple checkbox and delete and manage these like any WP page.
• Forced Options – Force page or post lock down. Page unlocks when user agrees to your legal terms.
• Additional Features – The plugin is updated with new features when new versions are released.

After installing WordPress Legal Pages, a menu feature will display inside your main navigation section …

(WordPress Legal Pages – Menu)

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

(WordPress Legal Pages – Settings Screen)

The plugin gives you the option of creating legal pages for different types of sites, such as business websites with products, review websites, AdSense sites, etc …

(WP Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress – Page Type)

Select from a number of pre-written legal templates …

(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin – 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

Visit the plugin website to learn more this useful plugin:

• WP Legal Pages Plugin

Compliance Bar Plugin – WordPress Website Compliance Plugin

Compliance Bar is a simple plugin for WordPress users that includes over twenty customizable legal templates for your website …

For more details, visit the plugin site here:

• Compliance Bar – Compliance Plugin For WordPress

Legal Suite Pro

(Legal Suite Pro Plugin For WordPress)

Legal Suite Pro Plugin For WordPress 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 Service
• Earnings Disclaimer

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

For more details, go here:

• Legal Suite Pro

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

We want your website to be safe!

Download the FREE Legal Pages Generator software below, or choose one of the better solutions we discuss in this article, such as using ready-made legal forms, or plugins as described in the section below.

(Legal Pages Generator Software)

Legal Pages Generator quickly generates necessary legal documents for your website including Terms of Service, Privacy Statement, Copyright Notice, Website Disclaimer and Earnings Disclaimer.

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As stated earlier, if you engage in any form of business online (or are planning to), it’s important that your site remains compliant with regulatory agencies and the terms of service (TOS) and guidelines for 3rd-party services and products that you may be promoting or endorsing online. Your website or blog must comply with a whole range of laws and regulatory guidelines, many of which you may not even 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?

Disclaimer: Once again, please note that we are not lawyers and we do not offer legal advice on this website. We strongly advise you to do your own due diligence and consult legal experts 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 suggest you visit to better understand what your website may require to comply and meet its legal requirements and guidelines:

• FTC Latest List Of Rules & Regulations
• FTC Advertising & Marketing Rules Of the Road
• FTC Advertising And Marketing On The Internet
• Better Business Bureau Website
• 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
• United States Patent and Trademark Office
• US Copyright Office

Plus …

• Google Analytics Help – Policy requirements for Google Analytics Advertising Features
• Google AdSense Program Policies Explained
• 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

Hopefully, this article has helped you understand the importance of having a legally compliant website. Use the information above to quickly and easily add essential legal pages to your website using simple solutions.

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