Tag: Privacy Statement

If you do any kind of business online, the last thing you want to do is to learn the hard way that you have broken the law.

As the digital way of life continues to grow at an extraordinary rate and the rules keep changing, it’s absolutely vital that you try to stay informed about what’s happening and make sure that your site remains compliant with all laws and regulations, especially if having a digital presence is an essential factor in your business strategy.

New laws introduced in 2014 regulating how businesses promote advertising on their sites clearly state that if you promote anything on your site for material gain, then you need to follow certain disclosure guidelines to prevent enforceable orders being issued against you by consumer protection agencies, such as the US-based 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)

The introduction of new laws affect various online business activities, including:

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

If your website does not display certain legal pages (e.g. terms of service, privacy statement, earning disclaimers, etc.), many third-party sites like Google won’t let you advertise, sites like ClickBank will not allow you to sell digital products, PayPal may shut down your account and freeze your funds, Facebook will disapprove web applications, and you will not be allowed to promote a range of advertising or online marketing networks.

If your business online is not in compliance, you could also face a whole range of penalties, including fines, having your website shut down, even jail time!

In this article, we look at why it’s important to have a legally compliant website and how to quickly and easily add legal pages to your website or blog.

Does Your Website Comply With All Legal Requirements?

Legal Disclaimer: We are not lawyers and we do not offer legal advice on this website. You must do your own due diligence and we recommend consulting legal experts about the best way of ensuring that your website is compliant with all laws in your country or region.

Why Ensuring That Your Website Is Compliant Is Important

Consider for a moment what the implications to your business would be in the following scenarios:

• A customer suffers a cardiac arrest after using your online fitness workout.
• The skin care products you promote as an affiliate marketer gives someone who purchases from your link skin rashes.
• Your opt-in list provides a statement informing subscribers that you won’t sell their information, but you haven’t described exactly what you plan to do with their details.
• Someone copies your content and puts it up on their own site.
• There is no statement on your website or blog informing visitors that you’re an affiliate for the product you’re promoting that you may derive an affiliate commission if visitors buy it.
• You don’t spell out the terms of your refund and return policies.
• Someone claims the testimonials on your site are misleading and tries to sue you.
• You have not disclosed in a product review that you received a free copy of the product.
• Your site publishes adult information and you haven’t taken appropriate measures to keep underage persons from accessing it.

Consider too these real examples of costly compliance breaches:

• A CPA Marketer failed to provide adequate disclaimers telling online users they would have to give up personal information (including credit card details 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 children’s private details.
• Facebook’s Terms Of Service does not allow users to scrape UIDs. Many marketers took a risk and lost. Their accounts were shut down, resulting thousands of dollars in lost revenue.
• An independent 2010 study by Brad Geddes of SearchEngineLand, showed that, of a couple of hundred randomly-picked websites, more than 90% were breaking at least one of Google’s policies, more than 65% were breaking at least two of Google’s policies, and more than 40% were breaking at least three 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 entirely to the Google program whose policies with the violation, which could result in loss of income (e.g. AdSense or AdWords).

Can you see how easy it is to become exposed to the risk of non-compliance?

Regardless of whether you are a:

• CPC (Cost Per Conversion) Marketer
• Multilevel Marketer
• Affiliate Marketer
• AdWords User
• Info Product Marketer
• Amazon Affiliate
• EBay Seller
• Publisher Of Adult Content
• Freelancer, Coach or Consultant
• Seller Of Any Service Or Product Online

It’s imperative to make sure that your digital presence has the right legal pages and information displayed to all you site visitors.

Compliance With 3rd-Party Services Terms And Policies

Compliance with 3rd-party services terms and policies is important.

You are expected to let your site users know that your business complies with laws and professional guidelines. This not only improves consumer trust and buyer confidence in your site, it’s also a requirement of most companies you will engage with.

Let’s take a look at some examples:

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

(Policy requirements for using Google Analytics)

Earning revenue with your WordPress blogs with Google AdSense …

(Google AdSense policy requirements)

Or promoting your services using Google AdWords …

(Google AdWords – Policy Requirements)

If you plan to sell information-based products using companies like ClickBank, JVZoo, or other established merchant sites, you are required to add legal pages to your site before your products can be approved for sale …

(Policy requirements for vendors using ClickBank)

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) also requires that you include clear disclaimers and statements on your website, especially concerning the use of testimonials or product endorsements …

(Federal Trade Commission – consumer guidelines and regulations)

FTC Regulations – Ensure That Your Website Is Compliant

FTC regulations governing the conduct of doing business online were introduced in March 2012. A quick search online reveals that many websites are still unaware (or choose to ignore) these requirements. As is already the case, 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 do any type of business online, therefore, it’s best not to take any chances. Even if your business does not operate in the U.S. you should protect your business by making sure that your website complies with FTC guidelines and regulations.

You can find many online business resources that can provide guidelines and examples on how to structure disclaimers and disclosures to help you meet FTC requirements. See the additional resources section at the end of this article for more information …

(Structure your disclaimers and disclosures correctly to avoid running foul of laws and regulations)

Don’t Forget Social Media Apps

If you are planning to develop applications for your site users, sites like Facebook, Twitter, and others will require you to provide access to various legal pages …

(Facebook developer app – policy requirements)

• If you are unsure whether or not you are breaking the law, and/or Terms of Service policies and guidelines of companies 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 using affiliate marketing, or making money online with Google AdSense, Amazon, or eBay advertising, or using Google AdWords pay-per-click ads to drive visitors to your pages, etc., then find out exactly what kind of legal information you need 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 if “borrowing” a Copyright Notice is Copyright infringement, then it’s best to act now and take proper precautions to protect yourself and your website.

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

What Compliance Information Do I Need To Add To My Site To Be Safe From Legal Compliance Issues?

If your website or blog is falling short in areas of compliance, then you will find this section helpful.

At its most basic, adding the following compliance pages to your website should help your site keep out of trouble with most regulatory authorities and third-party providers, and avoid potential legal issues):

• About Us
• Contact Page
• Privacy Policy
• Terms & Conditions
• Disclaimer Pages
• General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) Compliance

In addition to the above pages, you may want to consider implementing one or more of the pages listed below if applicable:

• Affiliate Agreement (if you sell products or services through an affiliate program)
• Anti-Spam Policy
• Compensation Disclosure
• External Links Policy
• Health Disclaimers (if your website provides general health or medical information)
• Refund Policy (if you sell products or services online)
• Audio/Video Terms (e.g. if you allow media downloads on your site)

Types Of Disclosure Pages

Adding the right disclosure information to your website is important. For example:

• No Material Connection – Informs your visitors that you’re not being paid for writing the post.
• Affiliate Links – Lets site users know that you will benefit financially if they buy through your affiliate links.
• Sample Or review Copy – Lets site users know that you have been given a review or sample copy of the product or service.
• Sponsored Post – Disclosure that lets site users be aware that you have been compensated in some way to write the post.
• Third Party Advertising – Lets visitors 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.

How To Add Legal Pages To Your Website

Ideally, you will consult lawyers and ask them to prepare the content of your legal documents. Once these have been done, there are several ways to include them in your website.

Upload Legal Web Pages Manually To Your Site

If someone prepares and delivers the legal verbiage for you in HTML format, you can simply upload these to your server, or have someone upload them for you.

We recommend creating a legals folder in your web server and uploading your legal pages to this folder using FTP …

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

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

(Custom WordPress Menu Feature)

Make sure that your legal pages are up-to-date and clearly visible to visitors. You can insert these into the sidebar menu (or the footer section of your website or blog) so that users will be able to access legal information from every web page …

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

If you need help displaying links to pages on your sidebar menu, see this step-by-step tutorial:

• How To Add And Configure WordPress Widgets In Your Website

Store-Bought Legal Templates

You can easily find attorney-drafted downloadable website forms and agreements by searching online, or visiting websites like this one:

Find Legal Forms

(Find Legal Forms – Legal forms)

For more details, go here:

• FindLegalForms.com – Attorney-drafted legal forms

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

Cut & Paste Website Legal Pages

(Cut & Paste Website Legal Pages)

Cut & Paste website legal pages feature less passive voice and more plain language phrasing and can be customized with simple search and replace to insert your own details, then pasted into your pages.

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

• Anti-Spam Policy
• Copyright Notice
• Disclaimer (multi-discipline professional disclaimers)
• DMCA Compliance
• Federal Trade Commission Compliance (This proprietary FTC page accommodates new FTC regulations brought into effect in 2012)
• Privacy Policy: Google, DoubleClick DART, etc.
• ToS & Conditions of Use.

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

For more information, go here:

• Website Legal Pages

WordPress Plugins – Legal Pages

As well as using legal templates, another option is to use WordPress plugins.

Here are some WordPress plugins that you should check out:

WP Legal Pages

(WP Legal Pages Plugin)

If you don’t want to spend time creating legal web pages manually, then consider choosing a plugin like WordPress Legal Pages instead …

The WP Legal Pages plugin is not free, but it’s a reasonably affordable and well-supported plugin that will help make the work of creating and implementing legal pages on your site a lot easier and save you a great deal of time and effort.

Here are just some of the reasons to consider using WP Legal Pages plugin:

• Built-in Legal Templates – Over 20 built-in legal templates created by professional lawyers.
• Quick And Easy To Use – You can set up most of your basic legal pages in around 3 minutes with a few clicks of the mouse.
• Fully Customizable Pages – Includes fully customizable and easy to edit legal form templates (e.g. ToS, Disclaimer, Earnings Disclaimer, Privacy Policy and more!)
• Easy To Edit Pages – WordPress content editor lets you edit all legal pages like any WP page.
• Shortcodes – Add shortcodes to any of your WordPress pages and the information will be automatically inserted into your pages when published.
• Exclude pages. The plugin lets you exclude pages from menus with a simple checkbox and delete and manage these like any page on your website.
• Forced Options – Force page lock down. When users agree to your terms, the page unlocks, giving them access.
• Additional Features – New plugin features get added when new versions are released.

After installing WordPress Legal Pages, a new menu item will appear in your main navigation area …

(WP Legal Pages – Legal Pages Menu)

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

(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress – Settings Area)

The plugin gives you the option of creating legal pages for different types of sites, such as business websites, affiliate websites, e-commerce sites, etc …

(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin – Create different legal page types)

Select from several pre-written legal templates …

(WordPress Legal Pages – 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

Go here to learn more about using this handy plugin:

• WP Legal Pages

Compliance Bar – Compliance Plugin For WordPress

Compliance Bar is a simple plugin for WordPress users that includes over twenty customizable legal pages for your web presence …

Go here to learn more about the plugin:

• Compliance Bar – WordPress Website Compliance Plugin

Legal Suite Pro Plugin

(Legal Suite Pro)

Legal Suite Pro 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 & Conditions
• 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 license allows you to install and use this plugin on all of your websites (even sites that you decide to sell).

More information:

• Legal Suite Pro Plugin

If using the services of lawyers to create your online legal documentation is currently out of your budget, then consider implementing at least some form of legal protection on your website until you can afford professional assistance.

We want your site to be safe!

Download the FREE Legal Pages Generator tool below, or use one of the better solutions we discuss in this article, such as using attorney-prepared legal documents, or a legal pages plugin - see section below.

(Legal Pages Generator Software)

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

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As we’ve previously pointed out, if you engage in any form of commercial activity online, you need to make sure that your site complies with regulatory agencies and any terms of service and guidelines of third-party services and products that you may decide to promote or advertise online. Your digital presence must comply with a wide range of laws and regulatory guidelines, some of which you may not be aware of.

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?

Disclaimer: Once again, we are not lawyers and we offer no legal advice. Do your own due diligence and consult a legal expert about the best way to ensure that your website fully complies with all legal requirements pertaining to your business.

References And Resources

Below is a useful list of sites we suggest you visit to help you better understand what your site may require to remain compliant and meet legal obligations:

• FTC Latest List Of Rules & Regulations
• Federal Trade Commission Advertising & Marketing Rules Of the Road
• FTC Advertising And Marketing On The Internet
• BBB – 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
• United States Copyright Office

Additionally …

• 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 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 all necessary legal pages to your WordPress site.

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