One of the worst situations you can find yourself in as a website owner is to be on the wrong side of the law.
If your website doesn’t comply with laws intended to protect consumer rights, you’re breaking the law.
Being non-compliant not only puts you at risk of suffering significant financial loss, but also the loss of your reputation. Why risk your money and your business reputation, when you can protect yourself so inexpensively?
In this post, we look at a simple and easy-to-install solution for WordPress users that can help make your website fully compliant just minutes.
Is Your Site Legally Compliant?
As the digital business realm continues growing at breakneck speed and the rules are constantly changing, it’s vitally important that you stay on top of what’s going on and to make sure that your site remains compliant, especially if your web presence is a fundamental component of your business strategy.
Without legal pages on your site (e.g. terms of service, privacy statement, earning disclaimers, etc.), many sites such as Google won’t let you advertise, digital marketplaces like ClickBank will not allow you to list your digital products on their network, PayPal may close down your account and withhold payment of your funds, Facebook will suspend your web applications, and you will not be accepted into a range of leading advertising or affiliate merchant networks.
You could also be inadvertently leaving yourself open and vulnerable to lawsuits or legal action.
At the very least, without making it very clear to your visitors that your online properties comply with all legal requirements and regulatory guidelines, it may affect your visitors trust and confidence about doing any future business with you.
(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, most 3rd-party websites require you to comply with their terms of use!)
Legal Disclaimer: We are not lawyers and we offer no legal advice on this website.
The purpose of this article is to make you aware that:
- Your website may be subject to a number of legal requirements in accordance with the laws and regulations that govern your business (some of which you may not even be aware of),
- How important it is to comply with the terms of service of third-party providers whose products or services you are offering or endorsing in your website, and
- There are plugin-based solutions for WordPress users that can help your site become compliant, such as the solution that we discuss below.
If you suspect that your website is falling short in areas of compliance, here is a simple WordPress plugin that you should know more about.
Announcing …
Compliance Bar – WordPress Plugin For Website Compliance
Plugin Description
The Compliance Bar WordPress Plugin is a complete compliance & disclaimer solution for your web presence …
Learn more here: Compliance Bar
Benefits
Here are just a few of the benefits of using Compliance Bar to make your site instantly legally compliant:
Fast & Easy Installation
Compliance Bar is quite easy to install. Simply upload a zip file containing the plugin to your Plugins folder via your dashboard and activate.
Easily Editable Templates
Easily modify the prebuilt legal page templates inside the plugin from the settings menu using the WordPress visual editor.
Dedicated 24/7 Plugin Support
Compliance Bar plugin provides dedicated 24/7 plugin support to help users if they experience any problems.
Some additional benefits and advantages include:
- Customized Legal Page Templates: The plugin will create your legal pages in seconds and customizes them to your business and website.
- Video Training Library: Compliance Bar is not complicated to use - a complete library of training videos is provided.
- Can Be Used Anywhere In The World: As long as you consult someone who is qualified to give you legal advice to make sure that the built-in legal templates provided in the plugin are suitable and satisfactory for your business, country and website, you can use the plugin wherever you are located.
- Can Be Used For All Website Purposes: If your website is driven by WordPress, you can use the plugin for any website purpose. Select only the types of disclaimers which pertain to your particular business model (e.g. affiliate or CPA marketing, business services, AdSense, AdWords, adult, medical, etc) and ignore those that you don’t need.
Compliance Bar Plugin Features
Compliance Bar offers many great features to web site owners. Here are just a few of these:
- Quick and simple to install and set up. Ready to use in minutes.
- Display Attractive Icons – Display links to your compliance pages using attractive icons that can be placed on different locations in your pages. You can also upload icons of your choice.
- Show Sensitive Information – If your site contains content that may be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. information related to alcohol, ecigs, adult content, etc.), Compliance Bar can display popups that require users to accept your site’s terms or disclaimers.
- EU Cookie Compliance – If your business is based in the EU or display your content to visitors in the EU, you must be aware of EU compliance requirements. Compliance Bar displays an attractive bar notifying your users and covering your site from non-compliance issues.
- Records And Stores IP Addresses – The plugin records and stores your visitors’ IP address for future reference, just in case someone accepts your terms or disclaimers and then claims they haven’t.
- Shortcodes – Compliance Bar is integrated with shortcodes to automatically populate legal pages with your personal information. These shortcodes also allow you to place information anywhere on your site or blog, (even in the popups).
- Mobile Friendly – The plugin has settings for displaying on mobile devices and tablets and can display mobile optimized icons automatically depending on the web browser being used.
Using The Plugin
After installing and activating the plugin, you will get access to various sections where you can configure the plugin’s settings.
Let’s briefly review these settings …
User Profile
There are a number of default categories in this section where you can input your information into entered (e.g. “Contact Name,” “Company Address,” “Contact Phone,” “Market Niche,” etc.). Not all categories are required, but some are (e.g. “Business Name,” “Registered Address,” etc.)
(Compliance Bar User Profile Screen – Image source: plugin documentation)
Compliance Bar uses shortcodes to populate the information you’ve inputted into your User Profile into your legal pages …
(Compliance Bar Plugin User Profile Screen: Shortcodes – Image source: plugin documentation)
Once the minimum required (i.e. compulsory) information has been input into the user profile fields, you can then access the other plugin section.
Compliance Pages
The “Compliance Pages” section lists all of the templates …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Legal Templates – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Here’s the complete list of template pages made available by the Compliance Bar plugin last time we checked their site:
- About Us
- AdSense Disclaimer
- Affiliate Agreements
- Affiliate Disclosure
- 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
- XXX Disclosure
You can easily and quickly create compliance pages for your blog or website simply by selecting check boxes and clicking the “Save” button at the bottom of the “Compliance Pages” section …
(Compliance Bar: Compliance Templates – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Your legal pages will then be created and added under your “Pages” section.
Compliance Bar Icons
The plugin is installed with a default set of attractive icons for referencing your legal pages …
The Compliance Bar 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: Compliance Page Template Icons – Image source: plugin documentation)
Edit / Delete Compliance Page Templates
You can easily edit and delete the legal page templates from the “Compliance Pages” screen, just as you would any other page in WordPress …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Edit Legal Pages – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Notes
- Editing the compliance templates is recommended, as the pages contain generic content.
- The plugin indicates if it detects existing similar pages on your site (e.g. compliance pages created before you installed the plugin).
Compliance Bar
You have many options to customize the Compliance Bar, including position, displaying links or icon images, background colors and images, image size, specifying which pages should be included in the Compliance Bar, whether or not to display the Compliance bar on your main page, which pages the Compliance Bar will display in, mobile settings, and offset distance …
(Compliance Bar Screen: Create Bar – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Notes:
- You can create more than one Compliance Bar to display different icons on different pages, or to cover a range of uses in other areas of your site.
- The plugin lets you display the Compliance Bar on the front page of your site, even if you are using particular themes (e.g. Genesis, Thesis or WooThemes), where the home page is configured through the theme itself as a built-in template, and not as a “regular” page.
- Due to the smaller size of mobile screens, 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 displays links to your legal using a visually appealing icon bar on your site …
You have complete control over the location on your pages where you would like to display the compliance bar …
PopUps
If your website has content that may be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. content related to alcohol, tobacco, adult content, etc.), the plugin can display popups that require users to accept your website’s terms or disclaimers.
The “Create Pop Up” page gives you complete control over the settings and customization of your pop ups …
(Pop Ups Screen: Create Pop Up – Image source: plugin documentation)
You can create more than one Pop Up displaying on different pages, or to cover a range of uses in different areas of your site …
You can also specify a delay time if you don’t want a Pop Up to display as soon as visitors arrive, set cookie durations to prevent Pop Ups from displaying again within a specific time interval, and 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 the EU or display your content to EU visitors, you need to make users aware of your user cookies and notify them of how you use them …
Compliance Bar lets you customize the settings for compliance with EU User Cookies requirements, including the wording of your notification message and link text in the “EU Cookies” tab …
(EU Cookies Section: Manage Settings – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Compliance Bar has a non-intrusive way of notifying your visitors and covering you from non-compliance.
Page Templates
The “Page Templates” section, lists all of your legal templates and shortcodes, and lets you modify their content …
General Settings
The “General Settings” section, gives you access to general information, such as promoting and sharing the plugin and getting plugin updates …
Feedback From Plugin Customers
Here are a few of the testimonials plugin users have submitted for the Compliance Bar plugin:
”WOW” Shon Chris – Director (JV Peer Group)
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”Truly Amazing Product!” Patrick Mauchant – PT Enviromate Technology
Useful Tips
Below are some extra ways to use Compliance Bar:
- Protection against content theft by spelling out your website’s terms of use.
- Displaying compliance icons only on specific pages.
- End refund disputes by clearly spelling out your refund terms before customers purchase.
- If your site includes content that is inappropriate for minors, 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 you with anything you need. Plugin users also get access to complete video training.
Additionally, your purchase is backed by a no-risk, thirty day, 200% money-back guarantee. If your copy of Compliance Bar does not work within 30 days of purchase and it cannot be fixed within 48 hours (Monday to Friday), the plugin developers will refund double the amount of your purchase price.
Plugin Cost
- Single – Install the plugin on a single site that you own. Cost = $37 (Normally $127)
- Business License Edition – Can be installed on 25 sites that you own. Cost = $67.00 (Normally $197).
- Developer – Install the plugin on all as many of your own domains as you want. Install the plugin on any client site as part of a paid service. Cost = $97.00.
Please Note: Price details for Compliance Bar Plugin can vary, depending on whether there are any promotions or limited-time specials being offered. The price shown above was current at the time this review was written. This may not be the actual price charged by the plugin author when you visit the product site and there may be additional upsells or one-time offers after your purchase.
Check the plugin’s website for the current pricing information: Compliance Bar Plugin – Website Compliance Plugin For WordPress
Additional Plugin Info
Legal Page Templates Approved By Lawyers – The plugin developers state on their website that all legal page templates have already been reviewed and approved by a leading lawyer. Nonetheless, we strongly recommend that you get legal advice from a qualified legal expert in your area to ensure that your site is fully compliant.
For ”how-to” videos showing plugin usage, including help documentation and tutorials, FAQs, support help desk, contact details and more, visit the Compliance Bar website.
Our Recommendation
Compliance Bar is an easy-to-use, simple and cost-effective solution for WordPress-powered sites. We recommend downloading and installing this plugin for WordPress users 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
Legal Disclaimer: Once again, we are not lawyers and we cannot offer legal advice here. You must do your own due diligence and consult a legal expert about the best way to ensure that your website is compliant with the law wherever your business is based.
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