One of the worst things that can happen to you as a website owner is to break the law.
Your digital presence needs to comply with a whole range of laws and regulatory guidelines, many of which you are probably not even aware of.
Being non-compliant not only puts you at risk of suffering significant financial loss, but also the cost to your reputation. Why risk your money and your business reputation, when you can protect yourself so easily and inexpensively?
In this article, we look at a simple and easy-to-install solution for WordPress users that can help make your website fully compliant in minutes.
Is Your Site Legally Compliant?
As the cybersphere continues growing at breakneck speed and the rules of the game keep changing, it’s vital to stay on top of what’s going on and to make sure that your site remains compliant, especially if your web presence is an integral part of your overall business strategy.
If there are no legal pages on your web site (e.g. terms and conditions of use, privacy statement, legal disclaimers, etc.), many third-party sites like Google won’t let you advertise, sites like ClickBank won’t allow you to list your digital products on their network, PayPal could close down your account and withhold payment of your funds, Facebook and many other social networks could suspend your web apps, and you will not be accepted into most advertising or merchant networks.
If your website is not in compliance, you could end up facing a whole range of penalties, including fines, having your website shut down, even jail time!
At the very least, without making it clear to your visitors that your site complies with all legal requirements and regulatory guidelines, trust and confidence in your business may seriously diminish.
(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, almost all 3rd-party services require you to comply with their terms of use!)
Disclaimer: Please note that we are not lawyers and we cannot offer legal advice here.
The purpose of this post is to make you aware that:
- Your website could be subject to numerous legal requirements in accordance with federal, state or local laws that govern your business (some of which you may probably not even be aware of),
- The importance of remaining compliant with the terms of service of third-party providers whose products or services you may be offering or endorsing in your website, and
- There are easy solutions for WordPress users that can help your site become compliant, such as the solution that we discuss below.
If your website or blog lacks in terms of compliance, here is a simple plugin for WordPress users that you should know more about.
Announcing …
Compliance Bar – WP Website Compliance Plugin
Plugin Description
Compliance Bar is an easy-to-install WordPress plugin that includes over 20 customizable compliance disclaimer templates for your site …
Go here to learn more: Compliance Bar Plugin
Benefits
Below we have listed just some of the many benefits of using Compliance Bar to make your site instantly compliant:
Fast And Easy To Install And Set Up. Be Up And Running In Very Little Time.
Compliance Bar Plugin is quite easy to install. Just upload it to your Plugins folder via your WordPress dashboard and activate.
Easily Editable Page Templates
You can easily modify the default legal templates inside the plugin from the settings menu using the WYSIWYG content editor.
24/7 Plugin Support
Compliance Bar provides dedicated plugin support to assist you if you experience any problems.
Additional benefits of the plugin include:
- Customized Compliance Page Templates: The plugin will create your legal pages in seconds and customizes them to your business and website.
- Full Video Training Manuals: Compliance Bar is not difficult to use and a full library of training videos is available.
- Can Be Used In Every Country: As long as you consult someone who is qualified to give you legal advice to ascertain if the built-in templates provided in the plugin are suitable and satisfactory for your business, country and website, you can use the plugin anywhere in the world.
- Can Be Used For All Website Purposes: If your website or blog is built with WordPress, you can use the plugin for all website purposes. Just select the compliance pages you need to add to your site and ignore the unnecessary pages.
Plugin Features
Compliance Bar Plugin offers many features to site owners. Below we have listed just a few of these:
- Fast and simple to install and use. Be up and running in minutes.
- Display Attractive Icon Bar – Display links to your legal pages in the form of attractive icons that can be placed on different locations on your pages. You can also upload your own icons.
- Show Restricted Information – If your site includes content that should be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. content related to alcohol, tobacco, adult, etc.), the plugin can display pop-ups that require users to accept your website’s terms and disclaimers.
- EU User Cookie Compliance – If your business is based in Europe or display your content to EU visitors, you need to be aware of EU compliance laws. The plugin displays an attractive bar that notifies your users and covers your site from non-compliance issues.
- Records And Stores IP Acceptance – The plugin records and stores the IP address of your visitors for future reference, just in case someone accepts your terms or disclaimers and then claims otherwise.
- Shortcodes – Compliance Bar uses shortcodes that automatically populate the templates with your personal information. These shortcodes also allow you to place information anywhere on your site or blog, (even in the pop-ups).
- Works On All Mobile Devices – The plugin has settings for displaying on mobile devices and will display mobile optimized icons automatically depending on visitor web browsers.
Compliance Bar Features – Details
Once you have installed the Compliance Bar plugin, a section where the plugin’s settings can be configured is added to your WordPress backend.
Let’s review these settings briefly …
User Profile
There are a number of default fields in this section where your information can be entered (e.g. “Contact Name,” “Business Address,” “Company Phone Number,” “Refund Period,” etc.). Not all categories are compulsory, but some are (e.g. “Contact Name,” “Support Email,” etc.)
(Compliance Bar User Profile Screen – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
The Compliance Bar Plugin uses shortcodes to automatically populate the information you have input into your User Profile in your legal page templates …
(Compliance Bar Plugin User Profile Screen: Shortcodes – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Once the minimum required information has been entered into the user profile fields, users can then access the other areas of the plugin.
Compliance Pages
The “Compliance Pages” section contains all of the plugin’s templates …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Legal Pages – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Last time we checked the Compliance Bar plugin website, there were over 20 compliance templates available, covering all aspects of compliance:
- 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
- Adult Content Disclosure
Creating legal pages for your website or blog can be easily done. Just select the check boxes next to the pages you want to create and click ”Save” at the bottom of the “Create Pages” section …
(Compliance Bar: Legal Templates – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Your legal pages will then be created and added to the “Pages” section of your site.
Compliance Bar Icons
The plugin is installed with a built-in set of attractive icons for referencing your legal pages …
The Compliance Bar icons can be changed. You can purchase additional icons from the plugin developer, or create/upload your own to match the style of your theme …
(Compliance Bar: Legal Template Icons – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Edit / Delete Compliance Page Templates
You can easily modify and delete the legal pages from the “Compliance Pages” section, just as you would any other page in WordPress …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Edit Compliance Pages – Image source: plugin documentation)
Notes
- Customizing your legal templates is recommended, as the pages contain generic content.
- The plugin notifies you if it detects existing similar pages on your site (e.g. pages created before installing the plugin).
Compliance Bar
You have many options to customize the Compliance Bar, including where to position the bar, whether to show links or icon images, background colors and images, image size, specifying which pages to include an icon for 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 Section: Create Bar – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Notes:
- You can create unlimited Compliance Bars to display different disclaimers on different pages, or to cover different uses throughout your website.
- The plugin lets you display a Compliance Bar on the front page of your site, even if you are using particular WordPress themes (e.g. Genesis, Thesis or Woo), where the home page is specifically configured through the theme settings as a built-in template, and not as a normal “static” page.
- Due to the smaller size of mobile device screens, you can only select up to a certain number of page icons to display if you turn Mobile Settings “on.”
Once you have configured your Compliance Bar settings, it will display links to your compliance pages through dynamic icon bar on your site …
You have complete control over the location on your pages where you would like to feature the compliance bar …
PopUps
If you plan to show content that should be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. content related to alcohol, ecigs, adult content, etc.), you can display pop-ups that blocks access to visitors who do not accept your site’s terms or disclaimers.
The “Create Pop Up” tab gives you full control over the settings and customization of your pop ups …
(Pop Ups Screen: Create Pop Up – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
You can create several Pop Ups for different pages, or to cover various uses throughout your site …
You can also set a delay time if you don’t want Pop Ups to display as soon as visitors arrive, set a cookie duration to prevent Pop Ups from appearing again within a specific time period, and store the IP addresses of visitors who accept your terms and disclaimers for future reference …
(Pop Ups Section: IP Log Details – Image source: plugin documentation)
EU Cookies
If your business is based in the EU or display your content to visitors in the EU, you must make users aware of your user cookies and notify them of how you use them …
The plugin lets you edit the settings for compliance with EU User Cookies requirements, including the wording of your notification message and link text in the “EU Cookies” section …
(EU Cookies Section: Manage Settings – Image source: 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 compliance templates and shortcodes, and lets you edit the page content …
General Settings
The “General Settings” menu, gives you access to general information, such as promoting and sharing the plugin and receiving plugin update notifications …
User Testimonials
Here are just a few of the testimonials that plugin customers have provided for Compliance Bar:
”One of the Best Plugins I Have Used” Ray Lane – (The Video Guy)
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”Truly Amazing Product!” Patrick Mauchant – PT Enviromate Technology
Compliance Bar Plugin – Useful Tips
Below are some extra ways you can use Compliance Bar:
- Protect against content theft by spelling out terms of use of your website.
- Displaying compliance icons on specific pages only.
- End refund disputes by clearly spelling out the refund terms before purchase.
- If your site published adult content, you can force visitors to click to confirm that they are of legal age to view your content.
Support
Plugin Developers provide users with a dedicated plugin support team to assist users. Users also get access to an entire library of training videos.
Additionally, your purchase is backed by a risk-free, thirty day, 200% refund guarantee. If your version of Compliance Bar does not work within 30 days of purchase and it cannot be fixed within 48 hrs (M – F), the plugin developers will refund double the cost of purchase.
Product Pricing
- Single Site Personal License – Install the plugin on 1 domain that you own. Cost = $47 (Normally $127)
- Business Licensing – Install the plugin on up to 25 of your own domains. Cost = $67.00 (Normally $197).
- Professional – Can be installed on multiple of your own sites. Can be installed on any client site for payment or as part of a paid service. Price = $97.00.
Note: The price of the Compliance Bar plugin can vary, depending on whether there are any promotions or limited-time specials being offered. The above reflects the current price at the time this review was published. This may not be the actual price charged by the plugin developer when you visit the website and you may be shown additional upsells or one-time offers after you’ve purchased.
Check the plugin’s website for the latest pricing here: Compliance Bar – WP Website Compliance Plugin
Additional Plugin Information
Templates Reviewed By Lawyers – The plugin developers claim on their website that all legal page templates have already been reviewed and approved by lawyers. Nonetheless, we highly recommend that you get legal advice from a qualified legal expert in your area for your peace of mind.
For a demo video of the plugin, including help documentation and tutorials, FAQs, customer helpdesk, contact details and more, visit the Compliance Bar website.
Get This Plugin
Compliance Bar is an easy-to-use, simple and cost-effective solution for WordPress-driven websites. We recommend installing this plugin for WordPress users if you want immediate peace of mind and legal protection.
For more details, visit the plugin website here: Compliance Bar – Compliance Bar Plugin – WordPress Plugin For Website Compliance
Legal Disclaimer: Once again, please note that we are not lawyers and we are not offering legal advice on our website. You must 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 wherever your business is based.
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