One of the worst things that can happen to a website owner is to suddenly discover that you have broken the law.
Your internet presence has to comply with a whole set of laws, many of which you may probably not even be aware of.
Being non-compliant puts you at risk of incurring serious financial losses and the cost to your reputation. Why risk your money and reputation, when you can protect yourself so inexpensively?
In this post, we look at a simple and cost-effective solution for WordPress users that can help make your website compliant in minutes.
Is Your Website Or Blog Legally Compliant?
As the internet continues to grow at breakneck speed and rules keep changing, it’s important to stay on top of what’s going on and to make sure that your website or blog remains compliant with all laws and regulations, especially if your online presence is a significant aspect of your business strategy.
If you do not display certain legal pages on your site (e.g. terms and conditions of use, privacy policy, earning disclaimers, etc.), many third-party sites such as Google won’t let you advertise, digital marketplaces like ClickBank won’t allow you to list your digital products on their network, PayPal could shut down your account and freeze your funds, Facebook will suspend your web applications, and you won’t be allowed into a range of other advertising or merchant networks.
You may also be inadvertently leaving yourself open and vulnerable to litigation.
At the very least, if your business online is not compliant, trust and confidence in your business may be irrepairably.
(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, almost all third-party websites require you to comply with their terms of use and policies!)
Disclaimer: Please note that we are not lawyers and we offer no legal advice on this website.
The purpose of this post is to make you aware that:
- Your website could be subject to various legal requirements in accordance with federal, state or local laws and regulations that govern your business (some of which you may probably not even be aware of),
- The importance of complying with the terms of service of third-party providers whose products or services you are promoting or endorsing online, and
- There are solutions that can help your site become compliant, such as the tool that we review in this article.
In this article, you will learn about a simple WordPress plugin that provides a complete compliance & disclaimer solution for your site.
Presenting …
Compliance Bar – WordPress Plugin For Website Compliance
Plugin Description
Compliance Bar Plugin is a simple and easy-to-install WordPress plugin containing over twenty customizable legal pages for your online business …
Go here to learn more about the plugin: Compliance Bar
Benefits Of Using Compliance Bar
Below we have listed just a few of the benefits and advantages of using Compliance Bar to make your site instantly compliant:
Fast And Simple To Install And Set Up. Be Up And Running In Very Little Time.
Compliance Bar installs just like any plugin. Simply upload the plugin file to your Plugins folder via your WP admin login and activate.
Easy To Edit Legal Page Templates
Easily edit the prebuilt templates inside the plugin from the settings menu with the WordPress WYSIWYG content editor.
Dedicated Support
The plugin develop provides dedicated support to assist users if they experience any issues.
Additional benefits and advantages include the following:
- Customized Compliance Page Templates: The Compliance Bar plugin creates your legal pages in seconds and customizes them to your business and website.
- Video Training Manuals: Compliance Bar is not complicated to use - an entire library of training videos is available.
- Can Be Used In Every Country: As long as you consult a qualified legal representative to ascertain if the templates provided in the plugin are suitable and satisfactory for your business, country and website, you can use the plugin anywhere in the world.
- Use For Every Website Purpose: If your site is built with WordPress, you can use the plugin for all kinds of websites. Select only the types of disclaimers that suit your specific business model (e.g. affiliate or CPA marketing, services, AdSense, AdWords, adult, medical, etc) and ignore those that you don’t need.
Plugin Features
Compliance Bar offers a number of features to website owners. Below we have listed just a few:
- Fast and easy to install and configure. Ready to go to work in very little time.
- Show Visually Appealing Icons – Display links to your legal pages using attractive icons that can be positioned on different locations in your pages. You can also upload icons of your choice.
- Display Sensitive Information – If your website publishes content that needs to be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. information related to alcohol, ecigs, adult content, etc.), Compliance Bar can display pop-ups that require users to accept your terms or disclaimers.
- EU Cookie Compliance – If your business is based in the EU or display your content to visitors in the EU, you need to be aware of EU Cookie law. Compliance Bar displays an attractive bar notifying your visitors and covering your website from non-compliance.
- Record And Store IP Addresses – The plugin records the IP address of your visitors for future reference, just in case a user accepts your terms or disclaimers and then claims otherwise.
- Shortcodes – The plugin uses shortcodes that automatically populate the templates with your personal information. These shortcodes also allow you to place information anywhere on your site, (even in the popups).
- Mobile Friendly – The plugin has individual settings for displaying on mobile devices and can display mobile optimized icons automatically based on the browser being used.
Using Compliance Bar
After installing and activating the Compliance Bar plugin, users have access to a section where the plugin’s settings can be configured.
Let’s review these briefly …
User Profile
There are a number of default fields in this section where you can input your business details into input (e.g. “Contact Name,” “Registered Business Address,” “Location Details,” “Company Registration Number,” etc.). Not all categories are compulsory, but some are (e.g. “Website URL,” “Company Phone Number,” etc.)
(Compliance Bar User Profile Section – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
The plugin uses shortcodes to populate the information you have entered into your User Profile fields into your legal pages …
(Compliance Bar User Profile Page: Shortcodes – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Once the minimum required information has been input into the user profile fields, you can then access the other areas of the plugin.
Compliance Pages
The “Compliance Pages” screen lists all of the plugin’s compliance pages …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Legal Templates – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
When we last checked the Compliance Bar plugin website, there were over 20 legal pages available, addressing all areas 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
You can easily create compliance pages for your website or blog by simply selecting checkboxes and clicking the “Save” button in the “Compliance Pages” section …
(Compliance Bar: Legal Page Templates – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Your legal pages will then be created and added to your “Pages” section.
Compliance Bar Icons
The plugin comes with a built-in set of icons for referencing your legal pages …
Icons are customizable. You can purchase additional icons from the plugin developer, or create/upload your own to match the style of your theme …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Compliance Page Template Icons – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Edit / Delete Compliance Templates
You can easily customize and delete your compliance disclaimers in the “Compliance Pages” tab, just as you would any typical WordPress page …
(Compliance Bar: Edit Compliance Page Templates – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Notes
- Customizing is recommended, as the pages contain generic content.
- The plugin indicates if it detects existing similar pages on your site (e.g. pages created before installing the plugin).
Compliance Bar
The plugin offers many options to customize the Compliance Bar, including position, whether to show links or icon images, background colors and images, icon size, selecting which pages should be included in the Compliance Bar, whether or not to display the Compliance bar on your home page, which pages the Compliance Bar will display in, mobile settings, etc. …
(Compliance Bar Section: Create Bar – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Notes:
- You can create more than one Compliance Bar to show different icons on different pages, or to cover a range of uses in different areas of your website.
- The plugin lets you display the Compliance Bar on the main page of your website, even if you are using a specific theme (like Genesis, Thesis or WooThemes), where the home page is configured through the theme settings as a built-in template, and not as a “regular” page.
- Due to the smaller size of mobile devices, there is a limit to the number of page icons you can display if you turn Mobile Settings “on.”
Once you have specified your Compliance Bar settings, it displays links to your compliance pages using dynamic icon bar on your site …
You have full control over the location on your pages where you would like your compliance icons to show …
PopUps
If your site includes content that may be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. information related to alcohol, ecigs, adult-related, etc.), the plugin can display pop-ups that require users to accept your website’s terms or disclaimers.
The “Create Pop Up” area lets you fully customize your pop ups …
(Pop Ups Screen: Create Pop Up – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
You can create more than one Pop Up displaying on different pages, or to cover a range of uses in other sections of your site …
You can also specify a delay time if you don’t want Pop Ups to display immediately, set cookie durations to prevent Pop Ups from appearing again within a specific time interval, and even record the IP addresses of visitors who accept your terms and disclaimers for future reference …
(Pop Ups Section: IP Log Details – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
EU Cookies
If you do business in Europe 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 …
The Compliance Bar plugin lets you manage the settings for compliance with EU User Cookies requirements, including the wording of your notification message and link text in the “EU Cookies” area …
(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” tab, lists all of your compliance templates and shortcodes, and lets you modify the page content …
General Settings
The “General Settings” area, gives you access to general information, such as promoting and sharing the plugin and receiving plugin update notifications …
User Feedback
Below are a couple of the testimonials plugin customers have provided for the Compliance Bar plugin:
”When I got my hands on Compliance Bar, I knew I needed help to be compliant, but I had no idea how much danger I was in, nor did I know all of the different things I needed to be compliant. Once I installed Compliance Bar, I was able to very quickly add all the items I needed to ensure I didn’t end up getting fined by various agencies, or have my site pulled from Google. The best part is that getting it all set up took only minutes, and I know that I am far safer than I was. Compliance Bar is one of the best plugins I have used in a long time.” Ray Lane – (The Video Guy)
***
”I Highly Recommend Compliance Bar” Tony Grant (Portfolio Sports)
Compliance Bar Plugin Tips
Below are some extra ways you can use Compliance Bar:
- Protecting against content theft by spelling out your website’s terms of use.
- Display compliance icons only on specific pages of your site.
- End refund disputes by clearly spelling out your refund terms before purchase.
- If you have adult content on your site, you can force visitors to click to confirm that they are of legal age to view your content.
Product Support
Plugin Developers provide users with dedicated 24/7 plugin support to help you with anything you need. Plugin users also have access to video training manuals.
Additionally, your purchase is backed by a no-risk, thirty day, 200% money-back guarantee. If your edition of Compliance Bar does not work within 30 days of purchase and it cannot be fixed within 48 business hours (Monday to Friday), your money will be refunded in double.
Product Pricing
- Single – Install the plugin on one of your own sites. Price = $47 (Normally $127)
- Business License – Can be installed on up to 25 domains that you own. Cost = $67.00 (Normally $197).
- Professional – Install the plugin on multiple as many of your own domains as you like. Install the plugin on all client sites for payment or as part of a paid service. Cost = $97.00.
Note: Pricing for Compliance Bar depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time specials being offered. Currently, the product retails for the amounts shown above. This may or may not be the actual price set by the software developer when you visit the product site and you may be shown additional upsells or one-time offers after you’ve purchased.
Check the plugin’s website for the current pricing information: Compliance Bar – WordPress Website Compliance Plugin
Additional Plugin Information
Templates Approved By Lawyers – The plugin developers assert on their website that all legal templates have been reviewed and approved by a lawyer. Nonetheless, we strongly recommend that you get professional advice from a qualified legal expert in your area to ensure that your site is fully compliant.
For ”how to” videos showing how the plugin works, including installation instructions and tutorials, FAQs, support helpdesk, contact details and more, visit the Compliance Bar website.
We Recommend
Compliance Bar is an easy-to-use, simple and cost-effective solution for WordPress websites. We recommend installing this plugin for WordPress users if you want immediate peace of mind and legal protection.
For complete details, visit the plugin website here: Compliance Bar – Compliance Bar Plugin – WordPress Plugin For Website Compliance
Disclaimer: Once again, please note that we are not lawyers and we offer no legal advice in this article. You must do your own due diligence and consult a legal expert about the best way of ensuring that your website fully complies with the law wherever your business is based.
***