One of the worst predicaments you can find yourself in as a website owner is to receive a notice of legal action as a result of breaking the law.
If your website doesn’t comply with laws intended to protect consumers, you’re breaking the law.
Being non-compliant not only puts you at risk of incurring financial losses, but also the cost to your reputation. Why risk your money and your business reputation, when you can protect yourself so inexpensively?
In this article, we look at a simple and easy-to-use WordPress solution that can help make your website legally compliant just minutes.
Is Your Website Legally Compliant?
As the digital business realm continues growing at breakneck speed and the rules of the game constantly change, it’s vital to stay on top of what’s happening and to make sure that your site remains compliant, especially if your web presence is a significant aspect of your business strategy.
Without legal pages on your website (e.g. terms and conditions of use, privacy statement, earning disclaimers, etc.), many third-party sites such as Google won’t let you advertise, sites like ClickBank will not approve your digital products for sale, PayPal may close down your account and withhold payment of your funds, Facebook will suspend your applications, and you will not be allowed into many other advertising and affiliate marketing networks.
Plus, you could also be inadvertently leaving yourself open and vulnerable to being exploited by opportunistic online users.
At the very least, if your online presence is not in compliance, trust and confidence in your business may be irrepairably.
(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, most third-party services require you to comply with their terms of use and policies!)
Legal Disclaimer: Please note that we are not lawyers and we offer no legal advice in this article.
The purpose of this article is to make you aware that:
- Your website could be subject to many legal requirements in accordance with compulsory laws that govern your business,
- How important it is to maintain compliance 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 business become compliant, such as the tool that we discuss in this post.
In this article, we review a total compliance and disclaimer plugin for a WordPress-based digital presence.
Introducing …
Compliance Bar – WordPress Compliance Plugin
Plugin Description
Compliance Bar is a complete compliance and disclaimer solution for your online presence …
For more details go here: Compliance Bar
Benefits
Here are just a few of the benefits and advantages of using Compliance Bar to instantly make your website or blog legally compliant:
Ready To Go To Work In Very Little Time
Compliance Bar is quite easy to install. Just upload the plugin file to your Plugin folder via your dashboard and activate.
Easy To Edit Templates
Easily edit the default compliance templates inside Compliance Bar from the settings menu using the WordPress visual content editor.
24/7 Plugin Support
Compliance Bar plugin provides a dedicated support team to assist you.
Some additional benefits and advantages include the following:
- Customized Compliance Page Templates: Compliance Bar creates your legal pages in seconds and customizes them to your business and website.
- Complete Video Training: Compliance Bar is not difficult to use and an entire library of training videos is provided if users need help.
- Use In Every Country: As long as you consult someone who is qualified to give you legal advice to ascertain if the default legal page templates provided with Compliance Bar are suitable and satisfactory for your business, country and website, you can use the plugin anywhere in the world.
- Can Be Used On All WordPress Sites: As long as your website or blog runs on WordPress, you can use the plugin for all kinds of websites. Select only the types of disclaimers that suit your particular business model (e.g. affiliate or CPA marketing, business services, AdSense, AdWords, adult, medical, etc) and leave out any templates that you don’t require.
Plugin Features
Compliance Bar offers a number of great features to site owners. Here are just some of those features:
- Quick and easy to install and configure. Be up and running in very little time.
- Display Visually Appealing Icon Bar – Display links to your legal pages using attractive icons that can be positioned anywhere on your pages. You can also upload icons of your choice.
- Display Sensitive Content – If you plan to publish content that should be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. content related to alcohol, ecigs, adult-related, etc.), the plugin can display popups 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 visitors in the EU, you need to make users aware of your user cookies and notify them of how you use them. The plugin displays an attractive bar that notifies your users and protects your website from non-compliance.
- Record And Store IP Acceptance – The plugin can record and store the IP addresses of your visitors for future reference, just in case someone accepts your terms or disclaimers and then claims otherwise.
- Shortcodes – Compliance Bar is integrated with shortcodes to automatically populate the templates with your personal information. These shortcodes also allow you to place information anywhere on your site, (including the popups).
- Works On All Mobile Devices – The plugin has individual settings for displaying on mobile devices or tablets and displays mobile optimized icons automatically depending on the web browser being used.
Using The Plugin
After installing and activating the plugin, the plugin’s “Settings” area will be added to your WordPress dashboard.
Let’s review these settings briefly …
User Profile
There are a number of default fields in this area where you can enter your business information into input (e.g. “Website URL,” “Support Desk URL,” “Location Details,” “Refund Duration (Days),” etc.). Not all categories are required, but some are (e.g. “Business Name,” “Support Email,” etc.)
(Compliance Bar Plugin User Profile Screen – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Compliance Bar uses dynamic shortcodes to insert the information you’ve inputted into your User Profile into your legal templates …
(Compliance Bar User Profile Screen: Shortcodes – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Once the minimum required data has been entered into the profile fields, you can then access the other plugin areas.
Compliance Pages
The “Compliance Pages” area includes a list of all of the compliance template pages …
(Compliance Bar: Legal Page Templates – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Below is the complete list of templates made available by the plugin last time we checked the site:
- About Us
- AdSense Disclaimer
- Affiliate Agreements
- Affiliate Disclosure Statement
- 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 the “Save” button on the “Compliance Pages” area …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Legal Templates – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Your legal pages will then be created and added inside your “Pages” section.
Compliance Bar Icons
The plugin comes with a built-in set of attractive icons for referencing your legal pages …
The icons can be changed. You can purchase an additional set of icons from the plugin developer, or create/upload your own to match the style of your theme …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Compliance Page Icons – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Edit / Delete Legal Page Templates
You can edit and delete the compliance disclaimers from the “Compliance Pages” area, just like any other page in WordPress …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Edit Legal Templates – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Notes
- Editing is recommended, as the pages contain generic content.
- The plugin indicates if it detects existing similar pages on your site (e.g. legal pages created before installing the plugin).
Compliance Bar
You have various options to customize the Compliance Bar, including position, whether to show 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 front page, which pages the Compliance Bar will display in, mobile settings, and more …
(Compliance Bar Section: Create Bar – Image source: plugin documentation)
Notes:
- You can create more than one Compliance Bar to show different disclaimers on different pages, or to cover a multitude of uses in different areas of your site.
- The plugin lets you display a Compliance Bar on the home page of your website, even if you are using a specific theme (e.g. Genesis, Thesis or Woo), where the home page is configured through the theme itself as a built-in template, and not as a “regular” WordPress page.
- Due to the smaller size of mobile screens, you can only select up to a certain number of page icons to display if you turn Mobile Settings “on.”
Once you have specified your Compliance Bar settings, it displays links to your compliance pages through dynamic icon bar on your site …
You have full control over the location on your pages where you would like your compliance bar to show …
PopUps
If your site has content that should be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. information related to alcohol, tobacco, adult content, etc.), Compliance Bar can display pop-ups that blocks access to users who do not accept your terms and disclaimers.
The “Create Pop Up” screen gives you full control over the settings and wordings of your pop ups …
(Pop Ups Section: Create Pop Up – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
You can create a number of customized Pop Ups displaying on different pages, or to cover different uses throughout your site …
You can also set a delay time to prevent a Pop Up from displaying as soon as visitors arrive, set a cookie duration to prevent Pop Ups from appearing again within a specific time interval, and store 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 Europe 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 Compliance Bar plugin lets you edit the settings for compliance with EU 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” section, lists all of your legal pages and shortcodes, and lets you modify their content …
General Settings
The “General Settings” tab, gives you access to general information, such as promoting and sharing the plugin and getting plugin update notifications …
User Feedback
Below are a couple of the testimonials that users have published about the Compliance Bar Plugin plugin:
”I got a chance to review the Compliance Bar plugin…WOW!! I have to say that its definitely one of the most NECESSARY, yet easiest to use plugin’s to hit the scene in a while. Very Solid Product. Great job Anton & team!” Shon Chris – Director (JV Peer Group)
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”You wouldn’t drive a car around without insurance…so don’t RISK your online business by neglecting a simple, but important detail: website compliance. Grab your copy of Compliance Bar & protect yourself today!” Mike Thomas (The Mike From Maine Show)
Compliance Bar Plugin – Useful Tips
Here are some useful ways to use Compliance Bar:
- Protecting against content theft by spelling out your website’s terms of use.
- Display compliance icons only on specific pages.
- Minimize refund disputes by clearly spelling out the refund terms before purchase.
- If you publish adult content on your site, you can force visitors to click to confirm that they are of legal age to view your content.
Compliance Bar Product Support
Plugin Developers provide users with dedicated 24/7 plugin support to assist users with anything they need. Plugin users also have access to an entire set of training videos.
Additionally, your purchase is backed by a risk-free, 30 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 hrs (Monday to Friday), the plugin developers will refund double the amount of your purchasing price.
Plugin Price
- Single Site Personal License – Install the plugin on one site that you own. Cost = $47 (Normally $127)
- Business – Can be installed on up to twenty-five domains that you own. Cost = $67.00 (Normally $197).
- Professional Licensing – Install the plugin on multiple sites that you own. Install the plugin on all client sites for payment or as part of a paid service. Price = $97.00.
Please Note: Pricing details of the Compliance Bar plugin depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time specials being offered. When we last checked, the plugin sells for the prices shown above. This may not be the actual price set by the product developer 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 current pricing details: Compliance Bar Plugin
Compliance Bar – Additional Information
Legal Pages Reviewed By Lawyers – The plugin developers assure users on their website that all legal templates have been reviewed and approved by a lawyer. Nonetheless, we highly recommend that you get legal advice from a qualified legal expert in your area for your peace of mind.
For demo videos of the plugin in action, including installation instructions and tutorials, FAQs, support help desk, contact details and more, visit the Compliance Bar Plugin website.
Install This Plugin
Compliance Bar is an easy-to-use, simple and cost-effective solution for WordPress websites. We recommend installing this WordPress plugin if you want immediate peace of mind and legal protection.
For complete details, check out the plugin here: Compliance Bar – Compliance Bar Plugin – Website Compliance Plugin For WordPress
Note: 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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