One of the worst things that can happen to a website owner is to be on the wrong side of the law.
As the digital realm continues growing at such a fast pace and the rules keep changing, it’s important that you try to stay on top of what’s happening and to make sure that your site remains legally compliant, especially if your online presence is an integral factor in your overall business strategy.
New laws introduced in 2014 that regulate how businesses promote advertising on their sites clearly state that if you promote anything on your website for profit, then you need to follow certain disclosure guidelines to prevent enforceable orders being issued against you by consumer protection agencies, such as the Better Business Bureau (BBB). Search online for information about “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 these new laws has implications for various online business activities, including:
- Any type of advertising, e.g. inline ads, Google Adsense, etc.
- Retarget Marketing
- Google Analytics (or other analytics software)
- Affiliate Marketing
- Product Creators
- Blogging
- etc.
If your site does not display certain legal pages to visitors (e.g. terms of service, privacy statement, financial disclaimers, etc.), many sites such as Google won’t let you advertise, digital marketplaces like ClickBank won’t allow you to sell digital products, PayPal may suspend your account, Facebook could suspend your web applications, and you won’t be allowed to promote a range of advertising or online merchant networks.
If your website is not in compliance, you could also end up facing a number of penalties, including fines, having your website shut down, even jail time!
The purpose of this post is to make you aware that your website(s) may be subject to legal requirements, the importance of complying with the terms of service of external providers whose products or services you may be selling online, and that there are solutions that can help your website become fully compliant, such as the plugins listed further below.
Is Your Website Or Blog Breaking The Law?
Disclaimer: We are not lawyers and we do not offer legal advice. Do your own due diligence and we recommend consulting a legal expert about the best way to ensure that your website is compliant with all laws and regulations in your country or region.
Why It’s Important To Make Your Website Compliant
Is your business at risk? Consider for a minute what would happen to your business if these scenarios were to take place:
- Someone suffers a heart attack after they use your online workout program.
- The skin care creams you promote as an affiliate gives people allergic reactions.
- Your opt-in list provides a statement letting subscribers know that you will not sell their information, but you haven’t clearly spelled out what you plan to do with their personal details.
- Someone steals your content and publishes it on their site.
- You did not tell visitors that you’re an affiliate for the product you’re marketing that you will get paid a financial benefit if they end up buying using your link.
- You didn’t spell out the terms and conditions of your return policies.
- Visitors claim that your testimonials are misleading and try to sue you.
- You haven’t disclosed that you have received a free copy in a product review.
- Your website publishes adult content and you have not taken sufficient measures to keep underaged persons from accessing it.
Consider now the following documented case studies of costly compliance breaches:
- A CPA Marketer failed to provide adequate disclaimers telling visitors they would have to give up personal information (including credit card info to complete an offer they were promoting. Cost = $390,000.
- A social networking app developer copped a whopping $800,000 fine for collecting personal information from mobile device address books without the owners’ knowledge and consent – including storing private details about children.
- Facebook’s Terms Of Service prohibits users from scraping UIDs. Many internet marketers gambled that they could get away with it 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 websites picked at random, more than 90% were breaking at least one of Google’s policies, more than 65% had infringed at least 2 of Google’s policies, and more than 40% were breaking at least 3 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 with the violation, which could result in loss of income (e.g. AdSense or AdWords).
Can you see how you could become exposed to the risks of litigation?
Regardless of whether you are a:
- CPA (Cost Per Action) or PPA (Pay Per Action) Marketer
- Network Marketer
- Affiliate Promoter
- AdSense Publisher
- Info Product Marketer
- Amazon Affiliate
- EBay Seller
- Publisher Of Adult Content
- Freelancer, Consultant Or Coach
- Seller Of Any Product Or Service Online
It’s vitally important to ensure that your website remains fully compliant with the law.
Complying With 3rd-Party Services - ToS, Policies, etc.
Leading online companies and government regulatory agencies emphasize the importance of complying with the terms and policies of third-party service providers.
You are expected to let your site visitors know that your website complies will all legal requirements and professional guidelines. This not only increases trust and confidence in your website, it’s also a requirement of most companies you will do business with.
For example:
Google requires your site to display certain information when using their products. This includes Google Analytics …
(Policy requirements for using Google Analytics)
Making money online with your online properties using Google AdSense advertising …
(Google AdSense advertising policy requirements)
Or promoting your products through Google AdWords …
(Policy requirements for using Google AdWords)
If you sell information products using places like ClickBank, JVZoo, or other established merchant networks, you are required to add legal pages to your site before your products can be approved for sale in their network …
(ClickBank – policy requirements for digital product sellers)
The FTC (Federal Trade Commission) also requires you to add clear disclaimers and policy statements on your site, especially concerning the use of product testimonials or endorsements …
(Federal Trade Commission – consumer policies and regulations)
New FTC Regulations Require Your Site To Be Compliant
FTC regulations governing how business is conducted online were introduced in March 2012. Search online and you will see that many websites are unaware (or choose to flaunt) these requirements. As documented on their website, this will most likely prompt the FTC to make an example of businesses and prosecute companies for breaches of regulation in an effort to get other businesses to comply.
If you do any type of money-making activity 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 ensuring that your website is compliant with all FTC regulations.
A number of business resources provide guidelines and examples for structuring disclaimers and disclosures to help your site comply with FTC requirements. We provide a number of references and links to resources at the end of this article …
(You must structure your disclaimers and disclosures correctly to avoid running foul of the law)
Social Media Applications - Don’t Forget These
If you plan to create applications for your site, sites like Twitter, Facebook, and many others will require you to provide access to various legal pages …
(Facebook developer app – policy requirements)
- If you are unsure whether you are breaking the law, and/or Terms of Service policies and guidelines of service providers like Google, Facebook, etc., then you most probably are.
- If you plan to promote products or services on your site using affiliate marketing, or generating revenue online with Google AdSense, eBay or Amazon ads, or driving visitors to your site with Google AdWords, etc., then find out exactly what kind of legal information you need to include on your site to comply with their Terms Of Service and policy requirements - don’t risk having your accounts terminated.
- If you’ve ever wondered whether “borrowing” a Copyright Notice is Copyright infringement, take proper precautions to protect yourself and your business.
(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, most 3rd-party websites require you to comply with their policies and guidelines)
What Compliance Pages Does My Website Need To Be Legally Compliant?
If your website or blog lacks in areas of compliance, then this section will help you.
At its most basic, adding the following legal pages to your website should keep you out of trouble with many regulatory authorities and third-party providers, and avoid possible legal issues):
- About Us
- Contact Us
- Privacy Policy
- Terms Of Use
- Disclaimer Pages
- General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) Compliance
Additionally, you may want to look into implementing one or more of these pages:
- Affiliate Disclosure (if you promote or sell affiliate products or services)
- Anti-Spam Policy
- Earnings Disclaimer
- External Links Policy
- Health Disclaimers (e.g. if your website provides general health or medical advice)
- Refund Policy (if you run an e-commerce site)
- Media Terms Of Use (if you provide users with access to downloadable videos or audio files on your site)
Types Of Disclosure Pages
Adding correct web content disclosure information is important. For example:
- No Material Connection – This lets users know that you will not receive for writing the article.
- Affiliate Links – Disclosure that informs site users that you will derive some form of financial benefit if they buy through an affiliate link.
- Review/Sample Copy – Lets users know that you have received a sample or review copy of the product by the author or product developer.
- Sponsored Post – Discloses to users that you were compensated in some form to write the post.
- Third Party Advertising – Informs users that you’re using online behavioral tracking technology. This is required to satisfy the “enhanced notice” the Better Business Bureau has been requiring online publishers to show prominently on their sites since January 1, 2014.
How To Add Legal Pages To Your Site
Ideally, you will have your lawyer prepare the verbiage of your legal documents. Once you have this, there are several ways to include them in your website.
Upload Legal Pages Manually To Your Site
If someone prepares and delivers the legal verbiage for you in typical web page formatting (e.g. HTML), you can simply upload these to your server, or have someone upload them for you.
We recommend creating a legal folder on your server and uploading HTML pages containing your legal documentation to this folder (e.g. via FTP) …
(Upload legal pages to your server using FTP)
You can then easily add links to these pages from your WordPress site using custom links in your menu feature …
(Custom WordPress Menu)
After uploading your legal pages, make sure that these are up-to-date and clearly visible to all site visitors. You can add these to your sidebar (or the footer section of your website) so that visitors can access the information from every page …
(It’s important to display legal information to users on all of your site’s pages)
To learn more about displaying links to pages on your sidebar or footer, refer to this tutorial:
Legal Templates
You can easily find attorney-drafted downloadable internet forms and agreements just by searching online, or by going to websites like the ones listed below:
Find Legal Forms
Go here for more information:
Another option is to download a package of website legal templates written by attorney Scott Talbert …
Cut & Paste Website Legal Pages
(Cut & Paste Website Legal Pages – Website Legal Pages)
Cut & Paste website templates feature less passive voice and more plain language phrasing and can be customized with simple search and replace to insert your own business details, then pasted into your pages.
The legal forms included in Scott Talbert’s Legal Page Templates include:
- Anti-Spam Policy
- Copyright Notice
- Disclaimer: multi-discipline professional disclaimers
- DMCA Compliance
- Federal Trade Commission Compliance
- Privacy Policy: Google, etc.
- ToS & Conditions of Use: with inter- & intra-page redundancy, Contra Proferentem provision, reservation of rights, and exclusive social media admonition.
You can either create a new WordPress page for each legal form you want added to your website, then paste the content from the templates into your web pages and publish or upload these to your server as previously described.
More info:
Legal Pages – WordPress Plugins
In addition to using copy & paste templates, another option is to use a plugin.
Here are some WordPress plugins worth looking into:
WP Legal Pages
(WordPress Plugin – WP Legal Pages)
If you don’t want to spend time creating legal web pages manually, then consider using a plugin like WordPress Legal Pages …
This is not a free plugin, but it’s a low-priced and well-supported premium WordPress plugin that will help simplify the job of creating and implementing legal pages on your site and save you many headaches.
Some of the reasons to consider using WordPress Legal Pages plugin are:
- Pre-written Templates – The plugin gives you access to over 20 built-in legal page templates created by professional lawyers.
- Very Quick And Easy To Use – You can set up most of your basic legal pages in a few minutes with just a few clicks of the mouse.
- Customizable Pages – The plugin includes customizable and editable legal form templates (e.g. Terms Of Service, Disclaimer, Earnings Disclaimer, Privacy Policy and more!)
- Editable Pages – Full WYSIWYG editor lets you edit legal pages just like any page on your site.
- Custom Shortcodes – Add shortcodes to your WordPress pages and the information is then automatically inserted into your pages when published.
- Exclude pages. The plugin lets you exclude pages from menus with a simple check box and delete and manage these like any other page on your site.
- Forced Options – Force page lockdown. When the user agrees to your legal terms, the page unlocks.
- New Features – More features are being added to this plugin with each new version.
After installing WordPress Legal Pages, a menu feature will be added to your navigation area …
(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin – Legal Pages Menu)
This allows you to create, view and edit legal pages from the admin area …
(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin – Settings)
The plugin gives you the option to create legal pages for different online uses, such as business websites with products, niche websites, medical sites, etc …
(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress – Create different legal page types)
Choose from several pre-configured legal templates …
(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress – 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
To learn more this WordPress plugin, go here:
Compliance Bar Plugin – WordPress Plugin For Website Compliance
Compliance Bar is a simple WordPress plugin with over twenty customizable legal templates for your online presence …
Go here to learn more about this plugin:
Legal Suite Pro Plugin
(Legal Suite Pro For WordPress)
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 of Service
- Earnings Disclaimer
(Legal Suite Pro Plugin – 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 plugin licensing is very flexible, allowing you to install and use this plugin on all of your websites.
For more information, go here:
If using the services of legal experts to create your legal pages is currently out of your budget, then consider implementing at least some kind of basic legal protection on your site until you can afford professional assistance.
We want your site to be protected!
Download the Legal Pages Generator tool below (for FREE!), or consider using one of the better solutions we discuss in this article, such as using legal page templates, or plugins - see section below.
(Legal Pages Generator)
Legal Pages Generator Software lets you quickly generate necessary legal documents for your website including ToS, Privacy Statement, Copyright Notice, Website Disclaimer and Earnings Disclaimer.
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As stated earlier, if you make money online, you need to make sure that your website is found to comply with regulatory agencies and the guidelines and terms of service required by third-party sites that you may be promoting or endorsing online. If your website isn’t compliant with laws designed to protect consumer rights, you’re breaking the law.
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 are not offering legal advice. You are strongly advised to do your own due diligence and consult a legal expert to ensure that your website is compliant with the law concerning your specific business.
Additional Information
Here 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 its legal obligations:
- FTC Latest List Of Rules & Regulations
- FTC Advertising & Marketing Rules Of the Road
- FTC Advertising And Marketing On The Internet
- Better Business Bureau Website
- 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
- US Copyright Office
And …
- 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
- Google AdWords Help – What to include in your privacy policy for remarketing
- ClickBank – Creating Your First Product
- Facebook Platform Policies
Hopefully, this article has helped you understand the importance of having a compliant website. Use the information presented above to quickly add all necessary legal pages to your WordPress website.
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"I was absolutely amazed at the scope and breadth of these tutorials! The most in-depth training I have ever received on any subject!" - Myke O'Neill, DailyGreenPost.com