One of the worst things that can happen to a website owner is to be on the wrong side of the law.
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 incurring significant financial losses and the loss of your reputation. Why risk your money and your good reputation, when you can protect yourself so easily and inexpensively?
In this post, we look at a simple and inexpensive WordPress solution that can help make your website legally compliant just minutes.
Does Your Website Or Blog Comply With The Law?
As the digital business realm continues growing at breakneck speed and rules keep changing, it’s important to stay informed about what’s going on and to make sure that your website remains legal, especially if your web presence is an essential part of your business strategy.
Without legal pages on your site (e.g. terms and conditions of use, privacy policy, financial disclaimers, etc.), many third-party sites like Google won’t let you advertise, sites like ClickBank will not approve your digital products on their network, PayPal could shut down your account and withhold payment of your funds, Facebook and other social networks could suspend your apps, and you will not be allowed into most advertising and merchant networks.
Plus, you may also be inadvertently leaving yourself open and vulnerable to litigation.
At the very least, if your website is not compliant, visitors could lose trust and confidence in your business.
(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, most third-party websites require you to comply with their terms of use and policies!)
Disclaimer: Please note that we are not lawyers and we are not offering legal advice on this website.
The purpose of this post is to make you aware that:
- Your website could be subject to a number of legal requirements in accordance with federal, state or local laws that govern your business,
- How important it is to comply with the terms of service of third-party providers whose products or services you are offering or using online, and
- There are easy solutions for WordPress website owners that can help your business become compliant, such as the solution that we discuss in this article.
In this article, you will learn about a complete compliance & disclaimer solution for your WordPress-based web presence.
Let’s Review …
Compliance Bar Plugin – WordPress Plugin For Website Compliance
Plugin Description
Compliance Bar Plugin is a simple plugin for WordPress users that includes over twenty customizable compliance templates for your online presence …
For more details, visit the plugin site here: Compliance Bar
Compliance Bar Plugin Benefits
Below we have listed just some of the benefits of using Compliance Bar to make your website or blog instantly legally compliant:
Fast And Easy To Install And Use. Be Up And Running In Minutes.
Compliance Bar is very easy to install. Just upload the plugin file to your Plugin folder via your WP admin user login and activate.
Easy-To-Edit Page Templates
You can easily make changes to the pre-built legal templates inside the plugin from the settings menu with the visual content editor.
24/7 Support
Compliance Bar plugin provides a dedicated support team to assist you if you experience any problems.
Additional benefits and advantages include the following:
- Customized Legal Page Templates: The Compliance Bar 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 and a complete library of training videos is available if you need help.
- Use Anywhere In The World: As long as you consult someone who is qualified to give you legal advice to ascertain if the legal templates provided with Compliance Bar are suitable and satisfactory for your business, country and website, you can use the plugin wherever your business is located.
- Can Be Used For All Website Purposes: As long as your website is built with WordPress, you can use the plugin for all website purposes. Just select the compliance pages you want to include in your site and leave out the irrelevant pages.
Compliance Bar Plugin Features
Compliance Bar provides many features to web site owners. Below we have listed just a few:
- Quick and easy to install and implement. Ready to start using in no time.
- Display Attractive Icon Bar – The plugin displays links to your compliance pages in the form of attractive icons that can be positioned anywhere in your pages. You can also upload icons of your choice.
- Display Sensitive Information – If you plan to publish content that needs to be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. content related to alcohol, ecigs, adult, etc.), you can display pop-ups that require users to accept your website’s terms and disclaimers.
- EU User Cookie Compliance – If you do business in the EU 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. Compliance Bar displays an attractive bar notifying visitors and covering your website from non-compliance issues.
- Record And Store IP Acceptance – Compliance Bar can record your visitors’ IP address for reference, just in case a user accepts your terms or disclaimers and then claims they haven’t.
- Shortcodes – The plugin uses shortcodes to automatically populate the templates with your personal information. These shortcodes also allow you to place information anywhere on your site, (even in the pop-ups).
- Works On Mobile Devices – Compliance Bar has individual settings for displaying on mobile devices and displays mobile optimized icons automatically depending on the web browser being used.
Using Compliance Bar
After installing and activating the plugin, you have access to a section where the plugin’s settings can be configured.
Let’s review these settings briefly …
User Profile
There are a number of default categories in this section where your business details can be entered (e.g. “Contact Name,” “Registered Address,” “Company Phone Number,” “Niche Market,” etc.). Not all categories are compulsory, but some are (e.g. “Website URL,” “Support Desk URL,” etc.)
(Compliance Bar Plugin User Profile Section – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Compliance Bar uses dynamic shortcodes to automatically populate and display the information from your User Profile fields inside your legal page templates …
(Compliance Bar Plugin User Profile Section: Shortcodes – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Once the minimum required (i.e. compulsory) data has been entered into the user profile fields, users can then access the other areas of the plugin.
Compliance Pages
The “Compliance Pages” screen lists all of the pages …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Compliance Page Templates – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Below is the complete list of legal templates made available by the 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
- Adult Content Disclosure
You can easily create legal pages for your website or blog by simply selecting checkboxes and clicking ”Save” in the “Compliance Pages” screen …
(Compliance Bar: Compliance Pages – Image source: plugin documentation)
Your legal pages will then be created and added inside 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 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 Plugin: Legal Page Icons – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Edit / Delete Compliance Page Templates
You can edit and delete your legal page templates from the “Compliance Pages” section, just like any typical WordPress page …
(Compliance Bar: Edit Compliance Templates – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Tips
- Editing your compliance pages 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 installing the plugin).
Compliance Bar
The plugin settings area provides various 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 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 – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Notes:
- You can create more than one Compliance Bar to display different icons on different pages, or to cover a multitude of uses throughout your site.
- The plugin allows you to display the Compliance Bar on the main page of your site, even if you are using particular premium theme frameworks (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” WordPress 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 specified your Compliance Bar settings, it will display 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 to feature the compliance icons …
PopUps
If your site publishes content that should be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. information related to alcohol, ecigs, adult, etc.), Compliance Bar can display popups that require users to accept your website’s 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 more than one Pop Up for different pages, or to cover a range of uses throughout your website …
You can also set a delay time if you don’t want the Pop Ups to display immediately, set cookie durations to prevent Pop Ups from displaying again within a specific time period, 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 are 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 …
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” screen …
(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 legal pages and shortcodes, and lets you edit the page content …
General Settings
The “General Settings” area, lets you access general information, such as promoting and sharing the plugin and receiving plugin update notifications …
Feedback From Users
Below are some of the testimonials and feedback plugin users have published about Compliance Bar:
”WOW” Shon Chris – Director (JV Peer Group)
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“Don’t Risk Your Online Business” Mike Thomas (The Mike From Maine Show)
Compliance Bar Plugin – Useful Tips
Here 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 customers purchase.
- If your site published content for adult viewers, you can force visitors to click to confirm that they are of legal age to access your content.
Plugin Support
Plugin Developers provide users with dedicated plugin support to assist users if they experience any problems. Plugin users also have access to an entire set of training videos.
Additionally, your purchase is backed by a no-risk, 30 day, 200% money-back guarantee. If your version of Compliance Bar does not work within 30 days of purchase and it cannot be fixed within 48 hrs (Monday to Friday), your purchase price will be refunded in double.
Product Cost
- Single Edition – Can be installed on 1 site that you own. Price = $37 (Normally $127)
- Business Edition – Can be installed on twenty-five of your own sites. Cost = $67.00 (Normally $197).
- Developer License – Can be installed on multiple as many of your own sites as you need. Can be installed on any client site for payment or part of a paid service. Price = $97.00.
Please Note: Pricing details of Compliance Bar depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time specials being offered. When we last checked, the software is being retailed for the pricing shown above. This may not be the actual price charged by the software seller when you visit the plugin site and you may be shown additional upsells or one-time offers after purchasing.
Check the plugin’s website for current pricing details: Compliance Bar
Compliance Bar – Additional Information
Templates Reviewed By Lawyers – The plugin developers state on their website that all legal templates have already been reviewed and approved by lawyers. Nonetheless, we strongly recommend that you get professional advice from a qualified legal expert in your area for your own peace of mind.
For a demo video of the plugin, including installation instructions and tutorials, FAQs, customer help desk, contact details and more, visit the Compliance Bar website.
Download This Plugin
Compliance Bar is an easy-to-use, simple and cost-effective solution for WordPress-powered websites. We recommend downloading and installing this WordPress plugin if you want immediate peace of mind and legal protection.
To learn more, check out the plugin here: Compliance Bar – Compliance Bar Plugin – WordPress Plugin For Website Compliance
Note: Once again, please note that we are not lawyers and we are not offering legal advice in this article. Do your own due diligence and consult a legal expert about the best way of ensuring that your website is compliant with the law in your country or region.
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