How To Add Legal Pages To Your WordPress Site

Is your WordPress site legally compliant? Do you know if you are breaking any rules or regulations, or contravening the Terms of Service (TOS) of any 3rd-party companies whose services or products you promote or use?

Internet laws and regulations are designed to protect consumers and apply to any person who sells, markets or promotes goods or services online. Every website owner risks being sued for not following compliance laws. Feigning ignorance about the law won’t prevent someone from taking legal action against your business.

New laws introduced in 2014 regulating how businesses promote advertising on their websites state that if you plan to promote anything on your site for profit, you must follow certain principles of disclosure to prevent enforceable orders being issued against you by consumer protection agencies, such as the (US based) BBB, or Better Business Bureau. Look up “The Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program,” which regulates behavioral advertising across the internet to learn more.

(BBB – Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program)

These laws affect various online business activities, including:

• Any form of advertising, including contextual ads
• Retarget Marketing
• Google Analytics (or other analytics software)
• Affiliate Marketing
• Product Creators
• Blogging
• etc.

If your website does not display certain pages (e.g. terms of service, privacy policy, financial disclaimers, etc.), many sites like Google won’t let you advertise, sites like ClickBank will not allow you to list digital products, PayPal may shut down your account and withhold payment of your funds, Facebook could reject your applications, and you won’t be allowed to participate in a range of advertising or online merchant networks.

Plus, you may also be inadvertently leaving yourself open and vulnerable to legal action.

In this article, we look at why it’s important to have a legally compliant website and how to quickly add all necessary legal pages to your WordPress site using simple solutions.

Does Your Website Comply With All Legal Requirements?

Disclaimer: Please note that we are not lawyers and we cannot provide legal advice on this website. As previously stated, this article is designed only to help make you aware that your website may be subject to a number of legal requirements in accordance with the laws that govern online business practices and that compliance may be required with the terms of service of providers whose products or services you advertise

Why It’s Important To Make Your Website Compliant

Are you at risk? Consider for a minute what the implications to your business would be if any of these situations were to occur:

• A person has a heart attack after purchasing your online fitness workout.
• The skin cream you promote as an affiliate marketer gives someone allergic reactions.
• You’ve let your subscribers know that you won’t sell their information, but you have not described exactly what you will do with it.
• Someone steals your content and publishes it on their site.
• You haven’t informed your visitors that you’re an affiliate for the product you are promoting that you will receive financial benefits if they buy using your affiliate link.
• You don’t spell out the conditions of your refund policies.
• A visitor claims that your testimonials are fake and decides to sue you.
• You didn’t disclose that you were given a free copy in your product review.
• Your site includes adult-related content and you haven’t taken sufficient measures to restrict access by underaged children.

Consider too the following documented case studies of costly compliance breaches:

• A CPA Marketer failed to provide adequate disclaimers telling visitors they would be required to give up their personal information 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 without users’ knowledge and consent – including storing children’s private information.
• Facebook’s Terms Of Service does not allow users to scrape UIDs. Many internet marketers took a risk and lost. Their accounts were shut down, costing them thousands of dollars in lost revenue.
• An independent study by Brad Geddes of SearchEngineLand, showed that, of a couple of hundred randomly-picked websites, more than 90% were breaking at least one of Google’s policies, more than 65% had breached at least 2 of Google’s policies, and more than 40% had broken at least three 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 whose policies with the infringement, which could result in loss of income (e.g. AdSense or AdWords).

Can you see how a website owner can easily become exposed to the risks of litigation?

Regardless of whether you are a:

• CPC (Cost Per Conversion) Marketer
• Multilevel Marketer
• Affiliate Product Promoter
• AdWords User
• Product Publisher
• Amazon Affiliate
• e-Commerce Store Owner
• Adult Content Publisher
• Freelancer, Coach or Consultant
• Online Seller Of Any Service Or Product

it’s important to make sure that your website or blog is legally compliant.

Compliance With Third-Party Companies

Complying with third-party companies terms and policies is important.

You are expected to let your site visitors know that your website complies with legal requirements and professional guidelines. This not only improves consumer trust and buyer confidence in your site, it’s also a requirement of most companies you engage with online.

Let’s take a look at some examples:

Google requires your site to display certain information if using their services and product features. This includes Google Analytics …

(Policy requirements for using Google Analytics)

Monetizing your website with Google AdSense display advertising …

(Google AdSense advertising policy requirements)

Or promoting your services through Google AdWords …

(Google AdWords – Policy Requirements)

If you sell information products using places such as ClickBank, JVZoo, or other established online merchant networks, you will need to add certain legal pages to your website before your products are approved for sale in their marketplace …

(Policy requirements for vendors using ClickBank)

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) also requires that you display clear disclaimers and policy statements to visitors, especially regarding the use of product testimonials or endorsements …

(FTC – consumer policies and regulations)

FTC Regulations Require Your Site To Comply

New FTC regulations governing the conduct of businesses online were introduced in March 2012. A quick search online will easily reveal that many websites are still unaware (or choose to ignore) these requirements. As documented on their website, this often results in the FTC making an example of businesses and prosecuting website owners for breaches of regulation in an effort to get other businesses to comply.

If you plan to do any kind of money-making activity online, therefore, it’s best not to take chances. Even if your business does not operate in the U.S. we strongly recommend protecting your business interests by ensuring that your site is compliant with all FTC regulations.

There are many resources sites for businesses that can provide guidelines and examples on how to structure disclaimers and disclosures to help your business meet FTC requirements. We provide additional references at the end of this article …

(Structure your disclaimers and disclosures correctly to avoid running foul of the law)

Social Media Apps Also Have Compliance Requirements

If you are planning to create social networking applications that will integrate with your website, sites like Twitter, Facebook, and others will require you to provide information about various legal pages …

(Apps that interface with social networking sites like Facebook also require compliance)

• If you are not sure whether or not you may be breaking the law, and/or Terms of Service policies and guidelines of websites like Google, Facebook, etc., then it’s best to assume that you most probably are.
• If you plan to promote services or products online via affiliate marketing, or generating revenue with Google AdSense, ads for eBay or Amazon products, or using Google AdWords pay-per-click ads to drive visitors to your pages, etc., then find out exactly what kind of legal information you need to display on your site to comply with all Terms Of Service and policy requirements to avoid having your accounts shut down.
• If you’ve ever wondered if “borrowing” a Copyright Notice is Copyright infringement, take proper precautions to protect yourself and your website.

(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, almost all third-party websites require you to comply with their terms of use)

What Legal Information Do You Need To Add To Your Website To Be Protected From Legal Compliance Issues?

If you suspect that your web site is falling short in terms of compliance, then this section will help you.

At its most basic, adding the following legal pages to your site will keep your business out of trouble with many consumer protection authorities and external providers, and avoid potential legal issues or even threats of legal action (e.g. “takedown” notices):

• About Us
• Contact Page
• Privacy Statement
• Terms Of Use
• Disclaimer Pages
• General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) Compliance

Additionally, you may want to look into adding any of the pages listed below:

• Affiliate Disclosure (e.g. if you sell or promote affiliate products or services)
• Anti-Spam Policy
• Earnings Disclaimer
• External Links Policy
• Financial Disclaimers (e.g. if your website or blog provides content about financial areas or money-making opportunities)
• Refund Policy (if you run an e-commerce site)
• Video/Audio Terms (if you allow media downloads on your site)

Types Of Disclosure Pages

It’s important to add the correct types of disclosure pages to your site. For example:

• No Material Connection – This lets visitors know that you’re not being paid for writing the post.
• Affiliate Links – Lets visitors know that you may be compensated if they buy through an affiliate link.
• Review Or Sample Copy – Lets visitors be aware that you have been given a review or sample copy of the product or service by the author or developer.
• Sponsored Post – Disclosure that lets readers know that you were compensated in some form to write the article.
• Third Party Advertising – Lets visitors know that you’re using online behavioral tracking technology. This is required to comply with the “enhanced notice” the Better Business Bureau has been requiring website publishers to show prominently on their sites since January 1, 2014.

How To Add Legal Pages Content To Your Site

Ideally, you will have a lawyer prepare the verbiage of your legal documents. Once these have been completed, there are several ways to add them to your website.

Uploading Legal Web Pages Manually To Your Site

If someone prepares and delivers the legal verbiage for you in HTML format, you can simply upload these to your web server, or have someone upload them for you.

We recommend adding a legals folder to your server and uploading your legal pages to this folder using FTP …

(Create a ‘legals’ folder on your web server and upload pages via FTP)

You can then easily add a link to your legal pages from your WordPress site using custom links in your menu administration …

(Custom WordPress Menu)

Displaying Legal Pages On Your Site

Make sure that your legal pages are fully up-to-date and clearly visible to all site visitors. You can add links to your legal pages to your WordPress sidebar (or the footer section of your site) to ensure that visitors can access the information from every web page …

(Display links to legal pages on all of your website’s pages)

To learn more about adding links to pages on your sidebar menu and footer in WordPress, see this tutorial:

• How To Add And Configure Widgets In The WordPress Sidebar

Store-Bought Legal Templates

You can easily find attorney-drafted disclosures and downloadable internet forms and agreements just by searching online, or by visiting websites like this one:

Find Legal Forms

(Find Legal Forms – Attorney-drafted legal forms)

Go here for more info:

• Find Legal Forms

Another option is to download a package of legal templates written by attorney Scott Talbert to help businesses protect themselves online …

Cut & Paste Website Legal Pages

(Cut & Paste Website Legal Pages)

Cut & Paste website legal templates feature less passive voice and more plain language phrasing and can be easily customized with a simple quick search and replace to add your own business name and URL, then pasted into your web pages.

The legal forms included in Scott Talbert’s Legal Forms include:

• Anti-Spam Policy
• Copyright Notice
• Disclaimer
• DMCA Compliance
• FTC Compliance (This proprietary FTC page accommodates new Federal Trade Commission guidelines that came into effect on March 2012)
• Privacy Policy
• Terms of Service & 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 page for each legal form you want to add to your site, then paste the content from the templates into your web pages and publish or upload the pages to your server as previously described.

More info:

• Website Legal Pages

Legal Pages – WordPress Plugins

As well as using legal templates, you can simplify things using a plugin.

Here are some legal plugins for WordPress users that you should check out:

WordPress Legal Pages

(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin)

If you don’t want to spend time creating legal pages manually, then consider choosing WordPress Legal Pages instead …

This is not a free plugin, but it’s a very affordable and well-supported plugin that will simplify the job of creating and implementing legal pages on your website and save you a great deal of time.

Some of the benefits of using WordPress Legal Pages plugin are:

• Built-in Templates – Includes over 20 built-in legal templates created by a team of professional lawyers.
• Very Quick And Easy To Use – Set up most of the basic legal pages you need in a few minutes with just a few mouse clicks.
• Fully Customizable Pages – The plugin includes fully customizable and completely editable legal form templates (e.g. Terms of Use, Disclaimer, Earnings Disclaimer, Privacy Policy and more!)
• Easy To Edit Pages – WordPress content editor lets you edit all legal pages just like every other page on your site.
• Custom Shortcodes – You can add shortcodes to any of your pages and the information will be automatically inserted into your content when you publish.
• Exclude pages. Exclude pages from menus with a simple check box and delete and manage these like any other WordPress page.
• Forced Options – Force page lockdown. When users agree to your legal terms, the page unlocks, giving them access.
• Additional Features – More features are being added to this plugin with each new version.

After installing WordPress Legal Pages, a new menu feature will appear inside your dashboard menu …

(WordPress Legal Pages – Menu)

This lets you create, edit and view legal pages from your admin area …

(WP Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress – Settings Screen)

You have the option of creating legal pages for different online uses, such as business websites, review websites, Amazon sites, etc …

(WordPress Legal Pages – Create different legal page types)

Select from several built-in legal templates …

(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin – Pre-configured 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:

• WP Legal Pages

Compliance Bar Plugin – WordPress Website Compliance Plugin

Compliance Bar is a simple WordPress plugin containing over twenty customizable compliance pages for your site …

Go here to learn more:

• Compliance Bar – Website Compliance Plugin For WordPress

Legal Suite Pro Plugin

(Legal Suite Pro Plugin For WordPress)

Legal Suite Pro Plugin For WordPress 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 Use
• Earnings Disclaimer

(Legal Suite Pro – 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 have packaged high quality, professionally written legal disclaimers into a plugin that can be installed quickly on any WordPress site. You can have legal pages installed and set up on your site in less than one minute and the license allows you to install and use this plugin on all of your websites.

Visit this website to learn more:

• Legal Suite Pro Plugin

If hiring legal experts to create your legal pages is out of your budget, then consider implementing at least some basic type of legal protection on your site until you can afford to hire the services of a lawyer.

We want your site to be legally safe!

Download the Legal Pages Generator software below (it’s FREE!), or choose one of the better solutions we discuss in this article, such as using ready-made legal documents, or plugins as described in the section below.

(Legal Pages Generator)

Legal Pages Generator Software quickly generates necessary legal documents for your website including ToS, Privacy Statement, Copyright Notice, Website Disclaimer and optional Earnings Disclaimer.

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As we’ve previously pointed out, if you do business online, it’s important that your website stays compliant with legal requirements of government agencies that regulate business online and any terms of service (TOS) and guidelines of 3rd-party products and services that you may be promoting or recommending online. If your website doesn’t comply with laws designed to protect consumer rights, you’re breaking the law.

Non-compliance 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, please note that we are not lawyers and we are not offering legal advice here. Do your own due diligence and consult legal experts to ensure that your website fully complies with the law pertaining to your business.

Legal Resources And References

Below is a time-saving list of websites we recommend you visit to help you better understand what your site may require to remain compliant and meet legal requirements and guidelines:

• FTC Latest List Of Rules & Regulations
• Federal Trade Commission Advertising & Marketing Rules Of the Road
• FTC Advertising And Marketing On The Internet
• Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program – Better Business Bureau
• 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
• United States Patent and Trademark Office
• United States Copyright Office

In Addition …

• 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
• AdWords Help – What to include in your privacy policy for remarketing
• ClickBank – Creating Your First Product
• Facebook Platform Policies

We hope you have found this article useful and that it has helped you understand why it’s important to have a compliant website. Use the information provided above to quickly and easily add all necessary legal pages to your website or blog.

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