How To Add Legal Pages To Your WordPress Site

If you plan to grow a successful business online, the last thing you want to do is to find out that you have broken any laws, rules or regulations.

Online laws and regulations were designed to protect consumers and apply to any person who markets, sells or promotes goods and services online. Every website owner risks being sued for not following compliance laws. Feigning ignorance about the law will not excuse you from being slapped with a legal notice.

New laws introduced in 2014 regulating how businesses promote advertising on their websites clearly state that if you promote anything on your site for profit, then you must follow certain principles of disclosure to prevent enforceable orders being issued against you by regulatory departments, such as the US-based Better Business Bureau, also referred to as BBB. Do a search online for “The Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program,” which regulates behavioral advertising across the internet for more details.

(Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program – BBB)

These laws has legal consequences for various business activities, including:

• Any form of advertising, like inline advertising, Google Adsense, etc.
• Retarget Marketing
• Google Analytics (or other analytics software)
• Affiliate Marketing
• Product Creators
• Blogging
• etc.

If you do not display certain legal pages on your site (e.g. terms of service, privacy statement, earning disclaimers, etc.), many sites like Google won’t let you advertise, online merchants like ClickBank or JVZoo won’t allow you to sell digital products, PayPal may shut down your account, Facebook will reject your web applications, and you will not be allowed to promote a range of advertising or online marketing networks.

If your digital presence is not in compliance, you could end up facing a number of penalties, including fines, having your website shut down, even jail time!

The purpose of this guide is to help make you aware that your website(s) are subject to certain legal requirements according to laws that govern business practices online, the importance of remaining compliant with the terms of service of external providers whose services or products you may be endorsing online, and that there are solutions that can help your website become fully compliant, such as the tools discussed further below.

Does Your Website Or Blog Comply With All Legal Requirements?

Legal Disclaimer: Please note that we are not lawyers and we do not offer legal advice. You must do your own due diligence and consult legal experts about the best way of ensuring that your website is compliant with all legal requirements wherever your business is based.

Why It’s Important To Make Your Website Compliant

Is your business at risk? Consider what the implications to your business would be in the following scenarios:

• A customer suffers a cardiac arrest after purchasing your online workout program.
• The skin care lotion you promote as an affiliate marketer gives people skin rashes.
• Your opt-in list provides a statement that lets subscribers know that you won’t sell their information, but you have not spelled out exactly what you plan to do with the details you have collected.
• Someone steals content from your site and publishes it on their site.
• There is no statement on your website letting your site users know that you are promoting a product as an affiliate and could derive a commission if visitors purchase it.
• You haven’t spelled out the conditions of your refund/return policies.
• Someone claims that your testimonials are false and tries to sue you.
• You have not disclosed in a product review that you received a free copy of the product.
• Your site contains adult-related content and you did not take sufficient measures to keep underage children from accessing it.

Consider now the documented examples of costly compliance breaches below:

• A CPA Marketer failed to provide adequate disclaimers telling online users they would have to give up personal information (including credit card information to complete an offer they were promoting. In addition to a significant $390,000 fine, he was also ordered to issue everyone they do business with for the next 20 years, a copy of the judgement — including employees.
• 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 Users IDs. Many internet marketers took a risk and lost. Their accounts were shut down, costing them thousands of $$$ in lost revenue.
• An independent 2010 study by Brad Geddes of SearchEngineLand, showed that, of a couple of hundred randomly-picked websites, more than 90% had breached at least one of Google’s policies, more than 65% had infringed at least two of Google’s policies, and more than 40% were in violation of 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 with the violation, which could result in loss of income (e.g. AdSense or AdWords).

Can you see how easy it is to be exposed to the risks of litigation?

Regardless of whether you are a:

• CPC (Cost Per Conversion) Marketer
• Multilevel Marketer
• Affiliate Marketer
• AdWords Advertiser
• Info Product Publisher
• Amazon Affiliate
• EBay Seller
• Publisher Of Adult Content
• Freelancer, Consultant Or Coach
• Seller Of Any Service Or Product Online

It’s imperative to make sure that your website remains legally compliant.

Complying With 3rd-Party Companies - ToS, Policies, etc.

All the big online companies and government regulatory agencies emphasize the need of observing the terms and policies of service providers.

You are required to let your visitors know that your business complies will all laws and professional guidelines. This not only improves trust and confidence in your business, it’s also required in many cases by most companies you interact with online.

For example:

Google requires you to display certain information if using their products. This includes using features like Google Analytics …

(Policy requirements for using Google Analytics)

Generating revenue online with your website with Google AdSense ads …

(Google AdSense online advertising - policy requirements)

And even promoting your business via Google AdWords …

(Policy requirements for using Google AdWords)

If you plan to sell digital products via places such as ClickBank, JVZoo, or other established online merchant networks, you will need to add a number of legal pages before your products can be approved for sale …

(Policy requirements for vendors selling through ClickBank)

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) also requires you to include clear disclaimers and disclosures to visitors, especially if you plan to use product testimonials or endorsements …

(Federal Trade Commission – consumer guidelines and regulations)

FTC Regulations Require Your Site To Be Compliant

New FTC regulations governing the conduct of businesses online were introduced in March 2012. Search online and you will see that many websites are still unaware (or choose to ignore) these requirements. As has happened in the past, this typically results in the FTC making an example of businesses and prosecuting companies for breaches of regulation in an effort to get other businesses to comply.

If you plan to do any kind of business online, therefore, it’s best not to take chances. Even if your business does not operate in the U.S. it’s best to protect your business by making sure that your site complies with FTC regulations.

You can find many sites that can provide guidelines on how to structure disclaimers and disclosures to help you meet FTC requirements. We provide a number of references at the end of this article …

(It’s important to structure your disclaimers and disclosures correctly to avoid running foul of laws and regulations)

Social Media Apps - Don’t Forget These

If you are planning to develop apps that will integrate with your website, you will also be required to provide sites like Facebook, Twitter, and others with information about various legal pages …

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

• If you are unsure as to whether or not you may be breaking the law, and/or Terms of Service policies and guidelines of organizations like Google, Facebook, etc., then assume that you most probably are.
• If you are considering promoting services or products online using affiliate marketing, or generating revenue online with Google AdSense, ads for eBay or Amazon products, or driving visitors to your website with Google AdWords, etc., then find out exactly what kind of legal information you need to include on your site to comply with all Terms Of Service and policy requirements - don’t risk having your accounts shut down.
• If you’ve ever wondered if “borrowing” a Copyright Notice is Copyright infringement, then it’s best to take proper precautions to protect yourself and your business.

(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, almost all 3rd-party websites require you to comply with their policies and guidelines)

Common Legal Pages To Add To Your Website To Ensure Compliance

If your website or blog lacks in terms of compliance, then you will find this section helpful.

Adding the following compliance pages to your website should help your site stay out of trouble with many regulatory authorities and third-party service providers, and avoid potential legal issues or even threats of legal action (e.g. “cease and desist” notices):

• About Us
• Contact Us
• Privacy Statement
• Terms Of Use
• Website Disclaimers
• General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) Compliance

As well as the above pages, you may want to consider including any of these pages if applicable:

• Affiliate Disclosure (if you sell or promote affiliate products or services)
• Anti-Spam Policy
• Earnings Disclaimer
• External Linking Policy
• Health Disclaimers (if your website or blog provides general health or medical information)
• Refund Policy (if you sell products or services online)
• Audio/Video Terms Of Use (if you provide users with access to download videos or audio files on your site)

Disclosure Pages – Types

Adding the right web content disclosure information is important. For example:

• No Material Connection – Informs visitors that you will not receive any type of payment for writing the content.
• Affiliate Links – Lets users know that you will be compensated if they act on your recommendation and buy through an affiliate link.
• Review Or Sample Copy – Discloses to readers that you have received a review or sample copy of the product.
• Sponsored Post – Disclosure that lets users be aware that you were compensated in some form to write the article.
• Third Party Advertising – Informs readers 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 display prominently on their sites since January 1, 2014.

How To Add Legal Content To Your Site

Ideally, you should consult a lawyer or a legal firm and ask them to prepare the content of your legal documents. Once you have this, there are several ways to add them to your website.

Upload Legal Pages Manually

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

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

(Upload legal pages to your web server via FTP)

You can then add a link to your pages from your WordPress site using a custom WordPress menu …

(Custom WordPress Menu Feature)

After uploading your legal pages, make sure that these are fully up-to-date and clearly accessible to your visitors. You can add these to the WordPress sidebar (or place them in the footer of your site) to ensure that visitors will be able to access legal information from every web page …

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

To learn more about adding links to pages on your sidebar using widgets, refer to this tutorial:

• How To Add Widgets To WordPress

Store-Bought Legal Templates

You can find attorney-drafted downloadable forms and agreements just by searching online, or visiting websites like the ones shown below:

Find Legal Forms

(FindLegalForms.com – Legal forms)

More information:

• FindLegalForms.com

Alternatively, you can purchase a package of website legal templates designed by attorney Scott Talbert to help businesses protect themselves online …

Cut & Paste Website Legal Pages

(Website Legal Pages)

These templates feature less passive voice and more plain language phrasing and can be easily customized with a quick search and replace to add your own details, then pasted into your pages.

The legal templates included in Scott Talbert’s Legal Form Templates include:

• Anti-Spam Policy
• Copyright Notice
• Disclaimer (multi-discipline professional disclaimers)
• DMCA Compliance
• FTC Compliance
• Privacy Policy: Google & DoubleClick DART, etc.
• Terms of Service (ToS) & Conditions of Use.

You can either create a new WordPress 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 these to your server as described earlier.

Go here for more details:

• Cut & Paste Website Legal Pages

Legal Pages – WordPress Plugins

In addition to using templates, you can keep things very simple using WordPress plugins.

Here are some plugins for WordPress users that you may be interested in checking out:

WordPress Legal Pages Plugin

(WordPress Plugin – WordPress Legal Pages)

If manually setting up legal pages for your website seems too time-consuming for you, then consider installing a plugin like WP Legal Pages instead …

WP Legal Pages is not a free plugin, but it’s a reasonably affordable and well-supported premium plugin that will make the work of creating and implementing legal pages on your WordPress site a lot easier and save you a great deal of time.

Some of the reasons to consider using WordPress Legal Pages plugin are:

• Built-in Templates – Over 20 built-in legal page templates created by a team of professional lawyers.
• Very Quick And Easy To Use – You can set up most of your basic legal pages in around 3 minutes with just a few clicks of the mouse.
• Customizable Pages – Includes customizable and editable legal form templates (e.g. Terms Of Service, Disclaimer, Privacy Policy, Earnings Disclaimer and more!)
• Easy To Edit Pages – WYSIWYG editor lets you edit all legal pages just like any other page on your site.
• Custom Shortcodes – You can add shortcodes to any of your 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 checkbox and delete and manage these like any WordPress page.
• Forced Options – Force page or post lock down. When the user agrees to your legal terms, the page unlocks.
• Additional Features – The plugin is updated with new features when new versions are released.

When you install WordPress Legal Pages, a new menu feature will appear inside your main navigation menu section …

(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress – Legal Pages Menu)

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

(WP Legal Pages Plugin – Settings)

The plugin gives you the option of creating legal pages for different online uses, such as business websites with products, niche sites, e-commerce sites, etc …

(WP Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress – Create different legal page types)

You can also select from several built-in legal templates …

(WP Legal Pages – 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

Go here to learn more about using this handy plugin:

• WP Legal Pages Plugin

Compliance Bar – WordPress Plugin For Website Compliance

Compliance Bar is a simple plugin for WordPress websites and blogs that contains over twenty customizable compliance page templates for your site …

More info:

• Compliance Bar Plugin – WordPress Compliance Plugin

Legal Suite Pro

(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 Service
• Earnings Disclaimer

(Legal Suite Pro For WordPress – 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 powered site. You can have legal pages installed and set up on your site in one minute or less and the license allows you to install and use this plugin on all of your websites.

For more information, go here:

• Legal Suite Pro

If using the services of a lawyer 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 legal services.

We want your business to be protected!

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 content, or a legal pages plugin - see section below.

(Legal Pages Generator)

Legal Pages Generator lets you quickly generate necessary legal documents for your website including Terms of Service, Privacy Statement, Copyright Notice, Website Disclaimer and Earnings Disclaimer.

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As we’ve previously pointed out, if you are making money online, it’s important that your site stays compliant with regulatory agencies and the terms of service and guidelines provided by 3rd-party services and products that you may be promoting or recommending online. If your website doesn’t comply with laws intended to protect the rights of consumers, 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?

Legal Disclaimer: Once again, we are not lawyers and we are not offering legal advice on this website. You are strongly advised to do your own due diligence and consult legal experts to ensure that your website is compliant with all legal requirements concerning your specific business.

Additional Legal Information

Here is a useful list of additional sites we recommend you visit to better understand what your site may require to stay compliant and meet legal obligations:

• FTC Latest List Of Rules & Regulations
• Federal Trade Commission 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
• United States Patent and Trademark Office
• US Copyright Office

And …

• Analytics Help – Policy requirements for Google Analytics Advertising Features
• Google AdSense Program Policies Explained
• 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 the importance of having a legally compliant website. Use the information above to quickly and easily add legal pages to your website.

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