How To Add Legal Pages To Your WordPress Site

As a website owner, you do not want to learn the hard way that you have broken the law.

As the digital realm continues to grow at breakneck speed and rules keep changing, it’s vital that you try to stay on top of what’s happening and make sure that your website or blog remains compliant with all laws and regulations, especially if having an online presence is important in the success of your business strategy.

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

(Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program)

The introduction of these laws affect various online business activities, including:

• Any form of advertising, e.g. Google AdSense
• Retarget Marketing
• Google Analytics (or other analytics software)
• Affiliate Marketers
• Product Creators
• Bloggers
• etc.

If your site does not display certain pages (e.g. terms of service, privacy policy, financial disclaimers, etc.), many third-party sites such as Google won’t let you advertise, digital marketplaces like ClickBank won’t allow you to list digital products, PayPal may suspend your account and freeze your funds, Facebook will suspend your web applications, and you won’t be allowed into most advertising and affiliate merchant networks.

More importantly, you could also be inadvertently leaving yourself open and vulnerable to expensive litigation.

The purpose of this article is to make you aware that your website are subject to legal requirements, the importance of being compliant with the terms of service of other providers whose services or products you may be recommending on your site, and that there are easy solutions for WordPress that can help your site become compliant, such as the tools that we list further below.

Is Your Website Or Blog Breaking The Law?

Legal Disclaimer: Please note that we are not lawyers and we do not offer legal advice in this article. As stated previously, this article is designed only to make you aware that your website may be subject to a number of legal policies in accordance with federal, regional or local laws governing business and that compliance may be required with the terms of service of providers whose products or services you recommend on your website

Why It’s Important To Make Your Website Compliant

Consider what could happen to your business in the following scenarios:

• A user has a heart attack after using your online workout program.
• The skin care creams you sell as an affiliate marketer gives someone who purchases from your link skin rashes.
• You’ve let your subscribers know that you will not sell their information, but you have not informed them exactly what you plan to do with the details you have collected.
• Someone steals your content and publishes it on their website.
• There is no statement on your website making your site visitors aware that you’re an affiliate for the product you’re marketing that you could receive an affiliate commission if they buy it.
• You have not spelled out the terms of your refund or return policies.
• Someone claims that your testimonials are fake and tries to sue you.
• You have not disclosed in a product review that you were given a free copy of the product.
• Your site contains adult-related information and you have not taken appropriate measures to restrict access by underaged persons.

Consider also these real examples of costly compliance breaches:

• A CPA Marketer failed to provide adequate disclaimers telling online users they would be required to give up their personal information to complete an offer they were promoting. In addition to a hefty $390,000 fine, he is now required to issue everyone he does business with for the next 20 years, a copy of the judgement — including employees.
• A social networking app developer received a massive $800,000 fine for collecting personal information from mobile device address books without the owners’ knowledge and consent – including storing children’s private details.
• Facebook’s Terms Of Service prohibits using software that scrapes UIDs. Many marketers gambled that they could get away with it and lost. Their accounts were shut down, costing them thousands of dollars in lost revenue.
• An independently-conducted 2010 study by Brad Geddes of SearchEngineLand, showed that, of a couple of hundred randomly-chosen websites, more than 90% had breached at least one of Google’s policies, more than 65% had broken at least two of Google’s policies, and more than 40% were in breach 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 to the Google program whose policies they had infringed, which could result in loss of income (e.g. AdSense or AdWords).

Can you see how easy it is to risk becoming exposed to non-compliance?

Regardless of whether you are a:

• CPA (Cost Per Action) Marketer
• Multilevel Marketer
• Affiliate Product Marketer
• AdWords Advertiser
• Info Product Marketer
• Amazon Affiliate
• e-Commerce Store Owner
• Adult Content Publisher
• Freelancer, Consultant Or Coach
• Seller Of Any Service Or Product Online

it’s important to do whatever is necessary to make sure that your website or blog complies with all laws governing the use of your site, wherever you are located.

Complying With 3rd-Party Services Terms And Policies

Leading online companies and government agencies that regulate trade in many countries emphasize the importance of observing the terms and policies of 3rd-party service providers.

You must let your site visitors know that your website complies will all legal requirements and recommended guidelines. This not only improves trust and confidence in your business, it’s also a requirement of most companies you engage with.

Let’s take a look at some examples:

Google requires your site to display legal information if using their products and service. This includes Google Analytics …

(Google Analytics – Policy Requirements)

Earning revenue online with your website using Google AdSense advertising …

(Google AdSense - policy requirements)

Or promoting your products or services through Google AdWords …

(Google AdWords – Policy Requirements)

If you sell information products using companies such as ClickBank, JVZoo, or other established online merchant networks, you will need to add certain legal pages to your website before they will approve your products for sale …

(Policy requirements digital product vendors using ClickBank)

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

(Federal Trade Commission – consumer policies and regulations)

FTC Regulations – Ensure That Your Site Is Compliant

FTC regulations governing the conduct of doing business online were introduced in March 2012. A quick search online reveals that many websites are still unaware (or choose to flaunt) these requirements. As is already the case, this often results in the FTC making an example of businesses and prosecuting site owners for breaches of regulation in an effort to get other businesses to comply.

If you plan to do any type of selling online, therefore, it’s best not to take any chances. Even if your business is not located in the U.S. it’s best to protect your business by ensuring that your site is compliant with all FTC guidelines.

A number of business resource sites provide guidelines and examples for structuring disclaimers and disclosures to help your business comply with FTC requirements. See the additional resources section at the end of this article for more information …

(Wording your disclaimers and disclosures correctly is important to avoid running foul of laws and regulations)

Don’t Forget Social Media Applications

If you plan to create apps for your website users, sites like Facebook, Twitter, and many others will require you to provide information about various legal pages …

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

• If you are unsure whether or not you may be breaking the law, and/or Terms of Service policies and guidelines of sites like Google, Facebook, etc., then it’s best to assume that you most probably are.
• If you are considering promoting anything on your site via affiliate marketing, or generating revenue with Google AdSense, ads for Amazon or eBay products, or driving visitors to your site with Google AdWords, etc., then find out exactly what kind of legal information you are required to include on your site to comply with all Terms Of Service and policy requirements to avoid having your accounts terminated.
• If you’ve been wondering whether “borrowing” a Copyright Notice is Copyright infringement, take proper precautions to protect yourself and your business interests.

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

What Legal Information Does My Website Need To Be Covered Against Legal Compliance Issues?

If you suspect that your web site lacks in aspects of compliance, then you will find this section helpful.

At its most basic, adding the following legal pages to your site should help your website keep out of trouble with many regulatory agencies and external providers, and help to avoid potential legal issues):

• About Us Page
• Contact Page
• Privacy Policy
• Terms And Conditions
• Disclaimer Pages
• General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) Compliance

Additionally, you may want to look into implementing any of these pages if applicable:

• Affiliate Disclosure (e.g. if you promote or sell affiliate products and services)
• Anti-Spam Policy
• Earnings Disclaimer
• External Linking Policy
• Health Disclaimers (e.g. if your website or blog provides general advice about health or medical areas)
• Refund Policy (if you run an e-commerce site)
• Media Terms Of Use (if you allow users to download videos or audio files on your site)

Disclosure Pages – Types

Adding the right type of disclosure to your website is important. For example:

• No Material Connection – Informs your readers that you will not receive for writing the article.
• Affiliate Links – Informs your readers that you may be compensated if they act on your recommendation and buy through an affiliate link.
• Review Or Sample Copy – Lets visitors know that you have received a review or sample copy of the product.
• Sponsored Post – Lets visitors be aware that you have been compensated in some form to write the content.
• Third Party Advertising – Lets readers know that you’re using online behavioral tracking technology. This is required to satisfy 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 Pages Content To Your Site

Ideally, you will have a lawyer prepare the content of your legal documents. Once you have this, there are several ways to include them in your website.

Uploading Legal Pages Manually To Your Website

If someone prepares the legal content for you in typical web page formatting (e.g. HTML), you can simply upload these to your web server, or have someone upload them for you.

We recommend creating a legals directory in your server and uploading your legal pages to this folder (e.g. via FTP) …

(Upload legal pages to your server using FTP)

You can then add links to these legal pages in WordPress using a custom WordPress menu …

(Custom WordPress Menu Feature)

Where To Display Legal Pages On Your Website

Make sure that your legal pages are fully up-to-date and clearly accessible to visitors. You can insert these into your WordPress sidebar (or place them in the footer section of your site) to ensure that visitors can access the information from all your pages …

(It’s important to display links to legal pages on all of your website’s pages)

To learn more about adding links to pages on your sidebar menu or footer in WordPress using widgets, see this step-by-step tutorial:

• Adding And Configuring WordPress Widgets In The Sidebar Navigation Section

Store-Bought Legal Templates

You can find attorney-drafted downloadable website forms and agreements by searching online, or going to sites like the ones listed below:

Find Legal Forms

(Find Legal Forms)

More information:

• Find Legal Forms

Another option is to purchase a package of cut and paste website legal templates written by attorney Scott Talbert …

Cut And Paste Website Legal Pages

(Scott Talbert’s Website Legal Templates)

Cut & Paste website 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 pages.

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

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

You can either create a new WordPress page for every legal form you want added to your website, then paste the content from the templates into your pages and publish or upload the pages to your server as described previously.

More info:

• Cut & Paste Website Legal Pages

Legal Pages – Plugins

As well as using copy & paste legal templates, another option for adding legal pages to your site is to use a plugin.

Here are some plugins for WordPress-powered websites worth looking into:

WP Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress

(WordPress Plugin – WordPress Legal Pages)

If you don’t want to spend time creating legal web pages manually, then consider installing a plugin like WordPress Legal Pages instead …

This plugin is not free, but it’s a very affordable and well-supported premium plugin that will help 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 are:

• Built-in Templates – The plugin gives you access to over 20 built-in legal templates created by professional lawyers.
• Very Quick And Easy To Use – Set up most of the basic legal pages you need in around 3 minutes with just a few mouse clicks.
• Customizable Pages – The plugin includes customizable and completely editable legal form templates (e.g. ToS, Disclaimer, Earnings Disclaimer, Privacy Policy and more!)
• Easy To Edit Pages – Full WYSIWYG editor lets you edit all legal pages like any other WordPress page.
• Shortcodes – Add shortcodes to any of your WordPress pages and the information will then be automatically inserted into your pages when you publish.
• Exclude pages. The plugin lets you exclude pages from menus with a simple check box and delete and manage these like any other WP page.
• Forced Options – Force page or post lock down. When users agree to the legal terms, the page unlocks, giving them access.
• New Features – New plugin features get added when new versions are released.

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

(WP Legal Pages Plugin – Menu)

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

(WP Legal Pages – Settings)

You can easily create legal pages for different types of sites, such as business websites, affiliate sites, AdSense sites, etc …

(WP Legal Pages Plugin – Create different legal pages)

You can also choose from a number of built-in legal templates …

(WP Legal Pages Plugin – Built-In 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 this plugin:

• WordPress Legal Pages Plugin

Compliance Bar Plugin – WordPress Plugin For Website Compliance

total website compliance & disclaimer solution …

To learn more about the plugin go here:

• Compliance Bar – Website Compliance Plugin For WordPress

Legal Suite Pro Plugin

(Legal Suite Pro For WordPress)

Legal Suite Pro Plugin 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 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. You can have legal pages installed and set up on your site in one minute or less and the plugin licensing is flexible, allowing you to install and use the plugin on all of your sites.

Go here for more information:

• Legal Suite Pro

If using the services of a lawyer to create your legal documentation is out of your budget, consider implementing at least some basic kind of legal protection on your website until you can afford to hire the services of a legal expert.

We want your business to be protected!

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

(Legal Pages Generator Software)

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

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As stated earlier, if you are making money online (or are planning to), you need to ensure that your website is found to comply with regulatory agencies and the terms of service and guidelines provided by 3rd-party products and services that you may be promoting or selling online. Your website must comply with a number of laws and regulatory guidelines, some of which you may not be aware of.

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?

Legal Disclaimer: Once again, we are not lawyers and we are not offering legal advice on our website. You are strongly advised to do your own due diligence and consult a legal expert to ensure that your website fully complies with the law pertaining to your specific business.

Additional Legal Information

Here is a time-saving list of additional sites we recommend you visit to help you better understand what your business requires to comply and meet legal requirements and guidelines:

• Federal Trade Commission 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
• 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
• United States Copyright Office

See Also …

• Google 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

Hopefully, this article has helped you understand the importance of having a legally compliant website. Use the information presented above to quickly add essential legal pages to your website.

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