Is your WordPress site compliant? Do you know if you are breaking any laws, rules or regulations, or breaching the Terms of Service (TOS) of any companies whose services or products you are doing business with?
As the internet continues growing at breakneck speed and the rules keep changing, it’s vital to try and stay on top of what’s going on and ensure that your site remains legally compliant, especially if your online presence plays an important role in your overall 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 commercial gain, then you will 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 “The Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program,” which regulates behavioral advertising across the internet to learn more.
(Better Business Bureau Website)
The introduction of these laws has consequences for various online business activities, including:
- Any type of advertising, like Google AdWords or AdSense
- Retarget Marketing
- Google Analytics (or other analytics software)
- Affiliate Marketers
- Product Creators
- Blogging
- etc.
If you do not include certain legal pages on your website (e.g. terms of service, privacy statement, earning disclaimers, etc.), many third-party sites such as Google won’t let you advertise, online merchants like ClickBank will not allow you to sell digital products, PayPal could shut down your account, Facebook could disapprove your applications, and you will not be accepted into many advertising and online marketing networks.
If your online business is not in compliance, you could end up facing a multitude of penalties, including fines, having your website shut down, even jail time!
This article explains the importance of having a compliant website and shows you simple methods to make your WordPress site legally compliant in minutes.
Does Your Website Comply With All Legal Requirements?
Legal Disclaimer: We are not lawyers and we are not providing legal advice. As previously stated, the aim of this article is to help make you aware that your website may be subject to certain legal policies in accordance with the laws and regulations governing business online and that compliance may be required with the terms of service of companies whose products or services you endorse on your website
Understanding The Importance Of Making Your Website Compliant
Are you at risk? Consider what the implications to your business would be if these situations were to happen:
- A person suffers a heart attack after using your online fitness workout.
- The skin care creams you promote as an affiliate gives someone skin rashes.
- You’ve informed subscribers that you will not sell their information, but you have not defined what you will do with their personal details.
- Someone steals your content and puts it up on their website.
- There is no statement on your website or blog making your site visitors aware that you are an affiliate for the product you are promoting that you will earn a sales commission if visitors purchase via your link.
- You have not spelled out the terms of your return policies.
- Visitors claim the testimonials on your site are fake and try to sue you.
- You haven’t disclosed in a product review that you were given a free copy of the product.
- Your website contains adult-related information and you have not taken sufficient measures to keep underage persons from accessing it.
Consider too these documented examples of costly compliance breaches:
- A CPA Marketer failed to provide adequate disclaimers telling visitors they would be required to give up personal information (including credit card information to complete his offer. In addition to a substantial $390,000 fine, they’re now required to provide everyone he does business with for the next 20 years, a copy of the judgement — including employees.
- A social networking app developer copped a massive $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 using software that scrapes UIDs. Many internet marketers gambled that they could get away with it and lost. Their accounts were shut down, resulting thousands of $$$ in lost revenue.
- An independent study by Brad Geddes of SearchEngineLand, showed that, of a couple of hundred websites picked at random, more than 90% were in breach of 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 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 you could easily be exposed to the risks of non-compliance?
Regardless of whether you are a:
- CPA or PPA Marketer
- Multilevel Marketer
- Affiliate Product Promoter
- AdWords Advertiser
- Info Product Marketer
- Amazon Affiliate
- EBay Seller
- Publisher Of Adult Content
- Provider Of Freelance, Coaching Or Consulting Services
- Seller Of Any Service Or Product Online
it’s important to ensure that your online business has the right legal pages and information accessible to your site users.
Complying With 3rd-Party Services - ToS, Policies, etc.
Big companies and government agencies that regulate trade emphasize the importance of observing the terms and policies of service providers.
You are expected to let your visitors know that your website complies will all laws and professional guidelines. This not only improves consumer trust and buyer confidence in your business, it’s also required by most companies you will interact with online.
Let’s take a look at some examples:
Google requires you to display certain information if using their services. This includes using Google Analytics …
(Google Analytics – Policy Requirements)
Monetizing your online properties with Google AdSense ads …
(Google AdSense policy requirements)
Or promoting your site through Google AdWords …
(Google AdWords – Policy Requirements)
If you sell digital products via places such as ClickBank, JVZoo, or other established online merchant sites, you will need to add legal pages before they will approve your products for selling via their marketplace …
(Policy requirements product vendors selling via ClickBank)
The Federal Trade Commission also requires you to display clear disclaimers and disclosures on your site, especially if you plan to sell or promote online using testimonials or product endorsements …
(Federal Trade Commission – consumer guidelines and regulations)
FTC Regulations Require Your Site To Be Compliant
FTC regulations governing the conduct of doing business online were introduced in March 2012. A quick search online will reveal that many sites are still unaware (or choose to ignore) these requirements. As documented on their website, this typically prompts the FTC to make an example of businesses and prosecute website owners 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 chances. Even if your business is not physically located in the U.S. we strongly recommend protecting your business interests by making sure that your website complies with FTC regulations and guidelines.
There are many online resources that can provide guidelines and examples on how to structure disclaimers and disclosures to help your business meet FTC requirements. We provide additional references to some of these at the end of this article …
(Structure your disclaimers and disclosures correctly to avoid running foul of the law)
Don’t Forget Social Media Apps
If you are planning to create applications for your website users, you will also be required to provide sites like Twitter, Facebook, and others with access to various legal pages …
(Facebook developer app – policy requirements)
- If you are unsure as to whether or not you are breaking the law, and/or Terms of Service policies and guidelines of websites like Google, Facebook, etc., then you most probably are.
- If you plan to promote products or services online as an affiliate marketer, or generating revenue with Google AdSense, ads for eBay or Amazon products, or driving visitors to your site with Google AdWords, etc., then find out exactly what kind of legal information you are required to provide on your site to comply with all Terms Of Service and policy requirements to avoid having your accounts terminated.
- If you have ever wondered if “borrowing” a Copyright Notice is Copyright infringement, take proper precautions to protect yourself and your business.
(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, almost all 3rd-party services require you to comply with their policies and guidelines)
Common Legal Pages You Should Include In Your Site To Ensure Compliance
If you suspect that your website lacks in areas of compliance, then this section will help you.
Adding the following legal pages to your site should help you keep out of trouble with most regulatory agencies and third-party service providers, and avoid potential legal issues or even threats of legal action (e.g. “takedown” notices):
- About Us
- Contact Us
- Privacy Policy
- Terms Of Use
- Disclaimer Pages
- General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) Compliance
As well as the above, you may want to look into implementing any of these legal pages:
- Affiliate Disclosure (e.g. if you provide information about affiliate products and services)
- Anti-Spam Policy
- Earnings Disclaimer
- External Linking Policy
- Health Disclaimers (if your website or blog provides health or medical advice)
- Refund Policy (if you run an e-commerce site)
- Video/Audio Terms Of Use (e.g. if you provide users with access to downloadable videos or audio files on your site)
Disclosure Pages – Types
It’s important to add the correct types of disclosure pages to your website. For example:
- No Material Connection – This lets visitors know that you will not receive for writing the post.
- Affiliate Links – Disclosure that informs site users that you will benefit financially if they act on your recommendation and buy through an affiliate link.
- Sample Or review Copy – Lets visitors be aware that you have been given a review or sample copy of the product by the author or developer.
- Sponsored Post – Lets your visitors be aware that you have been compensated in some way to write the article.
- Third Party Advertising – Lets your visitors 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.
Adding Legal Pages Content To Your Site
Ideally, you should consult lawyers or a legal firm and ask them to prepare the verbiage of your legal documents. Once you have this completed, there are several ways to add them to your website.
Upload Legal Pages Manually
If someone prepares the legal content for you as standard web pages (e.g. HTML), you can simply upload these to your web server, or have someone upload these pages for you.
We recommend adding a legals directory to your server and uploading HTML pages containing your legal documentation to this folder (e.g. using FTP) …
(Upload legal pages to your server using FTP)
You can then add links to your pages in WordPress using a custom WordPress menu …
(Custom WordPress Menu Feature)
After uploading your legal pages, make sure that these are fully up-to-date and display clearly to visitors. You can insert these into your sidebar (or the footer of your website) so that users can access legal information from all your pages …
(It’s important to display links to legal information on all of your website’s pages)
To learn more about displaying links to pages on your sidebar or footer in WordPress using widgets, see this tutorial:
Ready-Made Legal Templates
You can easily find attorney-prepared downloadable website forms and agreements by searching online, or going to sites like the ones listed below:
Find Legal Forms
(FindLegalForms.com – Attorney-drafted legal forms)
Go here for more information:
Alternatively, you can download a package of cut and paste legal templates written by legal attorney Scott Talbert to help businesses protect themselves online …
Cut & Paste Website Legal Pages
(Cut & Paste Website Legal Pages – Legal Templates)
These templates were created by an attorney and feature less passive voice and more plain language phrasing and can be easily customized with a quick search and replace to insert your own business name and URL, then pasted into your legal web 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
- Federal Trade Commission Compliance
- Privacy Policy
- ToS & Conditions of Use.
You can either create a new 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 these to your server as described earlier.
To learn more, visit this website:
Legal Page Plugins
As well as using legal templates, another option for adding legal pages to your website is to use a plugin.
Here are some great WordPress plugins that you may be interested in using:
WP Legal Pages
(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin)
If you don’t want to spend time creating legal web pages manually, then consider using WordPress Legal Pages …
The WP Legal Pages plugin is not free, but it’s an affordable and well-supported premium plugin that will simplify the job of creating and implementing legal pages on your site and save you time.
Some of the reasons to consider using WP Legal Pages plugin are:
- Pre-written Legal 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 your basic legal pages in a few minutes with a few clicks of the mouse.
- Customizable Pages – Includes customizable and easily 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 legal pages like any other page on your website.
- Custom Shortcodes – You can add shortcodes to your website or blog pages and the information will be automatically inserted into your content when published.
- Exclude pages. 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 lock down. Page unlocks when users agree to your legal terms.
- New Features – More features get added to this plugin with each new version.
After installing WordPress Legal Pages, a menu item will appear inside your navigation menu section …
(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress – Menu)
This allows you to view, create and edit legal pages from the admin area …
(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress – Settings)
With WP Legal Pages, you have the option of easily creating legal pages for different online uses, such as business websites with products, affiliate/review websites, e-commerce sites, etc …
(WP Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress – Page Type)
Choose from several pre-configured legal templates …
(WP Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress – 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
To learn more about the benefits of using this powerful plugin, visit the plugin website:
Compliance Bar Plugin – Website Compliance Plugin For WordPress
Compliance Bar is a simple plugin for WordPress websites containing over twenty customizable compliance templates for your online presence …
For a detailed review of this plugin go here:
Legal Suite Pro
(Legal Suite Pro For WordPress)
This 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 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 powered 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 this plugin on all of your websites (even sites that you decide to sell or flip).
For more details, visit this website:
If hiring legal experts to create your legal pages is out of your budget, then consider implementing some basic form of legal protection on your site until you can afford professional legal services.
We want your business to be legally safe!
Download the FREE Legal Pages Generator tool below, or consider using one of the better solutions we discuss in this article, such as using ready-made legal content, or a plugin as described in the section below.
(Legal Pages Generator)
Legal Pages Generator Software lets you easily generate 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 make money online (or are planning to), you need to make sure that your site is compliant with regulatory agencies and any terms of service and guidelines of third-party services and products that you may be promoting or using online. If your website doesn’t comply with laws designed to protect the rights of consumers, 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?
Legal Disclaimer: Once again, please note that we are not lawyers and we offer no legal advice. You must do your own due diligence and consult legal experts to ensure that your website fully complies with the law in your country or region.
Additional Legal Information
Here is a useful list of sites we suggest you visit to better understand what your site may require to stay compliant and meet legal requirements and guidelines:
- Federal Trade Commission Latest List Of Rules & Regulations
- FTC 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
- 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
- Google AdWords Help – What to include in your privacy policy for remarketing
- ClickBank – Creating Your First Product
- Facebook Platform Policies
We hope this article has helped you understand the importance of having a legally compliant website. Use the information presented above to quickly add legal pages to your WordPress website or blog using simple solutions.
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