One of the worst things that can happen to a website owner is to be on the wrong side of the law.
Internet laws and regulations were designed to protect the rights of consumers and apply to anyone who sells, markets or promotes products or services online. Anyone who owns a website risks being sued for not following compliance laws. Feigning ignorance about the law won’t protect you from being slapped with a legal notice.
Recent laws introduced in 2014 to regulate how businesses promote advertising on their websites state that if you promote anything on your website for profit, you need to 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.
(Online Interest-Based Advertising Accountability Program – BBB)
The introduction of these laws affect various online business activities, including:
- Any type of advertising, e.g. pay-per-click advertising
- Retarget Marketing
- Google Analytics (or other analytics software)
- Affiliate Marketing
- Product Creation
- Bloggers
- etc.
If your site does not display certain pages to visitors (e.g. terms and conditions of use, privacy statement, legal disclaimers, etc.), many third-party sites such as Google won’t let you advertise, sites like ClickBank or JVZoo will not allow you to list digital products, PayPal may shut down your account and freeze your funds, Facebook could reject your applications, and you won’t be allowed into various advertising and affiliate merchant networks.
If you are not compliant, you could end up facing a number of penalties, including fines, having your website shut down, even jail time!
The purpose of this article is to make you aware that your website are subject to legal requirements according to laws that govern your business, the importance of remaining compliant with the terms of service of 3rd-party providers whose services or products you may be endorsing on your site, and that there are solutions that can help your sites become more compliant, such as the tools that we discuss further below.
Does Your Website Comply With The Law?
Legal Disclaimer: Please note that we are not lawyers and we do not provide legal advice. As previously stated, this article is designed only to help 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 online and that compliance may be required with the terms of service of companies whose products or services you promote
Why Ensuring That Your Website Is Compliant Is Important
Consider what would happen to your business if these situations were to occur:
- Someone has a heart attack after using your online fitness program.
- The skin care products you sell as an affiliate marketer gives a number of users an adverse reaction.
- You’ve informed your subscribers that you won’t sell their information, but you haven’t spelled out exactly what you’ll do with it.
- Someone copies your content and puts it up on their own site.
- There is no statement on your website letting visitors know that you are an affiliate for the product you are selling and may receive a financial benefit if visitors buy using your link.
- You have not spelled out the terms and conditions of your refund policies.
- Online visitors claim that the testimonials on your site are false and try to sue you.
- You didn’t disclose that you received a free copy of the product you are reviewing.
- Your site publishes adult-related content and you have not taken sufficient measures to keep underaged children from accessing it.
Consider also the real case studies of costly compliance breaches listed below:
- A CPA Marketer failed to provide adequate disclaimers telling visitors they would have to give up personal information (including credit card information to complete a debt reduction offer. Cost = $390,000.
- A social networking app developer was slapped with a whopping $800,000 fine for collecting personal information without users’ knowledge and consent – including storing private information about children.
- Facebook’s Terms Of Service prohibits using software that scrapes Users IDs. Many marketers took a risk and lost. Their accounts were shut down, resulting thousands of dollars 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% were in violation of at least one of Google’s policies, more than 65% were in breach of at least 2 of Google’s policies, and more than 40% had breached 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 notices or lose access entirely to the Google program they had violated, which could result in loss of income (e.g. AdSense or AdWords).
Can you see how easy it is to risk being exposed to litigation through non-compliance?
Regardless of whether you are a:
- CPA (Cost Per Action) Marketer
- MLM Networker
- Affiliate Product Promoter
- AdSense Publisher
- Product Publisher
- Amazon Associate
- EBay Seller
- Publisher Of Adult Content
- Freelancer, Consultant Or Coach
- Seller Of Any Product Or Service Online
You need to ensure that your online business is fully compliant with the law.
Compliance With Third-Party Companies - ToS, Policies, etc.
Compliance with third-party services terms and policies is important.
You are expected to let your site visitors know that your website complies with legal requirements and recommended guidelines. This not only improves consumer trust and confidence in your business, it’s also a requirement of many companies you engage with.
For example:
Google requires websites to display certain information if using their products. This includes using Google Analytics …
(Policy requirements for using Google Analytics)
Making money online with your site with Google AdSense …
(Google AdSense - policy requirements)
Or promoting your services using Google AdWords …
(Policy requirements for using Google AdWords)
If you plan to sell products online with merchants such as ClickBank, JVZoo, or other established online merchant networks, you will be required to add legal pages to your site before they will approve your products for sale in their networks …
(Policy requirements for selling through ClickBank)
The Federal Trade Commission also requires that you add clear disclaimers and policy statements to visitors, especially concerning the use of testimonials or product endorsements …
(Federal Trade Commission – consumer policies and regulations)
New FTC Regulations Require Your Website To Comply
New FTC regulations governing how business is conducted online were introduced in March 2012. Search online and you will see that many business are unaware (or choose to ignore) these requirements. As has happened in the past, this often results in the FTC making an example of businesses and prosecuting companies 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 is not physically located in the U.S. we strongly recommend protecting your business interests by ensuring that your website complies with FTC regulations.
There are many resources online that can provide guidelines on how to structure disclaimers and disclosures to help your site meet FTC requirements. See our additional references and useful resources section at the end of this article for more information …
(Word your disclaimers and disclosures correctly to avoid running foul of laws and regulations)
Don’t Forget Social Media Applications
If you are planning to create applications that will integrate with your site, social networking sites like Twitter, Facebook, and others require you to provide information about your legal pages …
(Social networking apps also require compliance)
- If you are unsure as to whether 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 products or services on your site using affiliate marketing, or making money online with Google AdSense, Amazon, or eBay advertising, or driving visitors to your website using Google AdWords, etc., then find out exactly what kind of legal information you are required to include on your site to comply with their Terms Of Service and policy requirements to avoid having your accounts shut down.
- If you’ve ever wondered whether “borrowing” a Copyright Notice is Copyright infringement, then it’s best to take proper precautions to avoid becoming a litigation magnet.
(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, most third-party services require you to comply with their policies and guidelines)
What Compliance Information Should You Add To Your Site To Be Protected From Legal Compliance Issues?
If your website or blog is lacking in terms of compliance, then this section will help you.
Adding the following compliance pages to your website should help your site keep out of trouble with many consumer protection authorities and third-party providers, and help to avoid potential legal issues):
- About Us Page
- Contact Page
- Privacy Policy
- Terms Of Use
- Disclaimer Pages
- General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) Compliance
As well as the above, you may want to consider adding one or more of these compliance pages:
- Affiliate Agreement (e.g. if you sell products or services through an affiliate program)
- Anti-Spam Policy
- Earnings Disclaimer
- External Linking Policy
- Financial Disclaimers (if your website or blog provides financial information)
- Refund Policy (if you sell products or services online)
- Video/Audio Terms (e.g. if you allow users to download videos or audio files on your site)
Types Of Disclosure Pages
Adding correct disclosure information to your site is important. For example:
- No Material Connection – This lets users be aware that you will not be receiving any form of payment for writing the post.
- Affiliate Links – Lets your readers be aware that you will benefit financially if they act on your recommendation and purchase through one of your affiliate links.
- Sample/Review Copy – Lets users know that you have been given a sample or review copy of the product or service by the author or product developer.
- Sponsored Post – Disclosure that lets users be aware that you were compensated in some form to write the post.
- Third Party Advertising – Informs visitors 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 Compliance Pages To Your WordPress Site
Ideally, you will have a lawyer prepare the verbiage of your legal documents. Once these have been done, there are several ways to include them in your website.
Upload Legal Pages Manually To Your Website
If someone prepares and delivers the legal verbiage for you in standard web page format (e.g. HTML), you can simply upload these to your server, or have someone upload them for you.
We recommend adding a legal folder to your web server and uploading HTML pages containing your legal documentation to this directory using FTP …
(Create a ‘legals’ folder in your web server and upload pages using FTP)
You can then easily add a link to your legal pages from your WordPress site using custom links in your menu feature …
(Custom WordPress Menu)
Where To Display Legal Web Pages On Your Website
Make sure that your legal pages are fully up-to-date and clearly accessible to all visitors. You can insert these into your WordPress sidebar (or the footer of your site) to ensure that visitors have access to the information from all of your pages …
(Display links to legal information to users on all of your website’s pages)
We have created a detailed tutorial on adding links to pages on your WordPress sidebar here:
Templates
You can find attorney-drafted disclosures and downloadable internet forms and agreements by searching online, or visiting sites like the ones shown below:
Find Legal Forms
To learn more, go here:
Alternatively, you can download a set of legal templates written by attorney Scott Talbert to protect businesses online …
Cut And Paste Website Legal Pages
(Cut & Paste Website Legal Pages)
These legal templates feature less passive voice and more plain language phrasing and can be easily customized with simple search and replace to insert your own details, then pasted into your web pages.
The legal forms included in Scott Talbert’s Legal Forms include:
- Anti-Spam Policy
- Copyright Notice
- Disclaimer: multi-discipline professional disclaimers
- DMCA Compliance
- Federal Trade Commission Compliance
- Privacy Policy
- Terms of Service (ToS) & 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 website, then paste the content from the templates into your web pages and publish or upload the pages to your web server as previously described.
Go here to learn more:
Plugins – Legal Pages
As well as using legal templates, you can keep things really simple using plugins.
Here are some plugins for WordPress-driven websites and blogs worth looking into:
WP Legal Pages Plugin
(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress)
If creating legal pages manually feels too time-consuming for you, then consider installing a plugin like WP Legal Pages instead …
The WP Legal Pages plugin is not free, but it’s a low-priced and well-supported plugin that will help simplify the job of creating and implementing legal pages on your website and save you time.
Some of the benefits of using WP Legal Pages are:
- Pre-written Legal Templates – The plugin gives you access to over 20 built-in legal templates created by a team of professional lawyers.
- Quick And Easy To Use – Set up most of your basic legal pages in a few minutes with just a few clicks of the mouse.
- Fully Customizable Pages – The plugin includes fully customizable and completely editable legal form templates (e.g. ToS, Disclaimer, Privacy Policy, Earnings Disclaimer and more!)
- Editable Pages – Full WYSIWYG editor lets you edit legal pages just like any other page on your site.
- Shortcodes – You can add shortcodes to your website or blog 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 other WP page.
- Forced Options – Force page lock down. Page unlocks only when user agrees to your legal terms.
- Additional Features – More features get added to this plugin with every new version.
When you install WordPress Legal Pages, a menu item will display inside your WordPress dashboard area …
(WordPress Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress – Menu)
This lets you create, view and edit legal pages from your admin area …
(WP Legal Pages – Settings Screen)
The plugin gives you the option to create legal pages for different online uses, such as business websites with products, affiliate/review sites, medical sites, etc …
(WP Legal Pages – Page type menu)
Choose from a number of built-in legal templates …
(WP Legal Pages Plugin For WordPress – Pre-configured 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
Visit the plugin site for more information about the benefits of using this plugin:
Compliance Bar Plugin – Website Compliance Plugin For WordPress
total website compliance and disclaimer solution …
Go here to learn more:
Legal Suite Pro Plugin
(Legal Suite Pro Plugin)
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 And Conditions
- 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 have packaged high quality, professionally written legal disclaimers into a plugin that can be installed quickly on any WordPress powered site. Your legal pages can be 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.
To learn more, visit this site:
If hiring lawyers to create your legal documentation is currently out of your budget, consider implementing at least some form of legal protection on your website until you can afford professional assistance from a solicitor.
We want your site to be legally protected!
Download the FREE Legal Pages Generator software below, or use one of the better solutions we discuss in this article, such as using legal content, or plugins as described in the section below.
(Legal Pages Generator Software)
Legal Pages Generator lets you easily generate basic legal documents for your website including Terms of Service, Privacy Policy, Copyright Notice, Website Disclaimer and Earnings Disclaimer.
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As we’ve previously pointed out, if you are making money online (or plan to), you need to make sure that your website is compliant with regulatory agencies and the guidelines and terms of service provided by 3rd-party sites that you may decide to promote or sell online. Your website or blog must comply with a number of laws and regulatory guidelines, many 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?
Disclaimer: Once again, please note that 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 all legal requirements wherever your business is based.
Resources
Below is a useful list of sites we recommend you visit to help you better understand what your business requires to remain compliant and meet its legal obligations:
- FTC 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
- US Patent and Trademark Office
- United States Copyright Office
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 why it’s important to have a compliant website. Use the information above to quickly add all necessary legal pages to your WordPress website.
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"Wow! I never knew there's so much to learn about WordPress! I bought one of the WordPress for Dummies three years ago, such authors need to be on this course!" - Rich Law, Create A Blog Now