One of the worst predicaments you can find yourself in as a website owner is to be on the wrong side of the law.
Your digital presence has to comply with various laws, many of which you may probably not even be aware of.
Being non-compliant not only puts you at risk of incurring significant financial costs, but also the cost to your reputation. Why risk your money and your business reputation, when you can protect yourself so easily and inexpensively?
In this post, we look at a simple and inexpensive solution for WordPress users that can help make your site fully compliant in minutes.
Is Your Website Or Blog Legally Compliant?
As the digital business realm continues to grow at an extraordinary rate and the rules of the game constantly change, it’s vitally important to stay informed about what’s happening and to make sure that your website or blog remains compliant, especially if your digital presence is an essential aspect of your overall business strategy.
If there are no legal pages on your web site (e.g. terms and conditions of use, privacy statement, earning disclaimers, etc.), many sites like Google won’t let you advertise, sites like ClickBank will not let you list your digital products on their network, PayPal could shut down your account and freeze your funds, Facebook and other social sites will suspend your applications, and you will not be accepted into many advertising and merchant networks.
If your business online is not in compliance, you could also face a whole range of penalties, including fines, having your website shut down, even jail time!
At the very least, if you are not in compliance, expect visitor trust and confidence in your business to seriously diminish.
(In addition to legal and regulatory compliance, most 3rd-party services require you to comply with their policies and guidelines!)
Disclaimer: We are not lawyers and we are not offering legal advice in this article.
The purpose of this article is to make you aware that:
- Your website may be subject to many legal requirements in accordance with mandatory laws that govern your business,
- The importance of being compliant with the terms of service of third-party providers whose products or services you may be promoting or endorsing in your website, and
- There are solutions that can help your business become more compliant, such as the plugin that we discuss in this article.
If you suspect that your web site falls short in areas of compliance, below we discuss a simple WordPress plugin you should know more about.
Introducing …
Compliance Bar – WP Legal Plugin
Plugin Description
Compliance Bar Plugin is a simple and easy-to-install plugin for WordPress users containing over twenty customizable compliance templates for your digital presence …
More info: Compliance Bar Plugin
Plugin Benefits
Below are just some of the benefits and advantages of using Compliance Bar to make your web site instantly compliant:
Fast And Easy To Install And Set Up. Ready To Go To Work In Minutes.
Compliance Bar is very easy to install. Simply upload a zip folder containing the plugin to your Plugin folder via your administrator login and activate.
Editable Legal Page Templates
You can easily edit the prebuilt templates inside Compliance Bar from the settings menu with the WordPress visual editor.
Dedicated Plugin Support Team
Compliance Bar provides a dedicated plugin support team to assist users if they experience any issues.
Additional benefits of the plugin include:
- Customized Compliance Pages: The plugin will create your legal pages in seconds and customizes them to your business and website.
- Full Video Training Manuals: Compliance Bar is not complicated to use and an entire library of training videos is available.
- Can Be Used In Every Country: As long as you consult someone who is qualified to give you legal advice to ascertain if the templates provided in Compliance Bar are suitable and satisfactory for your business, country and website, you can use the plugin wherever you are located.
- Use On All WordPress Sites: If your site is built with WordPress, you can use the plugin for all website purposes. Select only the types of disclaimers which suit your particular business model (e.g. affiliate or CPA marketing, business services, AdSense, AdWords, adult, medical, etc) and ignore any that are unnecessary.
Compliance Bar Features
Compliance Bar provides a number of great features to website owners. Below we have listed just a few of these:
- Fast and easy to install and implement. Be up and running in no time.
- Show Visually Appealing Icons – Display links to your legal pages using attractive icons that can be placed anywhere in your pages. You can also upload your own icons.
- Display Restricted Content – If your site has content that may be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. information related to alcohol, tobacco, adult content, etc.), Compliance Bar can display pop-ups that require users to accept your site’s terms or disclaimers.
- EU User Cookie Compliance – If you do business in the EU or display your content to visitors in the EU, you must be aware of EU compliance laws. The plugin displays an attractive bar notifying your visitors and covering your business from non-compliance issues.
- Record & Store IP Acceptance – Compliance Bar records the IP address of your visitors for reference, just in case a visitor accepts your terms or disclaimers and then claims they haven’t.
- Shortcodes – The plugin is integrated with shortcodes to automatically populate the templates with your personal information. These shortcodes also allow you to place information anywhere on your site, (even in the pop-ups).
- Compatible With Mobile Devices – The plugin has settings for displaying on mobile devices and displays mobile optimized icons automatically depending on visitor browsers.
Plugin Features – Details
After installing and activating the plugin, you will have access to a number of sections where you can configure the plugin’s settings.
Let’s go through these settings briefly …
User Profile
There are a number of default fields in this section where your information can be input (e.g. “Business Name,” “Support Email,” “Company Phone Number,” “Niche Area,” etc.). Not all categories are compulsory, but some are (e.g. “Contact Name,” “Business Address,” etc.)
(Compliance Bar User Profile Page – Image source: plugin documentation)
The plugin uses dynamic shortcodes to dynamically insert and display the information you have input into your User Profile fields into your page templates …
(Compliance Bar Plugin User Profile Section: Shortcodes – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Once the minimum required (i.e. compulsory) information has been entered into the profile fields, you can then access the other sections of the plugin.
Compliance Pages
The “Compliance Pages” section includes a list of all of the templates …
(Compliance Bar: Compliance Pages – Image source: plugin documentation)
Here’s the complete list of template pages made available by the Compliance Bar plugin last time we checked their website:
- About Us
- AdSense Disclaimer
- Affiliate Agreements
- Affiliate Disclosure Statement
- Amazon Affiliate Disclaimer
- Anti-Spam Policy
- Contact Us
- Copyright/DCMA Notice
- Disclaimer
- Double Dart Cookies
- Earnings Disclaimer
- External Links Policy
- FTC Statement
- Legal Disclaimer
- Linking Policy
- Medical Disclaimer
- Privacy Policy
- Returns/Refund Policy
- Support
- Terms
- Terms & Conditions
- Testimonial Disclosure
- XXX Disclosure
You can create compliance pages for your website or blog quite easily by simply selecting check boxes and clicking ”Save” in the “Compliance Pages” section …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Legal Templates – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Your legal pages will then be created and added to the “Pages” section of your WordPress site.
Compliance Bar Icons
The plugin is installed with a default set of icons for referencing your legal pages …
The Compliance Bar icons can be changed. You can purchase an additional set of icons from the plugin developer, or create/upload your own to match the style of your theme …
(Compliance Bar: Legal Page Template Icons – Image source: plugin documentation)
Edit / Delete Legal Page Templates
You can easily modify and delete your legal templates from the “Compliance Pages” area, just as you would any other page in WordPress …
(Compliance Bar Plugin: Edit Compliance Templates – Screenshot source: plugin documentation)
Notes
- Customizing the compliance pages is recommended, as the pages contain generic content.
- The plugin indicates if it detects existing similar pages on your site (e.g. pages created before you installed the plugin).
Compliance Bar
You have various options to customize the Compliance Bar, including where to position the bar, whether to display links or icon images, background colors and images, icon size, selecting which pages to include an icon for in the Compliance Bar, whether or not to display the Compliance bar on your home page, which pages the Compliance Bar will display in, mobile settings, and offset distance …
(Compliance Bar Section: Create Bar – Image source: plugin documentation)
Notes:
- You can create a number of Compliance Bars to display different disclaimers on different pages, or to cover different uses throughout your website.
- The plugin lets you display the Compliance Bar on the front page of your website, even if you are using a specific 3rd-party theme (like Genesis, Thesis or WooThemes), where the home page is configured through the theme settings as a built-in template, and not as a normal “static” WordPress page.
- Due to the smaller size of mobile device screens, you can only select up to a certain number of page icons to display if you turn Mobile Settings “on.”
Once you have configured your Compliance Bar settings, it displays links to your compliance pages through dynamic icon bar on your site …
You have full control over the location on your pages where you would like your compliance bar to appear …
PopUps
If your site publishes content that should be restricted to certain age groups (e.g. information related to alcohol, tobacco, adult, etc.), Compliance Bar can display popups that require users to accept your site’s terms or disclaimers.
The “Create Pop Up” section lets you fully customize your pop ups …
(Pop Ups Screen: Create Pop Up – Image source: plugin documentation)
You can create more than one Pop Up for different pages, or to cover various uses in other sections of your site …
You can also specify a delay time if you don’t want a Pop Up to display immediately, set a cookie duration to prevent Pop Ups from displaying again within a specific time period, and store the IP addresses of visitors who accept your terms and disclaimers for future reference …
(Pop Ups Section: IP Log Details – Image source: plugin documentation)
EU Cookies
If your business is based in the EU or display your content to visitors in the EU, you need to be aware of EU Cookie law …
The Compliance Bar plugin lets you manage the settings for compliance with EU Cookies requirements, including the wording of your notification message and link text in the “EU Cookies” tab …
(EU Cookies Screen: Manage Settings – Image sourced from plugin documentation)
Compliance Bar has a non-intrusive way of notifying your visitors and covering you from non-compliance.
Page Templates
The “Page Templates” screen, lists all of your legal page templates and shortcodes, and lets you modify their content …
General Settings
The “General Settings” screen, gives you access to general information, such as promoting and sharing the plugin and receiving plugin updates …
User Feedback
Below are a few of the testimonials and feedback plugin users have written about the Compliance Bar plugin:
”One of the Best Plugins I Have Used” Ray Lane – (The Video Guy)
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”I Highly Recommend Compliance Bar” Tony Grant (Portfolio Sports)
Plugin Tips
Below are a few useful ways to use The Compliance Bar Plugin:
- Protection against content theft by spelling out your website’s terms of use.
- Displaying compliance icons on specific pages only.
- Minimize refund disputes by clearly spelling out your refund terms before purchase.
- If you publish content for adult readers on your website, you can force visitors to click to confirm that they are of legal age to view your content.
Product Support
Compliance Bar provides users with dedicated support to help users if they experience any problems. Plugin users also have access to an entire set of training videos.
Additionally, your purchase is backed by a risk-free, thirty day, 200% refund guarantee. If your edition of Compliance Bar does not work within 30 days of purchase and it cannot be fixed within 48 hrs (M – F), your money will be refunded in double.
Plugin Pricing
- Single Edition – Can be installed on a single site that you own. Cost = $47 (Normally $127)
- Business – Install the plugin on up to 25 sites that you own. Cost = $67.00 (Normally $197).
- Professional Edition – Can be installed on all as many of your own domains as you need. Can be installed on all client sites for payment or part of a paid service. Cost = $97.00.
Please Note: The cost of purchasing the product depends on whether there are any promotions or limited-time special offers. Currently, the product retails for the prices shown above. This may not be the actual pricing set by the software developer when you visit the product website and you may be shown additional upsells or one-time offers after you’ve purchased.
Check the plugin’s website for current pricing details: Compliance Bar – WordPress Plugin For Website Compliance
Additional Information
Templates Reviewed By Lawyers – The plugin developers claim on their website that all legal templates have been reviewed and approved by a lawyer. Nonetheless, we highly recommend that you get professional advice from a qualified legal expert in your area for your own peace of mind.
For ”how-to” videos showing plugin usage, including installation instructions and tutorials, FAQs, support help desk, contact details and more, visit the Compliance Bar Plugin website.
What We Recommend
Compliance Bar is an easy-to-use, simple and cost-effective solution for WordPress-powered websites. We recommend downloading and installing this plugin for WordPress users if you want immediate peace of mind and legal protection.
For more details, check out the plugin here: Compliance Bar – Compliance Bar Plugin – WordPress Plugin For Website Compliance
Note: Once again, please note that we are not lawyers and we offer no legal advice here. Do your own due diligence and consult a legal expert about the best way of ensuring that your website is compliant with all legal requirements wherever your business is based.
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