Do you understand the FTC rules that apply to your website?
“I’m a small business, do I really need legal notices on my website?”
The short answer? Yes.
The long answer? Here it goes…
First off, as a business owner you want to protect what matters most. And of course, you don’t want to start off breaking the rules, right?
If you ever find yourself in a legal battle, your website terms and disclaimers will come under scrutiny. Lawyers will be looking to determine the contractual agreements between you and your customers/users. You want to make sure your pages will hold up in court.
Additionally, legal notices build trust; not only between you and your users, but also with the third parties you may be conducting business with or across. Google™, Facebook™, PayPal™ and any other corporation will expect the proper legal notices are in place on your website if you interact with them in anyway. Also you will want to ensure you are operating within the FTC guidelines if you engage in any e-commerce, online marketing or advertising.
Keep in mind, legal pages are not something you will ask your web designer to set up for you. It is your choice, of course, to read them, understand them and know which ones to include on your website; but keep in mind, if there is ever an issue, it is not your web designer that attorneys will target – it is you.
So, what legal notices will you need for your website? Let’s start with a privacy policy. If you collect any information from your customers – from small details like first and last name or an email address to more intricate information like credit card numbers and billing addresses – you are legally required to have a privacy policy page on your website.
While the privacy policy may be the only page legally required, we strongly recommend looking into the following pages to determine which ones you need. When using these notices, we suggest they are visible on every page, easy to navigate to and easy to read.
1. Terms of use (forced agreement)
2. Linking policy template
3. External links policy template
4. Terms and conditions template
5. Refund policy template
6. Affiliate disclosure template
7. Privacy Policy template
8. Affiliate agreement template
9. FB privacy policy template
10. Earnings Disclaimer template
11. Antispam template
12. Double dart cookie template
13. Disclaimer template
14. FTC statement template
15. Medical disclaimer template
16. Testimonials disclosure template
17. Amazon affiliate template
We strongly suggest you purchase the pro version to keep the latest updates and support if you have any issues with the plugin.
You can find more information about one of the legal plug-ins at WordPress.org and at WP Legal Pages * for the pro-version.
And remember, after you have done your due diligence and ready to set up your legal pages, you might want to consult with your attorney.
*Affiliate Link
