One Important Thing to Think About… The Rules!

One of the most vital aspects of running a business is ensuring a steady flow of leads and sales. While many think social media will play an important part, only about 1% of all sales are made via this promotional channel.

Therefore, websites and blogs are required. Blogs are an effective way to increase lead generation and ranking. But as with most forms of communication, rules and laws must be observed. In this article, we will review these laws.

General Laws for Your Website

There are numerous laws that developers should follow on their websites. These include the following:

• All websites should have a Privacy Policy and Cookie Policy page.
• Your website should publish their contact details (including physical address and email).
• Websites should be inclusive to all types of readers.
• You need a terms of use/copyright notice on the website (optional but highly recommended).

These elements are essential whether you have a blog or not. Your location doesn’t matter. GDPR applies to any website viewed from an EU country. So unless you prevent users from an EU country from accessing your website, you should follow the rules.

And remember, the user only needs to be in the EU for the law to apply. Those who work off a VPN can still claim against the website if they are working in the EU but using an American VPN.

Some issues can easily be solved to make a website compliant.

Digital Content Laws

With content creation, other rules must be adopted as well. These can be easy to forget or miss but can also be very costly. These rules include the following:

1. Declaring Relationships

For those writing reviews about companies, software or hardware, there are specific rules about ensuring that any relationship between the reviewed item and the writer is mentioned.

If you’ve received payment, a gift, or had an exchange, you must publicly announce this relationship within the blog, usually at the top. You should also notify readers if you’ve worked with the company previously or are currently working with them.

You do not need to announce a standalone statement. You can mention it in an introductory paragraph, such as “Company X gave me a chance to test run Product Y.”

2. Affiliate Marketing

If you plan to use affiliate marketing as a revenue generator (and it’s a great passive income), then you need to declare this on your website. It should be on every page where there is an affiliate link.

It can be hard to follow this, so making this announcement in the footer can be a way to ensure compliance.

3. Third-Party Content

Another set of rules relates to third-party content. Be sure that you’re not:

• Copying text from another website (quotes are allowed but should be generally kept below ten words and attribute to the original article).
• Using images, illustrations, graphics, or other artistic work without permission or license.
• Use other media (videos, music) without prior permission.
• Sell any protected artistic work.

It’s easy to accidentally fail. Many people think that any artistic work on the internet is under fair use, but it is not. Much of the content is under copyright or other protections.

How to Protect Yourself From Breaching These Rules

Some of these rules are easy to follow. For example, there are plugins for WordPress, and automatic pages created by some website platforms. Edit these pages to your specific needs.

How you generate content is also critical. You can’t just copy text, images, or other media online. Instead, you need to source material that you have the rights to. For written text, this should be your creation.

For images, use sites like Pixabay, Unsplash, etc. Or purchase from online sellers. If you make a purchase, check their licensing. They might have restrictions on use, views, or something else.

Enroll to Access the Full Workshop

When running a website, freelance business, or being part of a company you need to ensure you are following the laws and rules around website and media content. Access our full workshop below and stay within the law. Ensure you don’t fall foul of some the rules which could turn out to be costly.