6 Important Legal Issues Bloggers Should Consider
Whether you’re writing about your financial services or your travel destinations, you want current and potential customers or followers to find your website, get all the information they need, and choose you over your competitors.
Regardless of the size of your audience or the type of information your website provides, you need to stay informed if you want to avoid legal trouble for bloggers.
What you say online can be used against you!
Here are 6 ways bloggers can stay on the right side of the law:
1. Reveal any material relationship with a brand or advertiser.
Don’t pretend you don’t get paid to write a brand post or talk about a new product.
Some examples of products or services that you should disclose in a related article include:
• Free tickets to a match or concert
• Products or services you have been asked to review
• Business gifts
In addition to helping you blog without breaking the law, disclosure also helps you build and maintain trust with your audience – it makes a lot of sense.
2. Avoid making promises.
You are required by law to talk about what people can generally expect instead of making outrageous claims. You can’t tell people they’re going to lose 10 pounds overnight by drinking one brand of tea or look 15 years younger by using a special cream.
It also doesn’t work to put a “non-typical results” disclaimer in the fine print. In most cases, the company will be the defendant in a consumer-driven class action lawsuit, but it could still be singled out by disgruntled customers or even named in a lawsuit.
3. Understand copyright laws.
These protect the original creator of a work, from text and images to audio clips. Many bloggers have gotten into big trouble for using content on blogs they didn’t create and didn’t ask permission to use.
Your best bet when it comes to finding image, audio, and video content is to look for sources that provide royalty-free licensed works or works under Creative Commons licenses.
4. Know the specific laws surrounding your business.
For example, if you are a lawyer, it is essential to know that, from a legal point of view, giving advice online is considered to be practicing law.
Only a licensed attorney can give legal advice, and he or she must have formed an attorney-client relationship with whoever is giving it to you. You should provide visitors to your website with information that resolves their problems without sounding like legal advice.
5. Privacy.
You are not allowed to capture private information about visitors and share or sell that information to a third party unless you have permission. If you collect data about your audience in any way, you must tell them in your Privacy Policy.
If you’re going to send an email newsletter, be sure to ask people before you send them anything. Also, provide them with a way to unsubscribe in every email. The Canadian Anti-Spam Act (CASL) and the UK GDPR make it legal to do so or face potential financial consequences.
6. Watch what you say.
Many site owners write content about their personal experiences and opinions. However, if you post false information about anyone or anything that could negatively affect a public reputation, you could be sued for defamation.
If you don’t have concrete proof that the negative information you post is 100% true, don’t post it.
Ignorance is not a viable defense when it comes to legal issues for bloggers. No matter what your area of expertise is, it is your responsibility to learn and follow the rules so you can blog without breaking the law.