The Importance of Terms & Conditions and Privacy Policies on Your Website
So, you’re about to launch a new website. You've spent hours fine-tuning the interface, designing icons and writing content, but one thing you might've overlooked is developing a set of terms and conditions for your website. It's crucial for business owners to remember to create terms and conditions and privacy policies for their website—especially for e-commerce brands and companies in highly regulated industries.
Terms and privacy policy content isn’t something you can confidently create on your own, though. As a marketing agency with a lawyer as our CEO, we understand how to write this admittedly unsexy content in a way that takes the burden off of your plate and protects you for years to come.
What Are Terms and Conditions/Privacy Policies?
First of all, it’s important to understand what this marketing legalese means. A website's terms and conditions are the parameters that the users of a website site should follow. That is, the terms and conditions (T&C) act as a contract between you, as the business/site owner, and the users who visit your site. Your T&C might include information about the risks of visiting your website, the terms that relate to the delivery of a product or service, information about online transactions, etc.
On the other hand, your site’s privacy policy is a document that explains how your website will use any personal information that is shared on the site. Oftentimes, a website will prompt customers to put in personal information to order goods and services or to make an account, and when your website does this, it's crucial you have a privacy policy in place so that your customers know what their information will be used for and how.
Why Are Terms and Conditions/Privacy Policies Important?
- It builds trust in your relationships.
The more transparent you are with your customers, the better. When you are open about what you're doing with your customers' information, then you will build a community of customers that trust you, and you'll also build a great reputation. This is critical if you're looking to increase sales and elevate your brand. - You avoid issues with copyright.
When you outline information about copyright-related issues in your terms and conditions, you'll avoid problems in the future. You don’t want visitors using your content and pretending that it’s their own. - It’s easier to manage user behaviors.
Whenever users are make an accounts on your site, you want to make sure everyone is on their best (and safest) behavior. Putting terms and conditions in place will make sure that your users follow the conduct that best fits your site, brand and industry. - You can terminate accounts.
Sometimes, for the safety of yourself and other users online, you'll need to deny access to certain bad-actor users. With clear terms and conditions in place, you'll have grounds to terminate an account if needed. - There are often laws that mandate them.
Mostly importantly, depending on where you're located, there may be rules and regulations that require you to create privacy policies and terms and conditions for your website. These rules are in place to protect both you and your customers, so, for your own well-being, you often have to create these documents to obey the law.
Need to Create Terms and Conditions/ Privacy Policies?
If, after reading this, you realize that you don’t have terms and conditions or a privacy policy on your website, don’t freak out. At Elevate My Brand, have 15 years of experience in developing great websites with compelling content and protective policies. We’re more than happy to set up a consultation with our CEO, Laurel Mintz, who earned a J.D/M.B.A from Rutgers. (She knows her shit!)
If you're in need of information about terms and conditions and privacy policies, let’s get started today!