Because the Internet is known as the “unknown” wild west at times when it comes to determining legal obligations and potential for lawsuits and legal trouble, it is strongly recommended that every website have legal terms and conditions governing privacy, the use of information, the use of the site and the sale of any services and products.

Many online entrepreneurs balk at having “legalese” on their sites in fear that it will reduce sales on their site.  This is definitely a legitimate concern.  In marketing, you do not want to add anything in your sales process that will cause a prospect to be confused, feel overwhelmed and “legalese” can overwhelm most anyone.

However, is it worth risking potentially significant liability?  I can tell you that after representing many clients in dealing with potential lawsuits and problems, the stress, uncertainty and the amount you can lose makes it most certainly not work it.

Plus, if you speak to any successful online entrepreneur (ones doing over a million dollars in annual sales) you will likely hear a story or two about some legal problems faced in their businesses.  And, they will likely emphasize to you the importance of having your legal agreements in place. In other words, if you plan on running an online business for the long term, you MUST have legal and risk planning as part of your business.  Do not wait until you are making hundreds of thousands of dollars to be shocked by risks and problems that could have been avoided.

When it comes to legal protection v. sales and marketing- there is a balance.  Keep your legal terms on a separate page and just link to them in the sales process. One really effective method used is to start your legal terms with a statement like “There are the terms that our attorneys require we include. . . ”

In your terms and conditions, avoid using unknown and legalese terms- have you lawyer write them so that they are easy to read and understand.

In your regular marketing copy, you can use the persuasive techniques taught by successful copywriters but be sure you are truthful and never deceptive.

I started learning about how to make money via Internet Marketing back in 2004. A good friend of mine also started learning with me.  However, we both chose totally different online paths.

I stuck with the traditional method of finding a market need, building a site to build relationships and provide value and to sell both my own products and products of others which I tested and felt comfortable recommending.

My friend chose the “black hat” route which consisted of launching websites, finding loop holes in the different web site places where you can get traffic and sometimes even exploiting aggressive marketing and technology methods to earn income.

I must admit I was amazed at what black hat marketers come up with and do- They truly are extremely creative and innovative when it comes to finding effective search placement and marketing methods.

In our first year in business, I made very little money from my online ventures but my friend was making pretty good money.  He would find ways to promote something and it sometimes brought in thousands of dollars with just a few hours or work and dollars in investment.  In addition, his activity was limited to being an anonymous conduit for other marketers which meant he did not have to deal with customer service or product support issues, etc.

He grew his black hat business into quite an operation which involved setting up thousands of email accounts and web pages.  But a few years ago, something started happening.  The Internet companies started to combat against black hat methods.  Many of his web pages were shut down overnight.  Sites like Google and Craigslist came up with ways to find and nullify black hat marketers.  And his income stream became very unwieldy.

Even recently, Google came up with a cell phone verification for setting up gmail accounts and Twitter implemented some anti-spam measures. So, my friend is once again trying to stay ahead and work with his black hat buddies to find new black hat ways- they love this stuff and sometimes thrive on the challenges that come up.

But, what is happening is that his income has hit a plateau and sometimes he loses a lot of it overnight.  He needs to keep coming up with a new bag of tricks which might or might not work.

In the last two years, my online properties have become more established using traditional marketing methods and I now have significant income coming in every month that for the most part I can rely on (in business, you can never ever rely on anything 100%).  In the meantime, I am developing brands that can only build more value and create more income streams over time.

So, I think the decision really depends on your personality but I personally feel that the long standing internet businesses apply the same success principles as any business.  Focus on providing REAL VALUE to their customers and developing relationships over time.

The Internet is evolving into a social media format where transparency and relationships will prove to be most profitable for online business owners.  I think black hat methods and other similar forms of internet marketing that proved extremely profitable before will become less effective as the technology to identify these methods advance and the customers who use the internet become more educated about them.