Does My Author Website Need a Privacy Policy?
The short version:
If you’re an author and you have a website, yes, it’s probably smart to have a privacy policy, or at least do your research to determine if you do need one.
Before we go into the details, please note:
🛑 DISCLAIMER
Privacy policies are legal documents, and we are not attorneys. This article should not be considered legal advice or a substitute for professional legal consultation.
What is a privacy policy?
A privacy policy is a statement that explains how a website collects, uses, stores, and protects users' personal information.
Who needs a privacy policy?
And now you may be thinking, “I don’t collect information, it’s just a basic author website. Hold up. Because if your author website has:
A newsletter form
A contact form
Affiliate links (ie, your Amazon links)
A shop
Social media integration
Downloadable content
Ad integration (if you run Meta or Google ads)
Then actually, you do collect user information (their email address, what site they’re coming from, what site they’re going to), and you probably need a privacy policy. And those are just the most common elements related to author websites; not a complete list.
Where to get a Privacy Policy
We’ve had clients give me privacy policy text they found for free via Google. We have no idea if a free privacy policy covers the legal bases or not. To us,, this feels akin to picking up a parachute you found on the side of the road and then jumping out of a plane with it. If it has holes, you’re not going to know until it’s too late.
But again, we’re not lawyers! Maybe it’s totally legit!
For what it’s worth, Lauren purchased this privacy policy from a legal boutique ← affiliate link. It comes bundled with Terms & Conditions, because, there’s good chance you need one of those too. I recommend reading this article for more information.
It’s not cheap, but then, neither is the potential $50,000 if you’re found being non-compliant with privacy law :)
All we can say is that we recommend doing your own research to decide if you want to cover your bases and include a privacy policy.
