If you expect anyone to take your website seriously, even Google spiders, then you will need to have the appropriate admin pages installed on your website. They must also be made visible and linked from somewhere on your website. They could be accessible via your main menu or your website’s footer, but they must be visible and clickable links. Note that these are “pages,” not “posts,” so make sure you create them correctly using a web interface like WordPress.
There are four admin pages that you should create and make clickable and accessible from your website, at least from the home page. They are About, Contact, Terms of Service, and Privacy Policy.
About
Your page should be titled About, not About Me, just simply “About.” That is all. This can be a short 500-word description of you and your website, explaining your intentions and what visitors are likely to find there.
For ideas, look around at other websites, especially those similar to yours. This does not need to be a literary masterpiece, but it does need to be one of your pages and prominently accessible.
Contact
How are people going to know how to contact you if you don’t make it obvious? The easier you are to contact, the more people will reach out to you. Again, this page is simply titled “Contact,” not “Contact us” or “Contact me.”
It should have the name of your website, your name, a physical address (a P.O. Box is acceptable, but a physical address recognized by Google Maps will give you an extra hit in your search engine ranking), a phone number (I suggest using a Google phone number here if you can), and your hours of operation.
Even if you don’t have actual hours of operation right now, put some days of the week and hours you intend to be open for business in this section. You can modify it later. No putting TBA or to be announced at a later date. Your site must appear as if it is open for business now to be taken seriously.
If you’re even slightly paranoid about the Internet, this may not be very safe, but don’t let that overwhelm you or get in the way of this great work you will be doing in the world. If it makes you feel better, you can get a mail drop service and a burner phone to use as your business phone. Don’t let your insecurities keep you down.
Terms of Service
Your terms of service page (TOS) should be titled “Terms of Service. ” It helps to protect you and your business from unscrupulous or predatory users. It also offers legal protection as it is recognized as a binding contract that your users agree to when using your website and is defensible in court.
There are many good free templates out there that you can use; find one you like and modify it for your purposes. You can borrow elements you want to be found on another website but do not copy and paste from someone else’s site, as terms of service are protected by copyright once they have been posted.
Don’t stress out on this part. Again, you can modify this later once you have legal staff onboard.
Privacy Policy
You have heard much about privacy policies in the news lately, and your site needs to display one. It is not legally required if you do not collect data from visitors to your website, and you may never intend to do so. If that’s true, then make sure that is stated in your privacy policy.
Be aware, though, that software that hosts or runs your website may be tracking your visitors. Even if you intend to never collect data from your visitors, your site may be doing so unbeknownst to you. That is why it is helpful to have boilerplate statements that account for third-party software to protect yourself from liability.
Again, there are plenty of free templates that you can use. You can easily find one by searching Google for a free privacy policy template. Use one, modify it for your specific needs, and post it.
Make certain that all these administrative pages, including About, Contact, Terms of Service, and Privacy Policy, can be found by clickingable links on your website, at least the home page.