I often talk about the importance of putting a virtual “electric fence” around your online business.
Why?
Because anything that’s this important to you deserves your protection.
What’s that saying? “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of non-infringement”? Or something like that. You know what I mean.
You also know that as entrepreneurs we don’t particularly want to think about “prevention.” It’s not fun. In fact, it can be downright the opposite of fun. On top of that, we adopt that old “it’ll never happen to me” mentality. Or, “My business isn’t big enough.” We think practicing due diligence is not only not fun… it might even hurt.
That’s the kind of thinking that often comes back to bite us in the ass. After all, we’re big girls now. This isn’t that difficult. In fact, some of it is quite simple.
Due Diligence refers to the care a reasonable person must take in order to protect his or her assets. Sometimes it’s an actual legal obligation, but for purposes of setting up your business, I’m referring to the obligation you have (to yourself and your business) to make sound and informed decisions and avoid potential harm. The only way due diligence hurts you is if you don’t practice it. My “Cover Your Assets Online” checklist walks you through the steps you need to take in order to practice due diligence when it comes to protecting your online business.
For example:
- Post a Privacy Policy on every page of your website. It’s the law for anyone who collects any type of information, including email addresses.
- Don’t use images that aren’t yours. Not a week goes by that I don’t hear about someone receiving a letter in the mail demanding thousands of dollars for the “unauthorized use” of images.
- Protect your online content with copyright notices and trademark registrations. This puts would-be copycats on notice that your stuff is not free for the taking.
- Sign up for my 4-part video training in which I go into much more detail on all of the above. It’s FREE. Sign up HERE. And I’ll send you the checklist, too.
This list is hardly exhaustive. But it’s a start. And that’s all you need to do to give yourself some peace of mind, one step at a time and you’re there. You don’t need to hire a lawyer. There’s a lot you can do on your own if you practice due diligence.
Remember, if it’s valuable to you and your business, it’s worth protecting.
Because you’re worth it.
What’s that other saying? By Clairol. It goes something like, “I’m worth protecting, dammit.”
Or something like that.
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