If you’re a therapist, counselor, or mental health professional who has turned your knowledge into printable worksheets, guides, or digital downloads, first of all – I love that for you!!!
Creating accessible resources for fellow professionals, parents, or even clients can be incredibly impactful. But while you’re focused on content that supports emotional wellness, don’t forget about the legal wellness of your business, too.
Whether you’re selling on Etsy, Shopify, or directly from your website, digital therapy resources come with unique risks, many of which can be avoided with a few key legal protections in place.
In this blog post, I’m walking you through the legal must-haves for selling digital therapy resources and how they help protect your time, your income, and your peace of mind.
5 Legal-Must Haves For Mental Health Professionals
1. A Clear Terms of Purchase Agreement
Let’s start with one of the biggest legal gaps most digital shop owners overlook: a Terms of Purchase agreement. This document outlines what someone agrees to when they buy a product from your shop.
Without it, you’re left wide open to refund requests, chargebacks, and confusion about what’s actually included in the sale.
Why This Matters for Digital Therapy Resources:
➡️ Your products are digital, which means they can be downloaded, saved, and shared instantly. A Terms of Purchase can make it clear that all sales are final, meaning there will be no refunds once the resource is accessed.
➡️ It explains how the product can and can’t be used. For example, are your printables licensed for personal use only? Can a school counselor buy them and share them with a team? Set the terms upfront in your Terms of Purchase!
➡️ It sets boundaries by helping customers understand what support you do and don’t offer after purchase, which is extremely important for managing expectations and protecting your time.
2. Storefront Terms and Conditions aka Terms of Use
Next up is your Storefront Terms and Conditions, which is especially important if you’re selling from your own website (as opposed to a third-party platform like Etsy).
This is your catch-all policy that governs how people interact with your site, including what they can do on it, how they can use the content, and what’s off-limits.
Why This Matters for Digital Therapy Shops:
➡️ You likely have a blog, landing pages, or previews of your products on your site and if so, this content is protected under copyright. Your specific terms, however, can reinforce that protection.
➡️ If someone misuses your site, such as uploading your resources elsewhere, copies you, or bypasses your checkout system, you’ll have a policy to fall back on.
➡️ This also helps with basic compliance, like privacy, user behavior, and intellectual property ownership.
Even if you’re just starting out, putting this in place early sets the tone for a professional, protected business.
3. Usage Rights & Licensing Language
When it comes to online resources of any kind, including digital therapy resources, it’s easy to assume your customers will follow the honor system, but unfortunately in the online business world, that’s not always the case.
Without specific usage rights listed, someone could buy your PDF workbook and start reselling it, uploading it to their own site, or using it in a way that doesn’t align with your values or intentions.
That’s where specific usage rights clauses in your contracts come into play!
And most of the time, it’s as simple as saying:
“This product is licensed for personal use only and may not be resold, redistributed, or modified for sale.” OR “You may print and use this workbook with your individual clients, but may not share it with other practitioners without a separate license.”
4. Refund + Chargeback Policies
One of the trickiest parts about selling digital products are the inevitable refund requests. Even though it seems absolutely crazy for someone to expect a refund after they’ve downloaded and likely even used the resource they purchased from you, it happens alllll the time in the online business world!
Without a clear refund policy though, you might find yourself having to honor these requests, or worse, dealing with payment platform chargebacks that cost you money and credibility.
With the right terms in place, you can:
- Clearly state that all digital product sales are final (here’s more on crafting the perfect no refund policy)
- Set expectations for when refunds might be considered (if at all)
- Provide a pathway for support or tech issues that doesn’t result in lost revenue
5. Boundary Protection for You and Your Buyers
Lastly, the most underrated benefit of legal agreements as a whole that doesn’t get talked about nearly enough, is that they set clear boundaries for both parties.
When you’ve laid out exactly what buyers can expect from your digital therapy shop (and what they shouldn’t expect), it frees you up to do what you do best: create meaningful resources without fielding emails asking for extras, exceptions, or custom work.
It also helps you avoid sticky situations like:
- A buyer assuming they now have access to “email support”
- Someone demanding custom edits to a printable
- Legal complaints about content “not working” for their clients
Overall, when your policies are spelled out in a clear, professional document, you have something to point to in these situations!
The One-Stop Shop for Legal Protection for Selling Digital Therapy Resources
As a mental health professional, you’ve poured your heart, experience, and training into your work and when you decide to provide resources for others in your industry, it’s important that you’re backed by legal agreements that protect your time and creations.
You shouldn’t have to draft legal policies from scratch in between client sessions and everything else on your plate.
Which is the very reason I created the Therapy Resources Contract Bundle, built specifically for Emotionanigans customers!
With the Terms of Purchase and Storefront Terms & Conditions templates, you’ll have everything you need to confidently sell your digital products without worrying about refund drama, IP theft, or unclear boundaries!
So, if you’re ready to protect your therapy resource shop on a legal level, click here to grab the bundle! Because your business deserves as much care as your clients do. 👏🏼
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