Raise your hand if you’re ready to get (or sound) smarter.

You?

Good.

This week’s Small Business Bodyguard Dictionary is another agreement you should be familiar with as a small biz mastermind.

Browse-Wrap Agreement

This puppy is a type of contract that’s usually used on web pages or software, where the user agrees just by continuing to use the product. Yeah, a kind of silent agreement/secret society. Okay, way less secret society and more so an agreement users make based on their behavior.

Browse-wrap agreements often look like this:

“By using this product/site, you agree to the following…”

And you’re like, okay, because you want to keep using the product or stay on the website. So by continuing to surf the website or access the software you are agreeing to the terms of the Browse-wrap Agreement making these agreements enforceable by law, but only as long as they show up BEFORE the user uses the product and are also fair, readable, and understandable. These agreements are different than click-wrap agreements because those require a user to check a box or click on something (hence the super clever name), to show you agree. These guys are usually more enforceable because they’ve required a user to physically agree by clicking.

Keep your eyes peeled for these because they’re everywhere. Usually they’re found on the very first screen of software or loud and proud in the footer of whatever page you land on first on a website. And now you know what to call them when you see them and can henceforth annoy your friends by using this term over and over again.

Godspeed, Smartypants!