Terms of Service

1. Definitions

2. Acceptance and eligibility

2.1 You must be 18+

You must be at least 18 years of age to use the Service. The Service is not directed at children.

2.2 Business use

Fokal is a business-to-business tool. By using the Service you represent that you are using it for business or professional purposes, not personal/household purposes, unless we expressly agree otherwise.

2.3 No restricted parties

You represent that you (and any entity you represent) are not on any government list of restricted or sanctioned persons in Australia, the United States, the United Kingdom, the European Union, or any other jurisdiction whose sanctions apply to us.

2.4 Compliance with law

You will use the Service in compliance with all laws applicable to you, including data-protection, anti-spam, intellectual-property, and advertising laws.

3. The Service

3.1 What Fokal does

Fokal is a software-as-a-service tool that helps brands rank higher on Google and AI-powered search engines. The Service includes (without limitation):

• AI-assisted content generation (articles, schema, briefs)
• Site and content audits
• Keyword and competitor research
• AI search-visibility checks
• OAuth-based integrations with Google Search Console, Google Analytics, Wix, Webflow, Shopify, and other platforms we add over time
• Publishing assistance to connected platforms

3.2 Updates and changes

We continuously develop the Service. We may add, change, remove, or restrict features at our reasonable discretion. We will give reasonable notice of changes that materially reduce a feature you actively use. Deprecation of a beta or experimental feature is not a material change.

3.3 Beta features

From time to time we may label features as "beta", "experimental", or "preview". These are provided on an "as is" basis and may change, break, or be withdrawn without notice. They are not covered by any service-level commitment.

3.4 Availability

We aim to make the Service available 24/7 but we do not promise uninterrupted availability. We may need to take the Service down for planned maintenance (with reasonable notice where practical) or for unplanned emergencies.

3.5 Service cadence and timing claims

Fokal's marketing material may describe typical service cadences (for example, "30 articles over your first month", "one new article per day", "first article in 15 minutes", "live before lunch", "rank in 30 days"). These are typical-case expectations, not guarantees. Actual cadence and timing depend on factors including the AI provider's performance, the depth of research required for your industry, the responsiveness of connected third-party services, and your interaction with the action queue.

We do not warrant that any specific cadence, timing, ranking outcome, or visibility result will be achieved. If you are a consumer with ACL statutory guarantees (see Section 7.8), those guarantees apply notwithstanding this Section.

4. Use and conduct of artificial intelligence

This Section applies whenever you use Fokal features that generate content or recommendations using artificial intelligence ("AI Output").

4.1 AI Output is a draft

AI Output may be incomplete, inaccurate, biased, out of date, or offensive, and does not necessarily represent the views, endorsements, or affiliations of Fokal. You are solely responsible for reviewing AI Output before publishing it, sharing it, or relying on it for any decision.

4.2 No professional advice

AI Output is not, and must not be relied upon as, legal, medical, financial, tax, accounting, or any other form of professional advice. Where a decision matters, consult a qualified professional.

4.3 Your responsibility for publication

Where you direct Fokal to publish AI Output to a third-party platform (e.g. your Wix, Webflow, or Shopify site), you confirm that:

• You have reviewed the content
• You have the necessary rights and consents to publish it
• The content complies with applicable laws, the policies of the destination platform, and the rights of third parties (including intellectual property, defamation, advertising, and consumer-protection laws)
• You accept responsibility for the published content

4.4 Training on your data

Fokal does not use Customer Content — including your prompts, generated drafts, OAuth-fetched third-party data, or other personal information — to train, fine-tune, or otherwise improve generalised AI or machine-learning models. We contract with our AI subprocessors on terms that prohibit this. See our Privacy Policy, Section 5 for details.

4.5 Your AI inputs

You agree not to submit to the Service any content that:

• You don't have the rights to use
• Is unlawful, defamatory, threatening, harassing, infringing, obscene, or otherwise objectionable
• Contains sensitive personal information of others (e.g. health, financial, biometric) without lawful basis
• Is intended to generate misinformation, deepfakes, or impersonation content

4.6 Outputs are not warranted

We do not warrant that AI Output will be accurate, complete, current, suitable for your purpose, or free of intellectual-property issues. The AI models we use are provided by third-party providers (e.g. Anthropic, OpenAI) and we have no control over their internal workings.

5. Customer Content and licence

5.1 You own your content

You retain all rights, title, and interest in your Customer Content. We claim no ownership.

5.2 Licence to Fokal

You grant Fokal a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free, fully-paid licence to host, store, transmit, copy, process, display, modify, and otherwise use your Customer Content solely to:

• Provide the Service to you and your authorised users
• Send your Customer Content to subprocessors (e.g. AI providers, hosting providers, your authorised integrations) strictly as needed to operate the Service
• Generate AI Output you request
• Maintain backups
• Comply with law

This licence terminates when you delete the relevant Customer Content or your Account (subject to retention required by law — see Privacy Policy, Section 8).

5.3 AI Output ownership

To the extent permitted by law and as between you and Fokal:

• You own the AI Output generated for you through the Service, subject to (a) your payment of all Fees and (b) the rights of third parties (e.g. AI providers' terms about output ownership).
• You are responsible for ensuring the AI Output is suitable for your use and does not infringe third-party rights.
• Fokal may retain copies of AI Output in your workspace until you delete it.
• Fokal does not assert any right to use AI Output for any purpose other than providing the Service to you.

5.4 Aggregated / de-identified data

We may use aggregated, anonymised, or de-identified data (which cannot reasonably identify you) for any lawful business purpose, including improving the Service, publishing benchmarks, and informing our marketing.

5.5 Fokal Directory profile

As part of the Service, Fokal hosts a public Directory profile for your brand at fokal.com/directory/[your-slug]. The profile is designed to make your brand discoverable to large-language-model search engines (e.g. ChatGPT, Perplexity, Google AI).

By using the Service, you:

• Grant Fokal a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free licence to publish, display, modify (for formatting), and make accessible on fokal.com and via search engines the brand information you provide (or that Fokal generates from public sources about your brand on your instruction)
• Confirm the brand information is accurate to your knowledge and that you have the right to publish it
• Acknowledge the Directory profile is public and will be indexed by search engines and consumed by AI engines

You may request removal of your Directory profile at any time by emailing hello@fokal.com. We will remove the profile within 7 days of the request. We will also remove the profile on Account termination (within 30 days), subject to caching by third parties (search engines, AI engines) we don't control.

5.6 Editorial outreach on your behalf

Where you use Fokal's outreach features, Fokal may send pitches and follow-up communications to editors, journalists, and publication staff on your behalf, using your brand name and details you provide.

By using the outreach features, you:

• Authorise Fokal to send these communications using your brand name and authorised content
• Confirm you have lawful basis to send commercial communications to the recipients (consent, existing relationship, or other basis valid under the Spam Act 2003 (Cth), CAN-SPAM, GDPR, and other applicable anti-spam laws)
• Take responsibility for the content of pitches you authorise Fokal to send
• Agree Fokal may send from a Fokal-controlled sender domain in the early phases of outreach, and you authorise our use of your brand identification in those communications

For privacy obligations relating to the editor and journalist contact data Fokal collects to send these pitches, see our Privacy Policy, Section 2.5.

6. Connected third-party services

6.1 You connect them, you control them

When you connect a Third-Party Service (e.g. Google, Wix, Webflow, Shopify), you authorise Fokal to access that service on your behalf within the scopes you grant. You can revoke this authorisation at any time.

6.2 Third-Party Service terms apply

Your use of any Third-Party Service is governed by that service's own terms and privacy policy. Fokal is not party to those terms and is not responsible for the Third-Party Service.

6.3 We don't guarantee Third-Party Services

Third-Party Services may change their APIs, deprecate features, throttle requests, revoke access, or cease operating entirely. Fokal is not liable for any disruption, error, or loss caused by a Third-Party Service. We will make reasonable efforts to adapt the Service to material Third-Party Service changes but we cannot guarantee continuity.

6.4 Your authority to publish

Where you direct Fokal to publish content to a Third-Party Service, you represent that you have the necessary authority to do so and that publication will not breach the Third-Party Service's terms.

6.5 Google APIs specifically

See our Google API Disclosure for the scopes Fokal requests, how Google user data is used, and Google-specific commitments.

7. Subscription, fees, and payment

7.1 Fees

You will pay the Fees published or quoted to you at signup. Fees are exclusive of GST, sales tax, VAT, and other applicable taxes, which are added at the prevailing rate.

Current subscription tiers are published at fokal.com/#pricing. Subscribing to a Solo workspace is one Fee; if you add additional brands or sites to your Account (the "agency" or multi-brand model), each additional brand or site is billed as a separate quantity on the same subscription at the per-brand Fee then in effect.

7.2 Billing cycle and auto-renewal

Subscriptions are billed in advance for each Subscription Term and automatically renew for successive terms of the same length unless cancelled before the renewal date.

For Customers in California (and as a general practice for all Customers), we comply with the California Automatic Renewal Law (Cal. Bus. & Prof. Code § 17600 et seq., as amended by AB 2863, in force from 1 July 2025) and the U.S. FTC Click-to-Cancel Rule. Specifically:

• We disclose auto-renewal terms before checkout in a clear and conspicuous manner
• We send a confirmation email after each renewal
• We provide an online "cancel anytime" mechanism inside the Service (Settings → Billing → Cancel)
• We give at least 7 days' notice (and up to 30 days' where required) before any material change to your renewal Fees

7.3 Promotional pricing and rollover

If you sign up under promotional pricing (for example, a discounted first month), you will be billed at the standard rate from the second billing period unless we explicitly state otherwise. The standard rate will be disclosed at signup, in the post-checkout acknowledgement email, and (if billed materially differently) in the renewal confirmation.

Where no promotional rate applies, your subscription is billed at the standard published rate from the first billing period and renews monthly at that rate.

7.4 Payment methods

Payments are processed by Stripe (see Subprocessors). You authorise us (via Stripe) to charge your payment method for all Fees as they become due. If a payment fails, we may retry, suspend the Service, or terminate the Account in accordance with Section 9.

7.5 Taxes

You are responsible for all taxes associated with your use of the Service (other than taxes on Fokal's net income). Where Australian GST applies, we will issue a tax invoice in accordance with A New Tax System (Goods and Services Tax) Act 1999 (Cth).

7.6 30-day money-back guarantee

New subscribers are entitled to a full refund of the first month's subscription Fees if you request it within 30 days of your initial paid subscription start date. To claim the refund, email hello@fokal.com from the email address on your Account. We will refund to the original payment method within 14 business days. After the refund, your Account access ends.

7.7 Other refunds

Outside the 30-day money-back window, Fees are non-refundable except:

• Where required by law (including under the Australian Consumer Law — see Section 7.8)
• Where Fokal terminates your Account under Section 9.2 (for our convenience), in which case we refund pre-paid unused Fees pro-rata
• Where Fokal materially fails to provide the Service and cannot remedy the failure within a reasonable time
• At our discretion, on a case-by-case basis

You may cancel at any time to stop future Fees. Cancellation outside the money-back window does not entitle you to a refund of Fees already paid for the current Subscription Term, and you retain access to the Service for the remainder of that term.

7.8 Australian Consumer Law

If you are a "consumer" within the meaning of the Australian Consumer Law (Schedule 2 to the Competition and Consumer Act 2010 (Cth) — the "ACL"), you have rights that cannot be excluded, restricted, or modified, including statutory guarantees as to acceptable quality and fitness for disclosed purpose. Nothing in these Terms excludes, restricts, or modifies those rights. Where these Terms otherwise limit our liability, that limitation applies only to the extent permitted by law.

7.9 Disputed charges

If you believe you have been incorrectly billed, contact hello@fokal.com within 60 days of the invoice date. We will investigate and respond within 30 days.

8. Acceptable use

You agree not to (and not to allow any third party to):

8.1 Misuse the Service

• Reverse-engineer, decompile, disassemble, or attempt to derive the source code of the Service (except to the extent this restriction is prohibited by applicable law, including the Copyright Act 1968 (Cth) s 47D for interoperability)
• Circumvent, disable, or otherwise interfere with security, rate limits, anti-abuse measures, or other technical limitations
• Use the Service to build a competitive product or to benchmark against Fokal without our written consent
• Resell, sublicense, lease, or otherwise commercialise the Service except as expressly permitted (e.g. via an agency subscription that allows you to add your client's workspaces)
• Use automated scripts or bots to access the Service beyond reasonable use of our public APIs and MCP integrations
• Submit content that infringes intellectual property, is defamatory, harassing, obscene, hateful, or otherwise unlawful

8.2 Misuse outbound features

If you use Fokal's outreach, email, or publishing features, you will:

• Comply with all applicable anti-spam laws, including the Spam Act 2003 (Cth) in Australia, the CAN-SPAM Act of 2003 in the United States, the GDPR (consent for cold email to EU recipients), and equivalent laws elsewhere
• Only send communications to recipients who have a lawful basis to receive them
• Include accurate sender information and a working unsubscribe mechanism in any marketing email
• Not use Fokal to send unsolicited, harassing, or deceptive communications
• Not impersonate any person or entity

You alone are responsible for the content of communications you send using the Service.

8.3 Don't misuse third-party data

When you connect a Third-Party Service, you only use the data Fokal fetches for your own business purposes. You will not:

• Use data fetched from a Third-Party Service in violation of that service's terms
• Re-distribute or sell data fetched from a Third-Party Service to anyone else
• Use Fokal's OAuth access to circumvent rate limits or terms you would otherwise be bound by

8.4 Don't misuse AI generation

You will not use Fokal's AI features to:

• Generate deepfakes, non-consensual intimate imagery, or content that impersonates a real person
• Generate content that incites violence, terrorism, child sexual abuse material, or other manifestly unlawful material
• Generate misinformation designed to influence elections or public health responses
• Generate malware, phishing pages, or other malicious code

8.5 Suspension for breach

We may suspend or terminate your Account, with or without notice, if you breach this Section 8 or if we reasonably suspect you have. Where suspension is preventive rather than punitive, we will work with you in good faith to resolve the issue.

9. Term, suspension, and termination

9.1 Term

These Terms apply from the date you first accept them and continue until terminated under this Section.

9.2 Termination for convenience by you

You may cancel your subscription at any time via Settings → Billing → Cancel. Cancellation takes effect at the end of the current Subscription Term. We may also terminate your Account on 30 days' notice for any reason or no reason; in that case we will refund any pre-paid, unused Fees pro-rata.

9.3 Termination for cause

Either party may terminate these Terms immediately if the other party:

• Materially breaches the Terms and fails to cure the breach within 30 days of written notice (or, in the case of a payment breach, 14 days)
• Becomes insolvent, ceases to do business, or has an insolvency, administration, or winding-up event

9.4 Effect of termination

On termination:

• Your right to use the Service ends immediately
• We will retain your data for 30 days to allow you to export it (subject to lawful obligations to retain certain data — see Privacy Policy, Section 8)
• After 30 days, we delete or anonymise your data per the retention schedule
• Sections that by their nature should survive termination (including 4.1, 4.2, 4.6, 5.2, 5.4, 7.6, 8, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18) will survive

9.5 Data export

You may request a data export of your Customer Content and AI Output at any time during the Subscription Term or within 30 days after termination by emailing hello@fokal.com. We will provide it in a structured, commonly-used, machine-readable format within 14 days.

10. Intellectual property

10.1 Fokal IP

We own all intellectual property in the Service, our software, the Fokal brand, our website, and any improvements, modifications, or derivatives thereof, except for Customer Content (which is yours). Nothing in these Terms grants you any right to use the Fokal brand, logos, or trademarks except as we expressly authorise.

10.2 Feedback

If you give us feedback, suggestions, bug reports, or ideas about the Service ("Feedback"), you grant us a non-exclusive, worldwide, royalty-free, perpetual, irrevocable licence to use the Feedback for any purpose, without attribution or compensation.

10.3 IP infringement claims by third parties

If a third party claims that the Service (excluding Customer Content and AI Output) infringes their intellectual-property rights, we will defend you against the claim and pay any damages or settlement amounts finally awarded, provided that:

• You promptly notify us in writing
• You give us sole control of the defence and settlement
• You reasonably cooperate with us at our expense

We may, at our option, modify the Service to be non-infringing, obtain a licence, or terminate the relevant Service component and refund pre-paid unused Fees.

This Section sets out our entire liability and your sole remedy for any IP infringement claim against the Service.

11. Confidentiality

Each party will protect the other's Confidential Information using at least the same care it uses to protect its own Confidential Information of like importance (but in no event less than reasonable care). Confidential Information will be used only to perform under these Terms. This obligation continues for 3 years after termination, except for trade secrets, which are protected for as long as they remain trade secrets.

Confidential Information does not include information that: (a) is or becomes publicly available without breach of these Terms; (b) was known to the recipient before disclosure; (c) is independently developed without use of the Confidential Information; or (d) is rightfully received from a third party without confidentiality obligations.

12. Privacy

Our Privacy Policy describes how we collect, use, store, and share personal information. By using the Service you consent to the practices described in the Privacy Policy.

Where Fokal processes personal information on your behalf (for example, customer contact data you upload), we act as a processor and you act as the controller under the GDPR (or the equivalent roles under other applicable law). We agree to the data-processing terms set out in our Data Processing Addendum, available on request to hello@fokal.com.

13. Warranties and disclaimers

13.1 Mutual warranties

Each party warrants that: (a) it has the power and authority to enter into and perform these Terms; (b) its performance will comply with applicable law; and (c) it has the necessary rights to grant the licences in these Terms.

13.2 Fokal disclaimer

Except as expressly stated in these Terms and to the maximum extent permitted by law, the Service is provided "AS IS" and "AS AVAILABLE" without any warranty of any kind, express or implied, including warranties of merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, non-infringement, accuracy, completeness, or that the Service will be uninterrupted, error-free, secure, or virus-free.

In particular, we do not warrant:

• That AI Output will be accurate, complete, current, or suitable for any purpose
• That the Service will detect every change on your site or in connected Third-Party Services
• That recommendations made by the Service will improve your search rankings or visibility
• That Third-Party Services will continue to function or remain available

13.3 ACL carve-out

If you are a "consumer" under the Australian Consumer Law, you have statutory guarantees that cannot be excluded. Nothing in this Section excludes, restricts, or modifies those statutory guarantees. Where our liability for a breach of a statutory guarantee cannot be excluded but can be limited, our liability is limited (at our option) to the supply of the services again or the cost of having the services supplied again.

14. Limitation of liability

14.1 Excluded damages

To the maximum extent permitted by law, neither party will be liable to the other for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential, exemplary, or punitive damages, or for any loss of profits, revenue, business, goodwill, anticipated savings, or data, arising out of or in connection with these Terms or the Service, even if advised of the possibility of such damages.

14.2 Liability cap

To the maximum extent permitted by law, each party's total aggregate liability arising out of or in connection with these Terms (whether in contract, tort, statute, or otherwise) is limited to the greater of (a) the total Fees you paid Fokal in the 12 months preceding the event giving rise to the claim, or (b) one hundred Australian dollars (A$100).

14.3 Carve-outs from the cap

The limitations in Sections 14.1 and 14.2 do not apply to:

• Either party's indemnification obligations under Section 15
• Either party's confidentiality obligations under Section 11
• Your obligation to pay Fees
• Liability that cannot be excluded under applicable law, including under the Australian Consumer Law

14.4 Allocation

The parties agree that this allocation of risk is fundamental to these Terms and reflected in the Fees.

15. Indemnification

15.1 Fokal indemnity

We will defend you, and indemnify you against damages or settlement amounts finally awarded, in respect of any third-party claim alleging that the Service (excluding Customer Content, AI Output, and Third-Party Services) infringes that third party's intellectual-property rights, as described in Section 10.3.

15.2 Customer indemnity

You will defend Fokal (and our officers, directors, employees, and agents), and indemnify us against any damages, costs, and expenses (including reasonable legal fees) arising out of or in connection with any third-party claim relating to:

• Your Customer Content
• Your use of AI Output (including publication of AI Output to your own or other sites)
• Your use of the Service in breach of these Terms or applicable law
• Your breach of any Third-Party Service's terms in connection with your use of the Service
• Your outreach or marketing activity using the Service
• Your authorisation or direction to publish content to any platform

15.3 Procedure

The indemnified party will: (a) promptly notify the indemnifying party in writing; (b) give the indemnifying party sole control of the defence and settlement; and (c) reasonably cooperate at the indemnifying party's expense. The indemnifying party will not settle any claim in a way that imposes admissions or obligations on the indemnified party without consent.

16. Governing law and dispute resolution

16.1 Governing law

These Terms are governed by the laws in force in New South Wales, Australia, without regard to its conflict-of-laws rules.

16.2 Jurisdiction

Subject to Section 16.3, the courts of New South Wales, Australia (and the federal courts sitting in that state) have exclusive jurisdiction over any dispute arising out of or in connection with these Terms.

16.3 Informal resolution

Before commencing court proceedings, the parties will attempt to resolve any dispute by good-faith negotiation between authorised representatives, lasting at least 30 days from written notice of the dispute. This Section does not prevent either party from seeking urgent injunctive or equitable relief.

16.4 Consumer rights

If you are a consumer in a jurisdiction whose laws give you the right to bring proceedings in your local courts, this Section does not affect that right.

17. General

17.1 Notices

Notices to Fokal must be sent to hello@fokal.com and copied to our registered postal address. We may send notices to you by email to the email address on file for your Account or by in-app notice.

17.2 Force majeure

Neither party is liable for any failure or delay caused by events beyond its reasonable control (e.g. natural disaster, act of war, civil unrest, internet outage, supplier failure, government action). The affected party will promptly notify the other and use reasonable efforts to mitigate.

17.3 Assignment

You may not assign these Terms without our prior written consent. We may assign these Terms (in whole or part) without consent in connection with a merger, acquisition, financing, or sale of all or substantially all of our assets. Any non-permitted assignment is void.

17.4 Severability

If any provision of these Terms is held to be unenforceable, the remainder will remain in full force, and the unenforceable provision will be modified to the minimum extent necessary to make it enforceable while preserving the parties' intent.

17.5 No waiver

Failure to enforce any provision is not a waiver of the right to do so later. Waivers must be in writing.

17.6 No agency

Nothing in these Terms creates any partnership, agency, joint venture, employment, or fiduciary relationship between the parties.

17.7 Entire agreement

These Terms, together with our Privacy Policy, Google API Disclosure, and Subprocessor list, constitute the entire agreement between the parties relating to the Service and supersede any prior agreement, understanding, or representation.

17.8 Order of precedence

Where there is a conflict between these Terms and another Fokal-published document referenced in Section 17.7, these Terms prevail unless the other document expressly states it prevails over these Terms.

17.9 No third-party beneficiaries

These Terms do not create any rights for the benefit of any third party, except where expressly stated.

17.10 Changes to these Terms

We may update these Terms from time to time. Material changes will be notified by email to active Account holders at least 30 days before they take effect, and the updated Terms will be posted at fokal.com/terms with a new effective date. Continued use of the Service after the effective date constitutes acceptance. If you don't accept the changes, you may cancel before they take effect and we will refund any pre-paid, unused Fees pro-rata.

18. Contact

• General: hello@fokal.com
• Support: hello@fokal.com
• Billing: hello@fokal.com
• Legal: hello@fokal.com
• Privacy: hello@fokal.com

19. Related documents

• Privacy Policy
• Google API Disclosure
• Subprocessors
• Cookie Preferences

These Terms of Service are provided in English. If translated, the English version prevails.