Unless you have a problem with leaks, I wouldn't put anything on the seals. A pressure barrel's different because of the gas pressure, but you won't have that in a bottling bucket.
A bottling bucket and stick are the way to do it though! Much easier than faffing around with syphons or jugs.
One of the best purchases I've made for a while, much easier for batch priming the sugar and a lot simpler / quicker to fill bottles from. Less mess than a syphon tube as well.
I just made sure the nut on the valve was done up nicely finger tight, no problems with that. No pressure in a bottling barrel as you would have in a pressure barrel as you're bottling before the carbonation can kick in and take effect.
I made my own bottling bucket by fitting a bottling stick to a regular FV. The main thing to do is test it with plain water before filling it with your precious beer, to check for leaks! So glad I thought to do so the first time I used it - would have been very messy otherwise...