Email tracking to contacts that have no opt-in

[JFryeOKOP]

Hi there!

To start, this is for emails I am customizing from a template and sending one by one, maybe mail merge but absolutely never, ever email marketing. These are personalized cold outreach emails. And I'm using Gmail w/ hubspot extension 👍

Haven't used Hubspot more recently, I signed up with my new company hoping to see the following for emails I'm contacting for the first time:

1) If its opened (and what time)

2) Where it was opened and on what device

3) If it's being sent to multiple people, which email clicked on it

4) If someone clicks a link (best case scenario- what link was clicked AND by whom)

I know GDPR is a thing but is this still not an option for one on one emails? I'm sending these to people for the first time so they won't have the option to double opt in which I see mentioned in the articles explain emaill tracking.

Any help is greatly appriciated! I have to use steak right now becuase the tracking is just to valuable, I can switch if I can figure it out!

PS- I'm reaching out to so few contacts that I'd be happy if I'm manually able to, on the backend, mark a contact as opted in by me in order to enable email tracking. Or other workarounds 🙂

[karstenkoehler · Accepted solution]

Hi @JFryeOKOP,

Assuming that there is a legal basis for processing the data of these contacts and sending them one-to-one sales communication, in HubSpot you can get:

Sales email open and date/time

Sales email click and date time (Sales Hub Starter, Professional, and Enterprise only)

When you send a tracked email, HubSpot embeds an invisible one-pixel image into the email message once it is sent. When your recipient views the email and the images load, you will receive a notification that the email has been opened, see also here.

When sending tracked emails from your email client or from a record in Sales Hub Starter, Professional, and Enterprise, you can track clicks on links included in the body of the email. Links are tracked by appending tracking to the end of any hyperlink included in your email. You can see click and open information in your HubSpot activity feed.

Due to how tracking pixels and links work, it is not possible to see who opened or clicked in an email. This is not about an opt-in or a legal basis, it's a technical limitation. In most cases you'll have to assume that the person on the receiving in box is opening the email but there is no way to tell whether the email was forwarded.

Hope this helps!

[JFryeOKOP]

Incredible answer thank you!

If my settings are set as shown, that should track the opens and clicks right? Or do are these settings not allowing for opens and clicks 

[karstenkoehler]

Hi @JFryeOKOP,

These settings don't really relate to the question, you're probably looking at the "Legal basis for processing". This is a property that should be maintained for contacts but as far as I know, HubSpot will track contacts regardless of it.

Best regards!