Legal

Privacy Policy

DRAFT FOR ATTORNEY REVIEW. This is not legal advice. A licensed California attorney should review both documents before they are published on rankconvertlocal.com.

Effective date: [DATE]

This Privacy Policy explains how RankConvert Local (“RankConvert Local,” “we,” “us,” or “our”) collects, uses, and shares information when you visit rankconvertlocal.com (the “Site”) or contact us about our services. RankConvert Local is operated by Paul Peterson, a sole proprietor doing business as RankConvert Local and serves local businesses in the San Diego, California area.

If you have questions, email us at paul@rankconvertlocal.com.

1. Information we collect

Information you give us

When you submit our contact or “Free Mockup Request” form, we collect:

  • Your name
  • Your email address
  • Your business name
  • Your business website
  • Your message and anything else you choose to include

If you email us directly or become a client, we also receive whatever you send us, such as contact details, business information, content, images, and account access needed to perform our services.

Information collected automatically

Like most websites, our Site and hosting servers automatically receive basic technical information when you visit, such as your IP address, browser type, device type, pages requested, and the date and time of your visit. This is kept in server logs [SERVER LOG RETENTION PERIOD]. Our Site also uses WordPress cookies (see Section 5).

Publicly available business information

To offer our services, we may look at publicly available information about local businesses, such as a business’s name, website, Google Business Profile, and public business contact details [PROSPECT DATA SOURCES]. We may use this to prepare a sample website mockup and contact the business about it.

We do not currently use analytics tools or advertising pixels on the Site. [ANALYTICS / PIXELS, IF ADDED]

2. How we use information

We use information to:

  • Respond to your questions and mockup requests
  • Prepare website mockups and proposals
  • Provide, manage, and bill for our services
  • Contact local businesses about our services, including sending a sample mockup
  • Keep the Site secure, working properly, and protected from spam and abuse
  • Comply with legal obligations and enforce our terms

We do not sell your personal information, and we do not share it for cross-context behavioral advertising.

3. How form submissions are handled

When you submit our form (built with the WPForms plugin), your submission is sent by email to the owner through Google Workspace’s email service. Form entries are not stored in the Site’s database. Our email-sending plugin (FluentSMTP) keeps a log of outgoing emails sent by the Site for 14 days, after which the log entries are deleted. The email itself is kept in our Google Workspace mailbox [EMAIL / PROSPECT RECORD RETENTION PERIOD].

4. Who we share information with

We share information only with service providers that help us run the Site and our business, and only as needed for them to provide their services to us. These include:

  • Cloudways and DigitalOcean: website hosting and server infrastructure
  • Google Workspace: business email, documents, and file storage
  • [ADDITIONAL SERVICE PROVIDERS]
  • Stripe: payment processing for clients, including invoices, card and bank transfer payments, and monthly subscriptions. Payment card and bank details are entered on and handled by Stripe under its own privacy policy; they are not stored on the Site or by us.

For clients, we also use third-party platforms you ask us to work with, such as Google Business Profile and Google Ads, under those platforms’ own terms and privacy policies.

We may also disclose information if required by law, to protect our rights or the safety of others, or as part of a sale or transfer of the business.

5. Cookies

Cookies are small text files stored by your browser. Our Site uses WordPress cookies, which are mainly used for logged-in users (such as site administrators) and to remember certain preferences, such as details for leaving comments if comments are enabled. [COOKIE LIST]

We do not currently use analytics, advertising, or tracking cookies. [ANALYTICS / PIXELS, IF ADDED]

You can block or delete cookies in your browser settings. The Site should still work for regular visitors if you do.

Do Not Track

Because we do not track visitors across websites, we do not change our practices in response to browser “Do Not Track” signals. [Update if analytics or ad pixels are added.]

6. How long we keep information

  • Form entries: not stored in the Site database.
  • Outgoing email logs (FluentSMTP): 14 days.
  • Emails and inquiry records in Google Workspace: [EMAIL / PROSPECT RECORD RETENTION PERIOD].
  • Client records: for as long as needed to provide services and meet tax, accounting, and legal requirements.
  • Server logs: [SERVER LOG RETENTION PERIOD].

You can ask us to delete your information at any time (see Section 7).

7. Your choices and rights

Anyone can ask us to:

  • Tell you what personal information we have about you
  • Correct it
  • Delete it
  • Stop contacting you

Just email paul@rankconvertlocal.com. If you are a business owner who received an outreach email from us and do not want to hear from us again, reply to that email or email us, and we will stop. We may keep a minimal record (such as your email address) so we do not contact you again.

8. California privacy rights

We are a small business based in California and care about the privacy rights of California residents.

[ATTORNEY TO CONFIRM: The California Consumer Privacy Act, as amended by the CPRA (“CCPA”), applies only to businesses that meet certain thresholds (for example, annual revenue over about $25 million [as adjusted], or buying, selling, or sharing personal information of 100,000 or more California consumers or households, or earning 50% or more of revenue from selling or sharing personal information). RankConvert Local does not currently believe it meets these thresholds. The section below is offered voluntarily. Revise if the CCPA applies.]

If you are a California resident:

  • Categories we collect: identifiers (name, email address, IP address); commercial/business information (business name, website, what you tell us about your business); internet activity (basic server log data); and publicly available business information.
  • Sources: you, your browser/device, and publicly available sources.
  • Purposes: the purposes listed in Section 2.
  • Disclosures: to the service providers listed in Section 4 for business purposes.
  • Sale or sharing: we do not sell personal information or share it for cross-context behavioral advertising, and we have not done so in the past 12 months. We do not knowingly sell or share the personal information of anyone under 16.
  • Sensitive personal information: we do not intentionally collect it.
  • Your requests: you may ask to know, correct, or delete your personal information by emailing paul@rankconvertlocal.com. We will verify your request by confirming details with you by email and respond within the time required by law. You may use an authorized agent. We will not discriminate against you for making a request.
  • “Shine the Light” (Cal. Civ. Code 1798.83): we do not share personal information with third parties for their own direct marketing purposes.

9. Children’s privacy

Our Site and services are meant for businesses and adults. We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under 13 [or under 16]. If you believe a child has sent us information, email us and we will delete it.

10. Security

We use reasonable measures to protect information, including encrypted (HTTPS) connections, hosting on infrastructure we control, software and plugin updates, and secure storage of client login details. No website or email system is perfectly secure, so we cannot guarantee absolute security. Please do not send highly sensitive information (such as payment card numbers or passwords) through our contact form.

Our Site may link to other websites, such as client websites or Google. We are not responsible for the privacy practices of those sites.

12. Changes to this policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. We will post the updated version on this page and change the effective date above.

13. Contact us

  • RankConvert Local (sole proprietorship)
  • Owner/Operator: Paul Peterson
  • Email: paul@rankconvertlocal.com
  • Phone: (619) 600-5921
  • Mailing address: 1050 University Ave, Suite E107 #782, San Diego, CA 92103
  • Website: rankconvertlocal.com
  • Notices: please send any notices by email to paul@rankconvertlocal.com. Mailing address: 1050 University Ave, Suite E107 #782, San Diego, CA 92103.