Welcome to our website, part of The Smart Sites (“Site”,”we”, “us”, “our”). We value your privacy and are committed to protecting your personal information. This Privacy Policy explains how we collect, use, disclose, and safeguard your information when you use our media website and the services we offer, including business listings. By using our website, you agree to the terms and practices described in this policy.

Other than as described in this Policy, we will not give any information about you to others without your express permission.

 

Information We Collect

We may collect the following types of information:

  • Personal Information: This may include your name, email address, phone number, and other contact details when you create an account, submit business listings, or contact us.
  • Business Information: When you submit business listings, we collect information about the business, such as its name, address, phone number, website, and a description of its products or services.
  • Usage Information: We automatically collect information about your interactions with our website, including your IP address, browser type, operating system, and the pages you visit.

We collect and use information based on the various contacts you have with us. 

1. Information we collect digitally through our website and partner sites

We use information gathered about you from Site statistics (for example, your IP address) to help diagnose problems with our server, to administer our websites, and to identify location information. We also gather broad demographic information from this data to help us improve our websites and make your browsing and purchasing experience more enjoyable. This is not linked to any personally identifiable information, except as necessary to prevent fraud or abuse on our system.

Google Analytics

We use a tool called “Google Analytics” to collect information about use of Our Sites, such as how often users visit the Sites, what pages they visit when they do so, and what other sites they used prior to coming to the Site.  Google Analytics collects only the IP address assigned to you on the date you visit Site, rather than your name or other identifying information.

Google Analytics plants a permanent cookie on your web browser to identify you as a unique user the next time you visit the Site.  This cookie cannot be used by anyone but Google, Inc.  The information generated by the cookie will be transmitted to and stored by Google on servers in the United States.

We use the information received from Google Analytics only to improve services on the Site.  We do not combine the information collected through the use of Google Analytics with personally identifiable information.

Google’s ability to use and share information collected by Google Analytics about your visits to this Site is restricted by the Google Privacy Policy.  You can prevent Google Analytics from recognizing you on return visits to this Site by disabling the Google Analytics cookie on your browser.

Targeted Advertisements

Our sites may display targeted offers to our customers based on the products currently owned by the customer.  These offers will display as varying product banners.  There is no personal or geolocation information collected within these product banners to build a profile about your activities or that is shared with third party advertising companies.

Embedded content from other websites

Articles on this site may include embedded content (e.g. videos, images, articles, etc.). Embedded content from other websites behaves in the exact same way as if the visitor has visited the other website.

These websites may collect data about you, use cookies, embed additional third-party tracking, and monitor your interaction with that embedded content, including tracking your interaction with the embedded content if you have an account and are logged in to that website.

Our sites contain links to other websites. Unfortunately, we have no control and are not responsible for the privacy practices or the content of such sites.

Facebook and Other Social Media

If you connect our services to your Facebook account or other Social Media account, we may automatically collect certain information, such as your name, picture, and email address. We will use all information available through Facebook or other Social Sites in accordance with their policies and the preferences you selected on those accounts.

Contests/Surveys

From time-to-time, we may provide you with the opportunity to participate in contests or surveys. If you choose to participate, we may request certain personally identifiable information from you. Participation in these contests or surveys is completely voluntary and you therefore have a choice whether or not to disclose the requested information. The requested information typically includes contact information (such as name and address), and demographic information (such as zip code and age level – note that you must be 18 or above to enter). We use this information to notify contest winners and award prizes, to monitor site traffic, and to personalize the Site.

We may use a third party service provider to conduct these surveys or contests. When we do, that company will be prohibited from using our users’ personally identifiable information for any other purpose. We will not share the personally identifiable information you provide through a contest or survey with other third parties unless we give you prior notice and choice.

Supplementation of Information

In order to provide certain services to you, we may on occasion supplement the personally identifiable information you submit to us with information from third party sources (e.g., information from our strategic partners, service providers, or the United States Postal Service).  We do this to enhance our ability to serve you, to tailor our products and services to you, and to offer you opportunities to purchase products or services that we believe may be of interest to you.

2. Information you provide to us directly including personal information

We use forms in which you give us contact information (including your name, address, telephone number, and email address) so you can place orders, submit your business listing, request information and support, and make product suggestions, submit content including photos, articles and links, participate in forum or add comments to articles or blogs. We receive and store any information you enter on these forms or give us in any other way, including through email, telephone, or other communications with our customer service department. If you contact us for support, we will keep an internal record of what support was given.

We use your information to contact you regarding functionality changes to our products, websites, new services, news and updates, and special offers we think you’ll find valuable. If you would rather not receive this information, you can opt out at any time.

We may also use your information to present a co-branded offer with our partners or affiliates. If we collect information from you in connection with a co-branded offer, it will be clear at the point of collection who is collecting the information and whose privacy statement applies.

Cookies

We use cookies and similar tracking technologies to enhance your browsing experience and collect information about your activities on our website.

If you visit our login page, we will set a temporary cookie to determine if your browser accepts cookies. This cookie contains no personal data and is discarded when you close your browser.

When you log in, we will also set up several cookies to save your login information and your screen display choices. Login cookies last for two days, and screen options cookies last for a year. If you select “Remember Me”, your login will persist for two weeks. If you log out of your account, the login cookies will be removed.

If you edit or publish a business listing, an additional cookie will be saved in your browser. This cookie includes no personal data and simply indicates the post ID of the article you just edited. It expires after 1 day.

 

How We Use Your Information

We use your information for the following purposes:

  • To provide and maintain our services, including business listings.
  • To communicate with you about your account and our services.
  • To improve our website and services.
  • To analyze and monitor usage patterns.
  • To prevent fraud and enhance the security of our website.
  • To comply with legal obligations.

Sharing Your Information

We may share your information with:

  • Businesses: We share your business listings with other users and visitors to our website.
  • Service Providers: We may use third-party service providers to assist with website hosting, data analytics, and other services. These providers may have access to your information as necessary for them to perform these tasks on our behalf.
  • Legal and Regulatory Authorities: We may disclose your information in response to legal requests or when required by law.

Your Choices

  • You can review and update your account information by logging into your account settings.
  • You can opt out of marketing communications by following the unsubscribe instructions in our emails.
  • You can manage cookies through your browser settings.

What Happens to my Personally Identifiable Information if I Terminate my Account?

When your account is cancelled (either voluntarily or involuntarily) all of your personally identifiable information is placed in “deactivated” status on our relevant databases. However, deactivation of your account does not mean your personally identifiable information has been deleted from our database entirely. We will retain and use your personally identifiable information as necessary in order to comply with our legal obligations, resolve disputes, or enforce our agreements.

Security of Information

We have security measures in place to protect against the loss, misuse or alteration of the information under our control.  When you enter sensitive information (such as a credit card number) on our order forms, we encrypt the transmission of that information using secure socket layer technology (SSL).

We follow generally accepted standards to protect the personal information submitted to us, both during transmission and once we receive it.  No method of transmission over the Internet, or method of electronic storage, is 100% secure, however.  Therefore, we cannot guarantee its absolute security.

Changes to this Privacy Policy

We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time. The most recent version will be posted on our website, and the effective date will be updated accordingly.

Please check this page periodically to view any changes to this policy. By continuing to use this Site, you accept the current Privacy Policy.