Privacy policy

Short version: we use your details to reply to your enquiry, prepare your free concept and quote for the work. We never sell them, and we only share them with the services that run our business, listed below. There is one exception, and only if you choose it: if you found us through a Google advert and tick the box on our enquiry form, we tell Google that your enquiry came from its advert. We never send Google your name, email address, phone number or message. We also contact some businesses first to offer our services: by phone, and registered companies by email. For those calls we may hold a business’s phone number from its own website or, if its website shows none, the business phone number shown on its Google Maps listing. If you heard from us by email, the section “If we emailed your business” explains where we found your details and how to stop us.

Who we are

Elevantae is a web design studio based in Wolverhampton, West Midlands, run by Patrick and Tommy. For anything about your data, email enquiries@elevantae.com and one of us will answer it personally.

For the enquiries you send us, we are the data controller. For the websites we build and host for clients, the client is the controller and we are the processor, working to their instructions.

What we collect, and why

When you send the enquiry form we collect your name, email address, business name, current website and phone number if you give one, whatever you write in the message, and how you found us if you choose to say. We use it to reply to you, to prepare your free concept, and to quote for the work, and your answer about how you found us to see where our enquiries come from. The lawful basis is legitimate interests: you asked us to get in touch about a possible job. The one exception is the click reference from a Google advert, explained next, which we only use with your consent.

If you found us through a Google advert. When someone clicks one of our Google adverts, Google adds a click reference to the link: a string of letters and numbers that identifies that click. We only read it if you tick the box about Google adverts on our enquiry form. It is read from the page address when you send the form, and nothing is stored on your device. We then send it to Google Ads with the time of your enquiry and, if the work goes ahead, the value of the job, so we can see which adverts bring real enquiries and stop paying for the ones that do not. Your name, email address, phone number and message are never sent to Google. The lawful basis is your consent, and you can withdraw it at any time by emailing enquiries@elevantae.com. If we have not sent the reference to Google yet, we will not. If we have, we remove your enquiry from our Google Ads reports, within the 54 day limit Google sets for doing that.

If you ring the number in one of our Google adverts. Google connects the call to us, and records when it happened, how long it lasted and the number you rang from, so our Google Ads reports can count the calls our adverts bring in. Ringing the number on this website does not go through Google.

When you email us we have whatever is in the email. Same use, same basis.

When you visit the site we use Cloudflare Web Analytics, which counts page views and rough location at country level. It sets no cookies, stores no identifier, and cannot follow you to any other website. That is why you did not have to click a cookie banner on the way in. If you would rather not be counted at all, any browser setting or extension that blocks analytics will stop it, and nothing on the site breaks.

Our hosting provider, Cloudflare, keeps short-lived technical logs, including IP addresses, to keep the site online and to block attacks. That is a security necessity rather than something we choose to collect.

We do not use advertising trackers, social media pixels, session recording or heat mapping.

If we emailed your business

We email some companies and other registered organisations to offer a free report on their website and how the business shows up online. If you heard from us that way, this section explains what we hold, where it came from, how long we keep it and how to stop us.

Who sent it

The email came from growth@elevantae.com, the address we use when we write to a business first, and it was signed by Patrick B., our Founder. Elevantae is a digital studio in Wolverhampton, run by Patrick B. and Tommy, our Co-founder. In law, the data controller is Patryk Marcin Bieniecki and Thomas Price, trading as ELEVANTAE, ELEVANTAE House, Coalway Road, Wolverhampton, WV3 7NA. For anything about your data, email enquiries@elevantae.com or ring 01902 288206, Monday to Friday, 9am to 6pm.

Who we email

We only email a business that the Companies House register shows as an active company or other incorporated body, such as a limited company, limited liability partnership, plc, company limited by guarantee, charitable incorporated organisation or Scottish partnership, checked in the 30 days before we write. A name ending in “Ltd” is not enough on its own: we check the register. We never email sole traders or ordinary partnerships, and we only email businesses registered in the UK.

We write to an address your business publishes on its own website, usually one for enquiries such as info@ or hello@. Sometimes it is the work address, on your business’s own web domain, of someone your website names on one of its own pages. We never write to a personal webmail address, such as Gmail or Hotmail, even when a business shows one. We send at most three emails to a business: a first email and two short follow ups a few working days apart. Once anyone at the business replies, we send no more follow ups. We do not track whether our emails are opened or clicked.

What we hold about your business

• From Companies House: the company’s name, number, type and status, the date it was set up, what it does and the town of its registered office. We also note how many active officers it has, as a number. We do not keep the officers’ names.
• The email address we wrote to, the page of your website where we found it, and the date.
• If we wrote to a named person: their work address as your website shows it, the page we found it on and the date. We do not keep their name. If we have not written to that person within 30 days of finding the address, we delete it or send them this notice.
• Your business phone number: the one your website shows, with the page we found it on, or, if your website shows none, the business phone number shown on your Google Maps listing. We note which it was.
• What our checks found on your public website, with the date. For example: whether it loads over a secure connection, fits a phone screen, has a page title and description, shows a phone number and a way to get in touch, carries a Google tag for measuring visits, and which social media accounts it links to.
• What anyone can look up about your domain’s email set up: whether it can receive email, and whether it publishes SPF and DMARC records, which help stop other people sending email that pretends to come from you.
• The scores from Google’s free PageSpeed Insights test of your homepage, rounded.
• A record of which emails we sent and when, and whether you replied, asked for the report or asked us to stop. Copies of the emails we sent, the report if you asked for it, and your replies stay in the mailbox we wrote from.

Most of this is about the company rather than a person. Some of it can still relate to one person, for example where one person runs the company or reads the inbox we wrote to, so we treat all of it as personal data.

Where it came from

All of it comes from public sources: the Companies House register, your business’s own website, your business’s Google Maps listing, public domain name records and Google’s PageSpeed Insights test. We may use Google Maps to find businesses in an area. From Google we keep its reference number for a listing and, if your website shows no phone number, the business phone number shown on your Google Maps listing. We do not copy names, addresses, ratings or reviews from Google.

We read only a few public pages of your website. We read your robots.txt file first and follow what it says, then your homepage, at most one contact page, up to two more pages your homepage links to, such as About us, Team or Directors, up to two more where businesses often give an email address, such as your privacy policy, terms or booking page, and your sitemap. Our checker names itself as ElevantaeLeadCheck, with a link to this page. It never signs in, fills in a form or changes anything.

Why we use it

To offer our services to businesses we think we could help, starting with a free report on their website and online presence. The lawful basis is legitimate interests: finding new clients for our business by offering that free report to limited companies. We have weighed that against your interests and written it down, and you can ask us for a copy.

The law on marketing email, the Privacy and Electronic Communications Regulations, allows us to email a company’s business address without asking first, as long as each email says who we are and gives a simple way to stop. Every email we send does both.

How we put the emails together

We find businesses, check them on the Companies House register, run the checks on the website and the email set up, and put each email together from wording Patrick approved, filled in with the facts our checks found about that business. Every statement about your business in an email or a report quotes something our checks found, with the date. Every email goes in Patrick’s name.

If you reply, we sort the new part of your reply: a request for the report, a request to stop, or something else. A request to stop is acted on straight away. If you asked for the report, we send it as a PDF to the address we wrote to, once. Anything else goes to Patrick, who reads it and answers. We never publish your report or show it to anyone outside your business without your written permission.

None of this has a legal or similarly significant effect on you.

Who else sees it

• Microsoft, which runs our mailboxes, growth@elevantae.com and enquiries@elevantae.com, on our Microsoft 365 account.
• Cloudflare, which runs our systems and keeps their database, stored in the EU.
• Anthropic, which helps us sort replies and prepare draft answers for Patrick. It sees your reply. It never sees your website.
• Google, which receives your homepage’s web address when it runs the PageSpeed Insights test.

Each one is bound by a written data processing agreement, with recognised safeguards for any data that leaves the UK.

How long we keep your business’s details

• If we checked your business but did not email it, the check results and any draft report are deleted after 30 days. If your business did not pass our checks, we keep only its company number or Google’s reference number and the reason, for 30 days.
• If your business is saved as a possible client and we have not written to you, we delete it, with the email address and phone number we found, 12 months after our searches last found it. If one person runs the company, we treat its address as that person’s and delete it after 30 days if we have not written to you by then. A named person’s work address that we found and have not written to is deleted after 30 days in the same way.
• If we emailed you, the record of what we sent, what our checks found, the report and your replies are deleted 12 months after our last contact with you, in our systems and in the mailbox.
• Drafts of our answers to you are deleted after 90 days.
• If you become a client or ask us about work, your details move to the periods for enquiries and clients set out in “How long we keep it”.
• If you ask us to stop, we keep only what we need to make sure we never contact you again, as explained next.

How to stop our emails

Any one of these works, and you do not need to give a reason:

• use the Unsubscribe button your email program shows next to our email;
• reply with “stop” or “no thanks”, or any words that ask us to stop;
• email enquiries@elevantae.com;
• ring 01902 288206.

We stop straight away, by email and by phone. To keep that promise, we put the email address, its web domain, the company number and the date on our do not contact list, and keep nothing else about you there.

Your rights

You can ask us for a copy of what we hold about your business, ask us to correct it, delete it or limit how we use it, or object to us using it. Your right to object to marketing has no exceptions: if you object, we stop. Email enquiries@elevantae.com and we will deal with it within one month, at no charge.

If you are unhappy with how we have used your details, please tell us first so we can put it right. You can also complain to the regulator, the Information Commission, whose office is still known as the ICO, at ico.org.uk or on 0303 123 1113.

Who else sees it

The companies that run the tools we use to do the work:

• Microsoft, for email and file storage, on our Microsoft 365 tenant, including growth@elevantae.com, the address we use to write to businesses first.
• Cloudflare, for hosting, the form’s spam check and analytics.
• Anthropic, to sort replies to the emails we send businesses.

Google, only if you tick the box about Google adverts on our enquiry form. Google then receives the click reference, the time of your enquiry and, if the work goes ahead, the value of the job, and never your name, email address, phone number or message. Google uses it as its own controller, under its controller terms for advertisers, not on our behalf. Its privacy policy explains what it does with it.

Microsoft, Cloudflare, Anthropic and Google are each covered by appropriate safeguards for any data leaving the UK.

If you become a client, we also use a Direct Debit provider to collect your monthly payments. If you are a Microsoft 365 client and choose backup, we also use a backup provider to keep the copies. Each one is named in your agreement.

Beyond these, we only share your details if the law requires us to, and we never sell data.

How long we keep it

Enquiries that do not become work: two years, then deleted. Enquiries that do become work: for the life of the project and six years after, because the tax rules require it. If you tick the box about Google adverts, the click reference stays with your enquiry for as long as we keep the enquiry. We only send it to Google within the 90 days Google accepts it, and our log of what we send to Google is deleted after 90 days. Businesses we emailed: 12 months from our last contact, as explained under “If we emailed your business”. Ask us to delete something sooner and we will, unless we are legally required to keep it.

Your rights

You can ask us for a copy of what we hold about you, ask us to correct it, ask us to delete it, or object to us using it. Where we rely on your consent, you can withdraw it at any time. Email enquiries@elevantae.com and we will deal with it within one month, at no charge.

If you are not happy with how we have handled it, you can complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office at ico.org.uk or on 0303 123 1113. We would rather you told us first so we can put it right.

Cookies

The website itself sets no cookies. If that ever changes, this page changes with it and you will get a proper choice before anything is set. The box about Google adverts does not change this: nothing is stored on your device, whether you tick it or not.

Changes to this policy

If we change it we update the date at the top. If the change is significant and you are a client, we tell you directly rather than expecting you to notice.