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Knowledge Base

Knowledge Base/Email/Sales Inbox/Email Tracking

Email Tracking

Breandan Flood, October 5, 2021

Note: The Email Tracking feature is one of the many useful features of Pipedrive’s Advanced, Professional, and Enterprise plans. To learn how to switch plans, click here.

Sections

1: What is Email Tracking?

2: How to enable Email Tracking

3: Using the Email Tracking feature

4: Filtering

5: Email Tracking and the GDPR

What is Email Tracking?

Email tracking functions are used by companies that want to know when their sent emails were opened by their customers. When used, Email Tracking allows for you to see when any email sent from within Pipedrive was opened by a recipient.

This is done by adding a tracking pixel to each email where tracking has been enabled, which will register when an email has been opened by the recipient, and if links in that email have been clicked.

Note: If a contact you are emailing has images disabled in their email client — or if the email is set to plain text (instead of HTML) — the tracking pixel will not work, and email opens will not be tracked. Link tracking will still function as expected, though.

How to enable Email Tracking

To enable Email Tracking in your Pipedrive account, go to Personal preferences > Email sync.
If you have connected an email account through the Email Sync feature of the Advanced plan, you will find 'Email tracking' options listed there.
If you have not yet connected an email account, you can learn how to do so here.

Open tracking will give you information about when the recipient opens your sent email.
Link tracking will give information about when any links embedded in your emails are clicked by the recipient.
Notifications for tracking activities will inform you about the above tracking data through the notification bell of the Pipedrive app.

Using the Email Tracking feature

When these options are enabled, your Send Mail functions — in the Mail tab and Detail Views — will have the icons to enable the tracking options.
In order to enable tracking for the email you are about to send, click the 'Enable open tracking' or 'Enable link tracking' options in the Send Email area.

Note: In order to track email opens or clicked links, these options will need to be clicked before sending the email. Once you have sent an email, the tracking settings will be saved and will be set as default for future emails until changed. Email tracking information is only available per user and cannot be shared with other users.

When you have sent an email with these options enabled, you will be able to check in on this information within the sent email itself when viewed in the Mail tab, or the sender can also view the information in Detail Views, by hovering your mouse over the associated open and link icons. You will also receive a notification in the Sales Assistant. Once an email has been opened or a link has been clicked, the icon will become opaque and hovering over the icon will provide information about when the email was opened or when the link was clicked.

When an email is opened, the icon will be opaque and contain information about the occasions when the email was opened or when the link was clicked.

Note: E-mails with empty bodies will not be tracked, as the tracking pixel is rendered in the e-mail body.

The Sales Assistant will also display a notification informing you that the email has been viewed, and if the link was clicked.

Keep in mind that your customers may have settings within their email client that prevent the tracking of email opens and link-clicking.
If that is the case, Pipedrive will not be able to provide any tracking information for those emails.

If an email is sent to several recipients — for example, through cc'ing or forwarding — Pipedrive will not be able to tell you which recipient opened the email, but will still inform you that the email was opened at a specific date and time. This will allow you to track if an email was opened by multiple recipients, but it's worth noting that it only applies to the original recipients. If the email is subsequently forwarded on, this will not be tracked.

Note: The tracking pixel can become unintentionally triggered by the opening of the tracked email through the Sent folder of your email client. To avoid triggering a false open alert, we suggest staying within Pipedrive for the purposes of the sending and opening of your tracked emails. Be aware that opening up the email from the Sent folder of your email client will also trigger that tracking pixel.

Filtering

Enabling the tracking functions in Pipedrive also allows for you to filter for those tracked emails while in the Mail tab of your Pipedrive account.
To filter for emails with the tracking enabled, go to the Mail tab, click the Filter button and select the Mail tracking enabled option found there.

Email Tracking and the GDPR

If your company is based in the EU — or deals extensively with EU customers — keep in mind that you must meet the requirements of EU laws. The EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) protects people’s privacy and places responsibilities on anyone collecting, using, storing, or otherwise processing personal data.

European data protection authorities have expressed the opinion that email tracking requires that recipients have opted in to the collection of tracking data. While not at the same level as the GDPR itself, such opinions are often taken into account when resolving disputes.
Pipedrive recommends that you understand the requirements of the GDPR and that you consult a professional, if necessary.

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