Open Pixel Tracking Consent | Zeta Marketing Platform | ZMP

Overview

Open Pixel Tracking Consent lets you manage email open and click tracking based on your recipients’ consent preferences and location. When enabled, Campaigns checks each recipient’s consent status and country when an email is built. Depending on those values, the platform may remove the open-tracking pixel and disable click tracking for that message. This helps you honor recipients’ tracking preferences without creating separate tracked and untracked versions of your campaigns.

This article explains how tracking consent works, which profile data is used, and how to manage consent for your recipients.

The list of covered countries (countries included in the platform’s location-based consent check) may change over time. Contact your Zeta account team for the current list.

For recipients in these countries, open and click tracking are suppressed when the consent value is no, missing, or null.
An explicit no suppresses tracking in every country, whether or not the country is included in the location-based consent check.

Background

An open-tracking pixel is an image embedded in an email that can be used to record when a recipient opens the message. Consent requirements for tracking technologies vary by jurisdiction. Open Pixel Tracking Consent helps you manage open and click tracking using the consent and country information stored on recipient profiles.

Work with your legal and privacy teams to determine the requirements that apply to your business and recipients.

How it works

When the feature is enabled, Campaigns evaluates the recipient’s consent and country when each email is built.

The following profile properties store consent information:

Property	Description	Accepted values
`open_tracking_pixel_opt_in`	Records the recipient’s open pixel tracking consent.	`yes`, `no`, or null/missing
`open_tracking_pixel_opt_in_date`	Optionally records when consent was collected.	Unix timestamp

The consent date is optional and is not required for the suppression logic.

2. Recipient country

Campaigns uses the profile’s z_country golden record to determine whether a recipient is in a covered country.

The way z_country is populated depends on the geo data you provide:

If you provide geo data: Your supplied geo data is used in preference to inferred data. This applies to the entire geo group: city, state, ZIP code, country, latitude, and longitude.
If you provide no geo data: The platform can infer location using IP address and user-agent signals from the profile’s web and email activity.

Geo data is handled as a group, rather than field by field. If you provide a city or state without a country, the platform does not retain an inferred country as a fallback. As a result, z_country may be blank. Include country whenever you provide geo data.

For more information about standard profile attributes, see Standardization of Attributes. If you’re unsure how your country data maps to z_country, contact your Zeta account team.

If your account uses a non-standard country field, your Zeta account team must map that field to z_country. This configuration replaces the standard country source; it does not add a second source.

Profiles with missing or incorrect country data may not be evaluated as expected. Contact your Zeta account team if you are unsure how your country data is mapped.

3. Tracking suppression

Consent value	Recipient in a covered country	Recipient outside a covered country
`no`	Open and click tracking suppressed	Open and click tracking suppressed
Missing or null	Open and click tracking suppressed	Tracking remains enabled
`yes`	Tracking remains enabled	Tracking remains enabled

When tracking is suppressed, the open-tracking pixel is not inserted and click tracking is disabled for that message.

Note: The table describes behavior for profiles that can be evaluated against the covered-country list. If z_country is missing or incorrect, contact your Zeta account team to understand how those profiles will be evaluated.

What you need to do

open_tracking_pixel_opt_in is not pre-populated on existing profiles. Set and update this property using the Identify API. File uploads and standard data loading are not currently supported for this property.

Set the value to yes when the recipient has opted in.
Set the value to no when the recipient has opted out or withdrawn consent.

Until a value is set, it is missing or null. For recipients in a covered country, a missing or null value suppresses tracking.

2. Verify your country data

Make sure z_country is populated accurately for your profiles:

If you provide geo data, include the country.
If you use a non-standard country field, ask your Zeta account team to configure the mapping.
If you provide no geo data, the platform can infer location from available signals. Inferred location may be less precise than a country you provide.

Continue collecting and updating consent through your established processes. When a recipient withdraws consent, update open_tracking_pixel_opt_in to no.

4. Account for timing in triggered sends

For event-driven or transactional sends, a consent update made immediately before a message is sent may not be saved to the profile before the message is built. In that case, the consent value may be read as missing.

Where possible, update the profile’s consent value before the triggering event. If your use case depends on updating consent and sending a message at the same time, contact your Zeta account team to review your options.

Impact on reporting

When tracking is suppressed for a message, neither opens nor clicks are recorded for that send. As a result, reports, segments, and other logic that rely on open or click activity will not reflect activity from those recipients.

Each sent-message reporting record includes the open_tracking_suppressed field:

Value	Meaning
`1`	Tracking was suppressed for the message. Open and click activity is not recorded.
`0`	Tracking remained enabled. Opens and clicks can be recorded.

This value is recorded separately for each recipient’s message. Sends with suppressed tracking remain included in campaign open and click rate calculations; the field does not change how those rates are calculated.

Historical data

The suppression controls described on this page apply when new messages are built. They do not describe or determine what should happen to previously collected tracking data.

Work with your legal and privacy teams to determine whether historical data should be retained or deleted, based on the applicable requirements and your organization’s policies.

Frequently asked questions

Which recipients have tracking suppressed?

When the feature is enabled, tracking is suppressed for:

Recipients whose open_tracking_pixel_opt_in value is no, regardless of country.
Recipients in a covered country whose consent value is missing or null.

Contact your Zeta account team for the current list of covered countries.

What if I don’t provide country data?

If you provide no geo data, the platform can infer location from available IP address and user-agent signals. If you provide other geo fields but omit country, the inferred country is not used as a fallback and z_country may be blank.

For more reliable location data, include country whenever you provide geo data.

No. open_tracking_pixel_opt_in_date is optional and is not required for tracking suppression.

Can tracking be enabled again after a recipient opts in?

Yes. Update open_tracking_pixel_opt_in to yes after the recipient has provided consent. Future messages will be built with tracking enabled under the logic described on this page.

How can I identify messages with suppressed tracking?

Check open_tracking_suppressed on the sent-message reporting record. A value of 1 means tracking was suppressed; 0 means it remained enabled.

Does this feature determine my legal obligations?

No. The feature applies the platform logic described above. Your legal and privacy teams are responsible for determining the requirements that apply to your business and recipients.

Need help? Contact your Zeta account team or Support.