Privacy Policy

This policy explains what personal information Website Growth Labs collects, why, who receives it, how long we keep it and the choices you have. Website Growth Labs is the operating name of 1001790863 Ontario Inc. (“WGL”, “we”, “us”).

It covers:

• our marketing websites: websitegrowthlabs.com, wglstudio.com and wglworks.com;
• the website editor at app.websitegrowthlabs.com, including sign-in, website previews, claiming, billing and support;
• the emails we send: website proposals, account and billing emails, and occasional product updates;
• the websites we host for our customers, where we handle visitors' enquiries for the business that owns the website (see Websites we host for customers).

Who is responsible and how to reach us

1001790863 Ontario Inc., operating as Website Growth Labs. Mailing address: 1001790863 ONTARIO INC., 1283 Arsenal St #16, #1021, Watertown, NY 13601, United States. This is a mail-receiving address, not an office.

Our Privacy Officer is responsible for this policy and for how we handle personal information. Email privacy@websitegrowthlabs.com with any question, request or complaint.

Our role. We decide how we use the information about our customers, prospective customers, account users, billing, outreach and preview measurement, and we are responsible for it. When a visitor sends an enquiry through a customer's website, we process it on that business's behalf and on its instructions: the business decides what to do with the enquiry, and its own privacy notice applies.

What we collect and where it comes from

Public business information, before you are our customer

We prepare free website proposals for businesses we find through public business listings and websites, or that a customer refers to us. We record factual business details: the business name, trade, town and state, public phone number and public email address, opening hours, links to the business's own website or social pages, the page we found them on and the date we checked, and the evidence that the business is in the United States. We write our own descriptions; we do not copy reviews, logos, photos or other people's text. The images in a proposal are illustrations from our own library, not photos of you or your work.

Preview measurement

Each proposal has a private, unlisted preview link. When someone views it, we record, for that link: how many times it was opened and when (first and latest), which of its pages were viewed, the device type (phone, tablet or desktop) and clicks on “Claim this website”. Our team gets an email the first time a preview is opened and again for a return visit after at least a day (at most one email per link per hour). The preview reads your browser's user-agent text to filter out automated link scanners and to work out the device type; we do not store it. This measurement uses no cookies and does not store your IP address, but it is still measurement of identifiable engagement with a proposal made for your business, and the preview page says so before it starts. Views by our team, and by people already signed in as members of that business's account, are not counted.

Asking for a website from its preview

If you ask for the website on a preview link (“Get this website”), we keep the email address you give us and a keyed one-way code (HMAC hash) of your network address, used to limit repeated requests; as on the build-your-own-site form, Cloudflare Turnstile checks that a person is asking. We email our team so a person can approve the request, and if they do, we email you the link to claim the website.

Building your own site

If you build a website yourself at app.websitegrowthlabs.com/start, we keep what you enter (the business name, trade, town and state, phone number, services, the optional “about” text and website or Google Business link) and your email address, with your agreement to these documents. To limit how many sites can be started, we keep keyed one-way codes (HMAC hashes) of your email address and network address, not the addresses themselves. Before the form is accepted, Cloudflare Turnstile checks that a person is filling it in: it runs in your browser, and Cloudflare processes information about your browser and network address only to tell people from automated traffic. Nothing is built until you confirm your email address. To write the first draft, your answers are sent to the AI provider (see AI editing); the draft uses only what you entered and our photo library, and we do not copy anything from the website or link you give us. We also record, against your account and without any content, which steps of this flow happened (started, email confirmed, site built, first edit, publish attempt, checkout, subscribed), to see where people get stuck.

Your account

Your email address (you sign in with an emailed link or code, or by tapping “Claim this website” or “Open your site” on the preview link we emailed you, which signs in the address it was sent to until the link expires), the business account you belong to and your role in it. To protect sign-in from abuse we keep keyed one-way codes (HMAC hashes) of the email address (or, for a tap on a preview link, the link) and network address used for each attempt, for one day. Our authentication provider keeps its own security records of sign-ins.

Your website

The business details, text, services, photos and other content you or we add, every saved version, and your settings (such as the email address that receives enquiries, and a custom domain if you connect one). Photos you upload are stored at unguessable public web addresses so your website can display them.

AI editing requests

When you ask the AI editor for a change, we send your request and your website's current content to the AI provider (see AI editing). We keep your request with the version it created, in your site's history (the current editor keeps its first 200 characters), and a usage record of each request (time, size, cost and which provider served it), not its content.

Enquiries to customer websites

The visitor's name, email address and/or phone number, their message, the page they sent it from and a salted one-way code (hash) of their network address used to slow down abusive submissions. See Websites we host for customers.

Billing

Our payment provider, Stripe, collects your payment details, billing address and any tax ID on its own checkout pages. We keep your Stripe customer and subscription references, plan, status, renewal date and whether a cancellation is scheduled. We do not receive or store full card numbers. We also keep a record of each billing email we send you (the subscription acknowledgment, renewal reminders, cancellation confirmations, and the notices that a payment failed, that the time to update your payment method is running out, and that your website went offline because of it): its type, the address it went to, what it said and whether it was delivered.

What you agreed to

When you claim a website, authorize a subscription or confirm a website for publication, we keep the statement you were shown, the versions of these documents, your email address and the time.

Messages and referrals

Emails you send us. If you refer a friend, the details you give us about them and your confirmation that they are happy for us to contact them; if a friend uses a referral link, the details they send us.

Technical and security information

Cloudflare, which carries all traffic to our websites, and our servers process IP addresses and request details to deliver pages, block attacks and diagnose errors.

How we use it

• to prepare and send website proposals, and to see whether a proposal was viewed so we know when to follow up;
• to provide accounts, the editor, previews, publishing and hosting;
• to carry out AI edits you request;
• to deliver enquiries to the business that owns the website;
• to bill subscriptions, calculate tax, send receipts, acknowledgments and renewal reminders, and handle refunds;
• to keep the service secure, prevent fraud and abuse, and enforce our Terms of Service;
• to answer questions and support requests;
• to send account and service emails, and occasional product updates you can turn off;
• to keep records the law requires, such as tax and consent records.

We do not sell personal information, we do not use it for advertising on other websites, and we do not use your content, enquiries or AI requests to train AI models.

Proposal emails

Our proposal emails are commercial messages. We send them only to business addresses published by businesses in the United States, record the evidence of each business's location, identify ourselves and include our mailing address and a simple way to opt out. If you opt out (use the link or reply “unsubscribe”), we stop all marketing emails to that address from every WGL sending address within 10 business days and keep the address on our opt-out list so it stays that way.

Product updates

If you own a website you have claimed, we may email you occasional product updates about new features and changes to the service. They come from news@updates.websitegrowthlabs.com, a sending address kept apart from sign-in, enquiry and billing emails. To send them, our email provider Resend keeps your email address, your first name if you gave it, your website's address name and whether you unsubscribed, on our customer list. Product updates contain no open or click tracking. Each one includes our mailing address and an unsubscribe link, and you can turn them off or back on at any time in Account settings. Unsubscribing stops product updates only. If you stop being an owner or delete your account, we take your address off that list.

Who receives it and where it is processed

Our application server is in Ashburn, Virginia, United States (Hetzner): pages, previews and published websites are generated there, and AI requests and emails are sent from there. We use these service providers:

Stripe also uses payment information for its own purposes, such as fraud prevention and meeting its legal obligations, under Stripe's privacy policy. We may also disclose information when the law requires it, to protect people or our service, or as part of a sale or reorganization of our business under equivalent protections.

We choose providers that protect personal information under contract.

AI editing

AI editing is optional; every field can be edited with the forms instead. When you use it:

• What is sent: your request and the current content of your website (in the older HTML editor, also the earlier messages from the same editing session). Do not include patient, client-confidential or other sensitive information in a request.
• Who receives it: OpenRouter, which passes it to one of three approved US model hosts: DeepInfra, Together AI or Fireworks AI. Requests are never sent to any other host. If none of them is available, the edit fails rather than going elsewhere.
• What they may do with it: only produce the answer. Our OpenRouter account requires zero data retention and does not allow providers to use requests for training. The providers do not store requests or answers after responding, except where the law requires it, for example to report child sexual abuse material.
• What we keep: the change itself in your site's version history, your request as that version's description (the current editor keeps its first 200 characters), and a usage record without the content.

Cookies and similar technologies

We use only cookies that the service needs:

The editor also remembers, in your own browser's storage, which “What's new” entry you last saw, so it can mark newer ones; this is never sent to us.

Cloudflare may set its own strictly necessary security cookies to protect our websites from automated attacks. Stripe sets its own cookies on the checkout and billing pages it hosts (checkout.stripe.com and billing.stripe.com); see Stripe's cookie policy.

We use no analytics, advertising or social-media tracking on our marketing websites, the editor or the websites we host. Our marketing websites have no forms and set no cookies; Cloudflare adds a small script there that hides email addresses from scrapers. The forms of measurement we do use are the preview measurement and the build-your-own-site steps described above, which use no cookies. The build-your-own-site form loads Cloudflare Turnstile, a security check, from Cloudflare. We have no cross-site or advertising tracking for such a signal to switch off, so our services do not change their behaviour in response to “Do Not Track” browser signals; preview measurement happens whether or not your browser sends one.

Websites we host for customers

Each website we host has its own Privacy Notice page, generated from the owner's details and these facts, and a short notice under its enquiry form. For enquiries:

• the website's owner decides what happens with an enquiry; we process it only to host the website, deliver the enquiry to the owner by email and keep the service secure;
• the enquiry is delivered to the email address the owner chose; copies in the owner's inbox are kept according to the owner's own practices;
• we remove the visitor's name, contact details and message from our systems 30 days after the enquiry is delivered, and delete the remaining record (website, time, page and the salted network-address code) 90 days after it was received, whether or not it was delivered;
• websites we host set no cookies and contain no analytics or advertising code; photos are loaded from our storage provider (Supabase), which therefore receives visitors' network addresses.

Questions about an enquiry you sent should go to the business first; you can also write to us at privacy@websitegrowthlabs.com and we will pass your request on and help the business answer it. Websites for health practices do not offer an enquiry form for now, so that health information is not sent through it.

How long we keep it

Deleted information can remain in backups until those backups expire. We may keep information longer when the law requires it or to resolve a dispute.

Your choices and rights

You can ask to see the personal information we hold about you, to correct it, or to have it deleted, subject to records we must keep (such as tax and consent records). You can withdraw consent where we rely on it, subject to legal and contractual limits; we will tell you the consequences, for example that we cannot host a website without the account behind it. Email privacy@websitegrowthlabs.com; we may need to confirm your identity and will answer within 30 days.

• Marketing emails: every proposal email and product update has an unsubscribe link, and you can also reply “unsubscribe”. Account, billing and enquiry emails are part of the service and continue while you have an account.
• Preview measurement: if you received a proposal and do not want it, write to us and we will withdraw the preview and delete its measurement.
• Enquiries: if you sent an enquiry to a business, you can contact that business or us.
• Complaints: please tell us first. You can also complain to a privacy regulator (see Canadian privacy law).

If you live in a US state with a consumer privacy law, you may have similar rights to access, correct and delete information. We do not sell personal information or share it for targeted advertising.

Security

We protect information with access controls (each business sees only its own websites and data), encrypted connections, limited staff access, and security settings our providers offer. No system is perfectly secure. If a breach creates a real risk of significant harm, we will notify the affected people and the authorities as the law requires.

Children

Our services are for businesses and are not directed to children. We do not knowingly collect children's personal information.

Canadian privacy law

WGL is a Canadian company, so Canada's federal privacy law, the Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act (PIPEDA), applies to how we handle personal information. Our application server and our service providers are in the United States and elsewhere, so your information is processed outside Canada and may be accessible to courts, law-enforcement and national-security authorities of those countries. If you are not satisfied with our answer to a complaint, you can complain to the Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada.

Changes to this policy

The version and effective date are at the top. If we make a material change, we will tell account holders by email or in the editor before it takes effect, and ask for fresh consent where the law requires it. A policy change alone never authorizes an unrelated new use of information collected earlier.