Privacy Policy.
This policy explains how Astutely collects, uses, and protects information when you visit this website or get in touch. We keep it short because there's not much to say — we collect the minimum needed to do our work, we don't sell your data, and we don't do anything surprising with it.
1. Who we are
Astutely is an independent SEO consultancy operated by Eli McGarvie, based in Brisbane, Australia. We provide SEO strategy, content, technical SEO, link building, and digital PR services to clients globally.
For the purposes of this policy, "Astutely", "we", "us" and "our" all refer to Eli McGarvie operating as Astutely.
You can contact us at eli@astutely.cc.
2. What we collect
We only collect information you actively provide to us or that is automatically collected through standard website analytics. We do not buy data, scrape data, or collect data from third-party sources.
| Data | How collected | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Name and email address | Contact form | To respond to your enquiry and communicate about potential work |
| Website URL | Contact form | To understand your site before a call |
| Business description and SEO situation | Contact form | To qualify the enquiry and prepare for the discovery call |
| Booking details (name, email, meeting time) | Cal.com booking | To schedule and manage discovery calls |
| Website usage data (pages visited, traffic source, device type) | Google Analytics 4 (anonymised) | To understand how the site is used and improve it |
We do not collect payment information (no purchases are made on this site), sensitive personal data, or any data from minors. The location widget on the About page displays Eli's location to visitors — it does not collect or store any visitor data.
3. How we use it
We use the information you provide solely to:
Respond to your enquiry — if you fill in the contact form, we use your name and email to reply. Simple as that.
Schedule and run discovery calls — booking information from Cal.com is used to manage the call itself and any follow-up communication about potential work.
Improve this website — anonymised analytics data (from GA4) helps us understand which pages are useful, where traffic comes from, and what to improve. This data is aggregated and not linked to you personally.
We do not use your data for marketing emails, automated profiling, or any purpose beyond the above. We will never send you unsolicited communications.
4. Third parties
We use a small number of third-party services to operate this website. Each has its own privacy policy which governs how they handle data.
| Service | Purpose | Data shared |
|---|---|---|
| Cal.com | Booking system for discovery calls | Name, email, selected meeting time. Cal.com privacy policy → |
| Google Analytics 4 | Website analytics | Anonymised usage data. IP addresses are anonymised. Google privacy policy → |
We do not sell, rent, or trade your personal data with any third party for commercial purposes. Ever.
5. Cookies
This website uses a minimal number of cookies. We do not use advertising cookies, tracking pixels, or any form of cross-site tracking.
| Cookie | Type | Purpose |
|---|---|---|
| _ga, _ga_* | Analytics (Google Analytics 4) | Distinguishes unique visitors for anonymised analytics. Expires after 2 years. |
| Cal.com session cookies | Functional | Required for the booking widget to function. Only active when you interact with the Cal.com embed. |
You can disable cookies in your browser settings at any time. Disabling analytics cookies will not affect your ability to use this website.
6. Your rights
Depending on where you are located, you may have certain rights regarding your personal data. Regardless of jurisdiction, we honour the following for all users:
Right to access — you can ask us what personal data we hold about you.
Right to correction — if any information we hold is inaccurate, you can ask us to correct it.
Right to deletion — you can ask us to delete your personal data. We will do so promptly unless we have a legal obligation to retain it.
Right to object — you can ask us to stop using your data for any purpose at any time.
To exercise any of these rights, email eli@astutely.cc. We will respond within 30 days.
EU/UK residents: We process your data in compliance with GDPR principles — lawfulness, fairness, transparency, purpose limitation, data minimisation, accuracy, storage limitation, and integrity. The legal basis for processing contact form data is your consent (by submitting the form). Analytics data is processed under legitimate interests.
7. Data retention
We keep your data only as long as necessary:
Contact form submissions — retained for as long as there is an active or potential client relationship, or a maximum of 2 years from last contact if no engagement follows. You can request deletion at any time.
Cal.com booking data — managed by Cal.com per their retention policy. We retain email correspondence related to bookings for up to 2 years.
Analytics data — Google Analytics 4 data is retained for 14 months by default. This data is anonymised and not linked to individuals.
8. Security
This website is served over HTTPS. Contact form submissions are sent via encrypted email. We do not store form data in any database on this website — submissions go directly to eli@astutely.cc.
We take reasonable precautions to protect your data, but no method of transmission over the internet is 100% secure. If you have a security concern, please contact us immediately at eli@astutely.cc.
9. Changes to this policy
We may update this policy from time to time — for example if we add new services, change our tooling, or if legal requirements change. The date at the top of this page reflects the most recent update.
We will not make changes that significantly reduce your privacy protections without making them easy to find. If you have an active engagement with us and we make material changes, we will notify you directly.
10. Contact
If you have any questions about this policy, want to exercise your data rights, or have a concern about how we've handled your information, please get in touch:
Eli McGarvie
Astutely
Brisbane, Australia
eli@astutely.cc
We take privacy seriously and will respond to all enquiries within 30 days.