Since starting my newsletter in 2016, I have decided to use MailChimp. A great tool that I can fully recommend. (By the way, it’s free until you reach 2000 subscribers).

Without thinking, I have used the default settings ever since:

Tracking Opens

Tracking Clicks

It seems innocent enough. Who wouldn’t want to track these things?

But, those stats can be super creepy, and most readers have no idea how much data is collected. For example, I can see:

How many times you opened each email, and when

On which links you clicked how many times, and when

Your location

And the whole history of your interactions with my newsletters

So I asked myself some questions:

Do I track regular emails like that? No, I don’t.

Do I use those stats in any meaningful way? No, I don’t.

Do I want to be tracked? No, I don’t.

So why am I using those tracking features again? Good question.

About a month ago, I deactivated all tracking. So now my campaign stats look like this:

This not only feels much better, but it also more consistent with my values and the way I’d like to be treated.

How to deactivate tracking in MailChimp

If you want to do the same, it’s quite simple:

Log in to MailChimp Click the Campaigns tab Create a new campaign or click on an existing campaign draft On the main campaign screen, scroll all the way down to Settings & Tracking Click the Edit link Uncheck all boxes Save