What cookies and similar technologies are
Cookies are small text files that sites place on your device. They let us keep track of a session, remember your preferences, and understand which pages are worth the effort. "Similar technologies" covers things like localStorage, which we use to remember your cookie-banner choice.
The categories we use
Two categories. One you cannot turn off, and one that stays off until you turn it on:
Strictly necessary
These keep the site working as you expect. They remember your cookie choice (so we don't nag you on every page) and protect our contact form from forged submissions. You can't turn these off. The site would stop functioning.
Analytics and visitor identification
Four tools run through Google Tag Manager: Google Analytics 4, to understand which pages are worth the effort; Apollo, which identifies the company a business visitor is browsing from; Microsoft Clarity, for anonymized session replay; and PostHog, on its European Union region, for page-level interest. In the UK, the EU, the rest of the EEA and Switzerland none of them stores anything until you accept. Everywhere else the law is opt-out, so they run from arrival and stop when you decline. You can withdraw at any time via the cookie preferences link.
If you decline, Google Tag Manager still loads but is told not to store anything on your device. Google then receives a cookieless signal that a page was viewed, including your IP address and browser type, which it uses to estimate aggregate traffic. That signal cannot be tied to you across sessions or across sites, and no Apollo identification, Clarity replay or PostHog event happens. If you would rather not send even that, the Global Privacy Control signal or a content blocker will stop it.
We don't use marketing, advertising, retargeting or social-network cookies. If that changes, we'll update this page before any such cookie is set, and we'll ask for your explicit opt-in consent first.
Cookie table
Here's a plain-English inventory. Exact cookie names may change as the providers update their software; the purpose and retention will stay the same.
When these are set. In the UK, the EU, the rest of the EEA and Switzerland, nothing in
the analytics rows below is stored until you accept. Everywhere else the law is opt-out rather than
opt-in, so we count the visit from arrival and declining stops it. The one exception is
whispor_intent, which is written only if you explicitly accept, wherever you are.
| Name | Purpose | Category | Duration |
|---|---|---|---|
whispor_consent |
Stores your cookie-banner choice (accept / decline analytics). | Strictly necessary | 12 months |
_ga |
Google Analytics 4. Distinguishes one browser from another so visits can be counted. | Analytics | 24 months |
_ga_<property> |
Google Analytics 4. Holds session state for our property. | Analytics | 24 months |
| Apollo visitor identifier | Apollo. Identifies the organization a business visitor is browsing from. | Analytics | See Apollo's cookie notice |
| _clck, _clsk | Microsoft Clarity. Records an anonymized replay of how the page was used: scrolling, mouse movement and clicks. What you type into a form is masked in the browser and never reaches Microsoft. | Analytics | 12 months, 1 day |
| ph_<key>_posthog | PostHog. Records which pages you looked at and how far you read, so we can tell an active evaluation from a passing visit. Held in the European Union. | Analytics | 12 months |
| whispor_intent | Whispor. Browser storage, not a cookie. Holds a visit count and an interest score derived from the pages you read, so a returning visitor is recognized as one. Written only if you accept, wherever you are, and never sent to a third party on its own. | Analytics | Until you clear site data |
Third parties
Our pages make third-party requests to Google Fonts (to load Inter and Instrument Sans), to Google Tag Manager, which hosts our Google Analytics 4, Apollo, Microsoft Clarity and PostHog tags, and to our form-handling provider when you submit the contact form. Google Fonts does not set cookies on this site in the configuration we use. The analytics tags set cookies on the regional basis described above. PostHog runs on its European Union region, so the data those events carry stays in the EU. We don't embed social widgets or ad networks.
How to control cookies
- Our banner, the first time you visit, you'll see a banner offering "Accept" or "Decline analytics". In the UK, the EU, the rest of the EEA and Switzerland nothing is stored until you accept. Elsewhere, where the law is opt-out rather than opt-in, we count the visit until you decline, and declining stops it. Your choice is remembered; change it any time via cookie preferences in the footer.
- Your browser, all major browsers let you block or delete cookies. See aboutcookies.org for instructions per browser.
- Global Privacy Control (GPC), we honor the GPC signal. If your browser sends it, we treat that as a decline for analytics cookies.
Do Not Track
The Do Not Track header is inconsistently implemented across browsers and is being phased out. We don't rely on it. Use the cookie banner or GPC instead. Both are respected.
Questions
Email hello@whispor.com with the subject "Cookies" or "Privacy". For the broader picture of how we handle personal data, see our Privacy policy.