This help article is for an old version of Direct Mail.
Direct Mail displays the geographic location of a subscriber or user in a few different places, including:
- Campaign report email open tracking
- New subscriber email alerts
- Direct Mail account control panel (under the Activity section)
This location data is an approximation based on the IP address of the user. It is not obtained via GPS or any other location-tracking mechanism (since these are not available in email clients).
The user's IP address is compared against a professionally-maintained database that attempts to match IP address to geographic location. However, due to the nature of how the internet works, there are limits to the accuracy of location data obtained in this manner. Accuracy may be limited by the following factors:
- Some Internet Service Providers (ISP) do not provide accurate location for the IP addresses they own
- Users accessing the internet via VPN or proxy are hidden behind the proxy's IP address, which may be located far from the actual user
- Apple’s Mail Privacy Protection feature reduces the accuracy of subscriber location data, although it is usually still accurate to the country and region level
It is best to treat geographic location data as an approximation or estimate.