Our Services
AdVantage Media Africa offers a suite of social media management tools (available in Personal, Entrepreneur, Agency, and other plans) that are accessible via our websites and mobile applications. These tools allow you to bring together all of your social media accounts for easy access and management through a single online platform. Through this platform, you can manage your social media, marketing, and advertising campaigns; engage with your audiences; schedule and publish messages; and analyze the results of these activities. Collectively, we refer to these tools as our “Services.” We are acting as a service provider to you when we provide the Services.
Any collection, use, and management of personal information by the social networks, including Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and LinkedIn (collectively, the “Social Networks”) are governed by their respective privacy policies and terms. When using Social Networks, you are required to comply with their privacy policies and terms. We recommend you carefully review their privacy policies and terms, as AdVantage Media Africa is not responsible for the Social Networks.
Our Services also enable you to customize and connect your AdVantage Media Africa account to third-party services (“Third-Party Services”), including through apps you can access in the App Directory or which may be available to you via our platform. The collection of your information by these third parties is governed by the Third-Party Services’ privacy policies and terms. We recommend you carefully review their privacy policies and terms, as AdVantage Media Africa is not responsible for Third-Party Services.
We rely on you to comply with applicable privacy laws when collecting, using, or disclosing information about individuals through the Services, including obtaining any necessary consents and providing any necessary notices. If we receive any questions or complaints regarding your use of the Services, we will direct the request to you for further assistance.
Our Services are not intended for use by children and should only be accessed by individuals who are at least 18 years old and are using the Services for business purposes.
What information do we collect?
We collect information about you as reasonably necessary for the following activities:
Using our Services
We collect the following information when you use our Services:
Account information:
- Your contact and profile information including your name, email address, organization name, and address; your preferences such as language, time zone, and the types of communications you would like to receive from us; and image (if you choose to provide this). We may also obtain this information if you choose to use a social login service, such as Facebook Login, to create or access your account.
- Billing and other payment information (if you sign up for a paid service or purchase a Third-Party Service), including payment method details, such as credit card number.
- The Services you have acquired from us, including the type of plan, number of team members, and transaction information related to the Services.
Content:
- Your social profile information for Social Networks you choose to connect to the Services. For example, your Facebook profile information may include your Facebook username and profile image.
- A specific location such as an address, a city, or a place (for example, a restaurant) if you choose to share this information.
- Your messages, posts, comments, images, advertising, and other material you curate on and upload to the Services; and information that is collected from the Social Networks that you choose to connect to and which is displayed on our Services.
- Content that you may send and receive through Social Networks may contain personal information of third parties. This may include information such as names, photos, age, gender, geographic location, opinions, preferences, and phone numbers that are provided or posted by social media users.
Logs, usage, and support data:
- Log data, which may include your IP address, the address of the web page you visited before using the Services, your browser type and settings, your device information (such as make, model, and OS), the date and time when you used the Services, information about your browser configuration, language preferences, unique identifiers, and cookies.
- Usage data and analytics, which may include the frequency of login, and the different types of activity undertaken by users such as frequently accessed areas of the Services.
- General Location information, such as IP address and the region in which you are located when you are logging in and using the Services, in accordance with the settings on your device.
- Customer support questions, issues, and general feedback that you choose to provide.
Surveys, events, marketing and other activities
Surveys, contests, events (such as webinars and in-person events) for those we host or are affiliated with:
- Contact information, such as your name, email address, telephone number, organization name and address.
- Participation, attendance, feedback and opinions.
- General information about your organization that you choose to provide, such as annual company revenue, number of employees, and industry. We may also use service providers to obtain additional business-related information about your organization such as the legal name, size, and publicly available revenue, to assist us in offering services that are appropriate to your organization’s needs.
Other interactions:
- Social media: Your messages, posts and other interactions with our brand and social media accounts.
- Email interactions and analytics: Information on how you engage with our emails such as email open and click rates, whether a link is clicked, which web pages are visited after opening the email, the type of browser and email clients you use, and general location (i.e., country and region) information.
- Teleconference, videoconference, and other meetings: Your preferences, feedback, opinions and business needs.
- Accessing resources (e.g., videos, whitepapers or case studies) on our website: Your name and contact information, and engagement analytics such as the type and frequency of resources accessed, viewed and downloaded.
Browsing our websites
When you browse our websites, we collect information about you as described below, some of which is collected automatically:
- When you use automated chat functionality (chatbots) to make an inquiry, provide feedback, or make another request, we may collect information about you such as your name and email address, your specific feedback or request, and information related to your use of our Services.
- AdVantage Media Africa and our authorized service providers use cookies and other similar tracking technologies on our websites and Services including web beacons, pixels, and software tokens. These are described in our Cookie Notice.
- Aggregated website usage data including form analysis data (such as time taken to complete the form), engagement rate, session replay, and mouse movements.
How do we use your information?
We use your information for the purposes described below:
Providing and securing our Services
- We need to identify and authenticate our users to ensure, for example, that only those authorized users are able to use the Services for their organization, and to make changes to their accounts.
- We use information that you provide when signing up to set up your account, process payments, contact you regarding the Services, and manage your account.
- We use your contact information and information related to your request to respond to your inquiries, manage our contract with you, respond to your questions and requests, and send you updates and information about the Services.
- We use logging and other data such as general location information—for example, the IP address of your browser or device, to help us manage the performance, security and compliance of the Services.
- Where you have chosen to share your specific location information, we use this information to provide location-based features, such as enabling you to share your location on your posts for Social Networks that support this functionality, and to use any functionality that relies on location information.
- We analyze usage information, your feedback, support queries, and survey responses to identify issues and help us understand how you use the Services so that we can make improvements to our Services.
- We use Content, information that you send and receive through Social Networks, and other information from these Social Networks (such as your messages, posts, comments, images, advertising, and other material you curate on and upload to the Services) in order to provide the Services.
Communicating with you
We use your contact information where appropriate to send you information about our Services, events, marketing communications (consistent with your preferences—see “Marketing emails, advertising and website browsing” below), and job opportunities.
We use email statistics, such as open rates, to assess the effectiveness of, and to make improvements to our communications. We also use engagement analytics to better understand your needs so that we can provide the information and services that would be more suitable for you.
Improving our websites and applications
We use information about you to help us understand usage patterns and other activities on our websites and applications so that we can diagnose problems and make improvements, including enhancing usability and security. We also use website personalization software to help us present information on our websites that may be more relevant to you, such as displaying resources applicable to your industry or organization size.
If you choose to provide information about you, your usage of social media services and other feedback during telephone calls and other interactions to our customer support and sales teams, we may use, monitor, and record this information for training purposes, to make improvements to our internal sales and marketing processes, and to improve our Services.
What are your rights regarding the information about you?
Services information
When using our Services, you may access, update, or correct most of your Account information by logging in to your account to edit your profile or organization record.
If you have requests that cannot be carried out by logging in to your account, such as accessing additional information or deleting information about you, please email our privacy team. Please note that we may need to retain certain information about you for as long as you maintain an account for our Services, to provide you with our Services, for record keeping purposes, for payment processing, to comply with our legal and regulatory obligations, to resolve disputes, or to enforce our agreements.
Marketing emails, advertising, and website browsing
You can unsubscribe from marketing emails by following the unsubscribe instructions included in each email or by logging in to your account and changing your email preferences. For other requests, please email our privacy team.
To provide you with a more personalized website experience, we use cookies which can be managed in our Cookie Preference Center.
You may have additional rights under applicable law, such as the right to request access to and deletion of the information we hold about you. For more information about your rights, or if you need assistance submitting a request, please contact us.
Information from children
We do not knowingly collect personal information from children under the age of 18. If we become aware that we have collected personal information from a child under the age of 18 without verification of parental consent, we will take steps to delete that information from our records.
How do we share your information?
We share your information as outlined below, and where individuals have provided consent, where applicable.
Sharing with service providers
We share your information with service providers, including our payment processors, cloud storage providers, customer support software providers, and others that help us to provide the Services and operate our business. For example, we use cloud services to store our records and manage our data. These service providers may need to access your information in order to perform services on our behalf, such as helping us send emails, hosting our website, and providing customer support. We require these service providers to enter into legally binding contracts that reflect the principles and requirements of applicable privacy laws.
Sharing with third-party services
If you choose to integrate Third-Party Services with our Services, we will share your information as reasonably necessary to facilitate use of the Third-Party Services. For example, when you sign up for a paid service, we may share your payment information with our payment processor. When you use the Social Networks or Third-Party Services through our platform, your information will be shared with them in order to enable your use of those services. This may include, for example, the social profile information and Content that you choose to share.
Compliance with legal obligations
We may be required to disclose information about you to comply with legal requirements, such as in response to a subpoena, court order, or other governmental request. We may also disclose your information to establish or exercise our legal rights or defend against legal claims.
Business transfers
If we are involved in a merger, acquisition, or sale of all or a portion of our assets, your information may be transferred as part of that transaction. We will notify you, where required by law, about any such transfer and provide you with the opportunity to exercise your rights regarding your information.
Security of your information
We have implemented appropriate technical and organizational measures designed to protect your information from unauthorized access, use, or disclosure. For example, we use encryption, firewalls, and secure access controls to protect your information. We also conduct regular security assessments and audits to ensure the ongoing security of our systems.
Who Has Access to Your Information?
AdVantage Media Africa does not rent or sell your information. We restrict access to your information to authorized employees and do not share your information with third parties except in the circumstances explained below.
Employees and Authorized Contractors
Our employees and authorized contractors may need to access information about you when they require this information to perform their job. For example, a customer support representative would need access to your account to validate your identity and respond to your question or request; our email communications team would need access to your contact information to ensure this information is sent correctly and any unsubscribe requests are properly managed; and our security staff would need to review information to investigate attempted denial of service attacks, fraudulent account activity, or other attempts to compromise the Services.
All our employees and contractors are required to agree to maintain the confidentiality and protect the privacy of your information.
Service Providers, Authorized Resellers, and Partners
We will share limited information about you with authorized service providers we use for marketing services, communicating with you, managing our customer database, the provision of professional services, and providing and managing the Services (including hosting data centers, securing our Services, and payment processing).
We limit the number of service providers who are permitted to process your Content for the purpose of assisting us in delivering the Services. We refer to these service providers as "subprocessors," and they are listed on this page.
Where you have purchased a service from an authorized reseller or partner, we may provide information about you to (and may receive information about you from) the reseller or partner as necessary to support your use of the service you purchased.
When sharing your information with any of the above service providers, resellers, and partners, we ensure they agree to obligations consistent with this Privacy Policy and any other appropriate confidentiality and security measures, and only use your information to carry out the Services and your requests.
We may also participate in and run marketing events (e.g. virtual conferences, webinars, and provide resources) with sponsors and other organizations. Where the sponsors or other organizations wish to collect your information for their marketing purposes, while we may facilitate this (e.g. information may be collected on the same registration form), they will be doing so independently under their own policies. We will advise you and provide you with an opportunity to share your information with the sponsors or other organizations for such purposes, either upon registration or during the event.
Social Networks and Third-Party Services
Where you are using our Services and have chosen to connect your Social Networks to the Services, or if you authorize a Third-Party Service to access your account, you are agreeing to provide information about you to the Social Networks and the Third-Party Services under their respective terms and privacy policies. For example, if you choose to connect your YouTube account to the Services, this connection uses YouTube’s API services, and the Google Privacy Policy (located here) will apply to you.
Customer Organizations
Where your employer or an entity has purchased Services on your behalf, we may disclose information about you such as your name and email address, and some usage information including whether a user has logged in to the Service, frequency of login, time spent using the Services, and enrollment and completion of AdVantage Media Africa Academy courses to assist your employer or the entity in managing its use and maximizing the value of the Services.
Successor and Affiliated Entities
We may share information about you among AdVantage Media Africa-controlled affiliates and subsidiaries, and they will protect your information in a manner that is consistent with this Privacy Policy and, where applicable, in accordance with the privacy policy specific to the entity.
We may also disclose your information as part of a corporate transaction such as a merger or sale of assets. If we do, we will inform such entities of the requirement to handle your information in accordance with this Privacy Policy, or inform you that you are covered by a new privacy policy.
Law Enforcement, Government Agencies, and Professional Advisors
We may need to disclose information about you where we believe that it is reasonably necessary to comply with a law or regulation, or if we are otherwise legally required to do so, such as in response to a court order or legal process, or to establish, protect, or exercise our legal rights or to defend against legal claims or demands. For governmental data access requests concerning you or your organization, we would first attempt to redirect the request to you and/or we would first attempt to notify you unless we are legally prohibited from doing so.
In addition, we may disclose information about you if we believe it is necessary to investigate, prevent, or take action: (a) against illegal activities, fraud, situations involving potential threats to our rights or property (or to the rights or property of those who use our Services), or to protect the personal safety of any person; or (b) regarding situations that involve the security of our Services, abuse of the Services infrastructure, or the Internet in general (such as voluminous spamming, or denial of service attacks).
We also use professional advisors, including lawyers and accountants, and may be required to disclose information about you when engaging them for their services and as necessary for audits, financial and other regulatory reviews.
What International Data Transfers Occur at AdVantage Media Africa?
Under the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and other data protection laws, information about you may only be transferred from your region to other regions if certain requirements are met. For instance, under the GDPR, information about you may be transferred from the European Economic Area (EEA) to outside the EEA if adequate data protections are in place. Our Services are managed by AdVantage Media Africa’s headquarters in Botswana.
AdVantage Media Africa also uses third-party service providers, such as managed hosting providers, credit card processors, and technology partners to provide the software, networking, infrastructure, and other services required to operate the Services. These third-party providers may process or store personal data on servers outside of the EEA, UK, and Switzerland, including in South Africa or the US. We rely on adequacy (if sent to South Africa) and standard contractual clauses (if sent to the US or onward to other countries) to ensure that information about you is lawfully transferred under EU law. In this case, we have implemented supplementary measures as outlined in the section “How do we safeguard your information?”.
The third-party service providers we use to help us deliver the Services and which process your Content are referred to as “subprocessors” and are listed on this page.
By its nature, social media data can be shared with people around the globe. The Social Networks and Third-Party Services that you choose to integrate with our Services may collect, store, and process your information from various locations around the world according to their own terms and privacy policies.
How Do We Safeguard Your Information?
AdVantage Media Africa maintains industry-standard security safeguards to protect your information. This includes ensuring our employees receive appropriate security and privacy training and guidance so they are aware of the measures they need to implement to protect your information.
Access controls are in place to limit access to your information to those who need it to perform their jobs. For example, information about you may be provided to our customer support specialists to help you with your requests. Individuals who are permitted to handle your information must adhere to confidentiality obligations.
We encrypt data in transit and at rest, where appropriate, to ensure that your information is kept private. We undertake service provider security and privacy reviews to ensure that service providers follow our stringent requirements to safeguard your information, and we also enter into data protection agreements with our service providers. All payment information is fully encrypted and handled only by PCI certified organizations. More detailed information on our security practices is available in our Trust Center and AdVantage Media Africa Security Practices web pages.
How Long Do We Retain Your Information?
In general, AdVantage Media Africa does not permanently store Content from Social Networks. Rather, when you log in to the Services, we retrieve data from Social Networks in real time so that it is displayed in the platform for viewing during your session. We store other Content that you produce (such as draft Content for publication on Social Networks) so that you can easily access this material on the Services. Messages in Inbox are stored for 6 weeks to enable you to take any action required, such as replying to messages. AdVantage Media Africa Analytic products such as Analytics and Insights will store mentions related to our customers from social media audiences for up to 25 months to allow our customers to conduct trending and analysis.
Aggregated data is used by AdVantage Media Africa for analysis, product improvement, and troubleshooting purposes. In some cases, Content may continue to exist on the Social Networks even after you or we delete it from our Services, and you will need to contact the relevant Social Network directly if you want it to remove this Content.
We retain your information as long as required to provide the Services requested by you, for record-keeping purposes, to comply with our legal obligations, resolve disputes, and enforce the terms for the Services. After it is no longer necessary for us to retain information about you, or otherwise upon your request, we will dispose of it in a secure manner or anonymize the information.
Changes to this Privacy Policy
We may update this Privacy Policy from time to time to reflect changes in our practices or applicable law. If we make material changes to this Privacy Policy, we will notify you by posting the updated Privacy Policy on our website or through other appropriate means. Your continued use of our Services after the effective date of the updated Privacy Policy will constitute your acceptance of the changes.
