What this is
This guide explains how the Propensity Website Tracker behaves when a visitor has not accepted cookies, so you and your privacy or technical team can decide how to configure your consent management platform (CMP), such as Cookiebot or a similar tool.
This article describes Propensity's tracking behavior only. It is not legal or privacy advice.
When to use this
Use this guide when you want to:
Understand what the Website Tracker can and can't do when cookies are blocked or not yet accepted
Decide how your CMP should be configured around the Propensity tracker
Test your implementation across different consent states before rollout
Cookies vs. the tracker running
These are two different things. Blocking cookies does not necessarily prevent the Propensity tracker, or requests to the contact-matching service, from running.
If you want to prevent all Propensity tracking before consent, your CMP needs to prevent both the tracker script and the code that starts it from running until consent is granted.
What can work without cookies
If the tracker is allowed to run, it can still send page details, the referring website, IP address, and browser information. Page tracking can continue, and Propensity can attempt to identify the visiting company using its IP address. A company match is not guaranteed.
Contact-level identification
Contact identification uses a separate matching service and may rely on multiple available signals, including cookies. When cookies are unavailable, fewer signals may be available for matching, which can reduce the ability to identify an individual visitor.
This does not affect company-level identification, which is separate from contact identification and uses IP-based matching rather than cookies.
Summary: with cookies vs. without cookies
The table below assumes the Propensity Website Tracker is allowed to run. If your CMP blocks the tracker itself until consent is provided, Propensity will not receive tracking information until the visitor consents.
| Capability | With cookies | Without cookies |
| Company identification | Propensity can attempt to identify the visiting company using its IP address. | Still works. Company identification is IP-based and does not require cookies. |
| Page tracking | Propensity can record pages visited and associate activity using the available visitor signals. | Still works. Page visits can be recorded while the tracker is running, although continuity across visits may be more limited. |
| Contact identification | Propensity can use cookies along with other available signals to attempt to identify an individual visitor. Identification is not guaranteed. | May be limited. Without cookies, fewer signals are available for matching, which can reduce Propensity's ability to identify an individual visitor. |
| Campaign and referral data | Landing-page and referral information can be captured when the tracker runs. | Partially available. Landing-page and referral information can still be captured, but connecting activity across multiple visits may be more limited without cookies. |
| Visitor qualification | Propensity can use available company and contact information to evaluate the visitor against your qualification criteria. | Company-level qualification can still work. Person-specific qualification may be limited when the individual visitor cannot be identified. |
In short, the Website Tracker doesn't need cookies to operate. Without them, Propensity can still record page activity and attempt to identify the visiting company. Cookies add extra signal that helps identify an individual contact and connect their activity across visits.
Configuring your CMP
The Propensity tracker does not automatically respond to your CMP's consent choices. Keep your existing Propensity embed as-is, and configure your CMP to control when the tracker is allowed to run, based on your own privacy and consent requirements.
Testing your implementation
Before rollout, test your implementation for accepting, rejecting, and withdrawing consent to confirm the tracker behaves as intended in each state.
Important notes
This article is not legal or privacy advice. Consult your own privacy or legal team to determine your consent requirements
Propensity does not prescribe which consent category the tracker should be placed in within your CMP
Cookies are not strictly required for the Website Tracker to run. Account-level tracking does not use cookies at all; see How to Set Up the Website Tracker
For more on how contact matching works, see Contact Website Tracker FAQs