Who We Are
Value Add VC (valueaddvc.com) and Value Add Pulse are properties of Value Add Holdings LLC, built by Trace Cohen. We publish free dashboards, data tools, and analysis for founders, VCs, LPs, and operators. This policy explains how we handle data when you use our sites.
What We Collect
We collect minimal data to keep the site running and improve the experience:
- Analytics: We use Vercel Web Analytics and Speed Insights (anonymized page views and performance metrics, no cookies, no personal identifiers), Google Analytics (aggregate traffic and engagement metrics), and Microsoft Clarity (session behavior analytics — how visitors scroll and click — used to improve the site, not to identify individuals). Google Analytics and Clarity each set their own cookies; see Cookies below.
- Server logs: Standard web server logs include IP addresses, browser type, and pages visited. These are retained for security and debugging purposes and are not shared with third parties.
- Newsletter: Our newsletter runs on Substack. The signup boxes on this site are Substack's own form, loaded from tracecohen.substack.com when you scroll near a box, tap it or the signup popup opens, before you type anything. That form runs Substack's own scripts, including its analytics and Google tags (among them a Google Ads tag), which may set Substack and Google cookies under their own policies. When you subscribe, your email address goes to Substack and is stored under Substack's privacy policy. We do not sell or share subscriber emails.
- Tool and beta forms: The SEO Score scanner, the watchlist alert beta and the suggest-a-correction form send your email address (and, for the scanner, the site you scanned; for corrections, your note) to a private Google Sheet through Google Apps Script. Newsletter signups made on this site before September 30, 2026 are stored there too.
- MCP server: When an AI assistant using our MCP server looks up a company or investor we don't have, we store the normalized search text, the tool name, a count and minute-level times in Vercel Blob so we know what to research next. Searches that look like an email, phone number, URL or ID are dropped, and no IP address, user agent, account or conversation content is stored with these records. Each night our research job searches each processed name once on the public web to classify it, then discards it: only names identified as companies or investment firms are kept (in our research report and, if verified, our database); for anything else we keep at most a count, plus a one-way hash for 14 days so the same text is not searched twice. If a name turns out to be a private individual, we stop and keep nothing about them. Misses the job has not processed within 14 days of first being seen are deleted.
- Contact forms: If you email us directly at t@nyvp.com, your message and email address are stored in standard email systems.
Cookies
Google Analytics and Microsoft Clarity each set their own cookies to distinguish visitors between sessions; neither is used to identify you personally. A small number of consumer pages (for example our movie, sports and NYC data pages — never the venture-capital, company or Pulse pages) display ads served by Google AdSense, which uses cookies and similar identifiers to serve and measure ads; Google's use of advertising data is described at policies.google.com/technologies/ads, and you can opt out of personalized ads at adssettings.google.com. Some third-party embeds (e.g., YouTube videos, affiliate tool links, the Substack newsletter signup form) may set their own cookies according to their respective privacy policies. We recommend using your browser's cookie settings to manage these, or Google's and Microsoft's own opt-out tools (Google Analytics opt-out, Microsoft Clarity).
Affiliate Links
Our recommended tools section contains affiliate links. When you click through and purchase a product, we may earn a commission at no additional cost to you. Affiliate relationships do not influence our editorial content or dashboard data.
Data We Do Not Collect
- We do not sell personal data to third parties.
- We do not use retargeting or behavioral advertising.
- We do not collect financial information, passwords, or sensitive personal data.
- We do not use fingerprinting or cross-site tracking technologies.
Third-Party Services
The site is hosted on Vercel. Newsletter signup and delivery are handled by Substack. Tool and beta form submissions are stored in Google Sheets. Content is stored on GitHub. Traffic and behavior analytics are handled by Google Analytics and Microsoft Clarity. Each service processes data according to its own privacy policy. We do not share your data with any other third parties.
Your Rights
You can request deletion of any data we hold about you (primarily newsletter subscription) by emailing t@nyvp.com. If you are a California resident, you have additional rights under the CCPA. If you are in the EU/EEA, you have rights under GDPR including access, rectification, and erasure. Contact us and we will respond within 30 days.
Changes to This Policy
We may update this policy as our practices change. Updates will be posted on this page with a revised date. We do not notify users of minor changes; material changes affecting data collection will be announced via the site or newsletter.
Contact
Questions about this privacy policy? Email t@nyvp.com or visit our contact page.