What is SalesViewerBot?

SalesViewerBot is a bot in the advertising and marketing bots category, operated by SalesViewer GmbH.

Bot name
SalesViewerBot
Operator
SalesViewer GmbH
Type
Bot
Respects robots.txt
Not confirmed
robots.txt user agent
page-preview-tool
Signs requests (Web Bot Auth)
No

About SalesViewerBot

Since we offer sales and marketing information we need to enrich the company information. To provide crucial company information inside our service we need to provide a preview of visitor websites. Therefore we need to visit the websites.

Advertising bots review landing pages, check ad placements and classify pages for brand safety and contextual targeting. Blocking ad verification bots can stop your ads or your inventory from serving, so allow the ones your ad partners use.

SalesViewerBot user agent

SalesViewerBot identifies itself with this user agent string:

  • page-preview-tool Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/80.0.3987.132 Safari/537.36

Anyone can copy a user agent string. Transfon Security also checks where each request comes from, so a request that claims to be a known crawler but comes from the wrong network is treated as a fake, not as the real crawler.

How to block SalesViewerBot in robots.txt

We have not confirmed whether SalesViewerBot follows robots.txt. Add a rule, then check your logs to see that it stopped. robots.txt is a plain text file at the root of your domain, such as https://example.com/robots.txt.

Block SalesViewerBot from the whole site

User-agent: page-preview-tool
Disallow: /

Block SalesViewerBot from some folders

User-agent: page-preview-tool
Disallow: /private/
Disallow: /search

Allow SalesViewerBot only on some folders

User-agent: page-preview-tool
Allow: /blog/
Disallow: /

Allow SalesViewerBot and block other crawlers

User-agent: page-preview-tool
Allow: /

User-agent: *
Disallow: /

Things to know

  • Each host needs its own file. Rules on www.example.com do not apply to shop.example.com.
  • A crawler obeys only the most specific group that names it. Once you add a User-agent: page-preview-tool group, SalesViewerBot ignores your User-agent: * rules, so repeat any that should still apply.
  • The user agent name is not case sensitive. We take page-preview-tool from SalesViewerBot's user agent; check SalesViewer GmbH's own documentation if it publishes a different robots.txt name.
  • Crawlers cache robots.txt, so changes can take up to a day to apply. Disallow stops crawling but does not remove pages already collected or indexed.

Limits of robots.txt

  1. SalesViewerBot may not follow the rule. robots.txt is a request that nothing enforces, and we have not confirmed that SalesViewerBot follows it. Check your logs after adding a rule.
  2. The user agent could be fake. robots.txt matches the name a request claims. Anyone can send SalesViewerBot's user agent, and a scraper using it is not bound by SalesViewer GmbH's robots.txt policy. Only checking the source network tells a real SalesViewerBot from a fake one.

Treat robots.txt as a statement of your policy, and enforce it where requests arrive.

Who should care about SalesViewerBot

Publishers

Ad verification and contextual crawlers like SalesViewerBot can decide whether your pages get demand. Blocking the ones your partners use can lower fill rates.

Transfon Security for publishers

Media buyers and advertisers

SalesViewerBot checks pages for ad platforms. Its visits to landing pages are not users, so exclude them from conversion data.

Transfon Security for advertisers

E-commerce

Ad platforms send crawlers like SalesViewerBot to check product landing pages. Keep it allowed so ads are not disapproved, and out of analytics.

Transfon Security for e-commerce

SaaS and APIs

Allow SalesViewerBot on landing pages linked from your ads, and keep it off the app.

Transfon Security for SaaS and APIs

Block SalesViewerBot with Transfon Security

robots.txt is a request, not an enforcement. Transfon Security shows SalesViewerBot by name in the Top Bots report, so you can see how often it visits and which pages it reads. Block or allow it with a User Agent rule, or slow it down with a rate limit decision rule.

Transfon Security

Control SalesViewerBot on your site

  • See every SalesViewerBot visit and the pages it reads
  • Spot bots that fake trusted crawler names
  • Block, allow or rate limit SalesViewerBot with one rule
  • Works with or without robots.txt support

Frequently asked questions

What is SalesViewerBot?

SalesViewerBot is a bot in the advertising and marketing bots category, operated by SalesViewer GmbH. Since we offer sales and marketing information we need to enrich the company information. To provide crucial company information inside our service we need to provide a preview of visitor websites. Therefore we need to visit the websites.

Does SalesViewerBot respect robots.txt?

We have not confirmed whether SalesViewerBot follows robots.txt. Add a robots.txt rule, then check your logs to see that it stopped, and block it by user agent if it did not.

How do I block SalesViewerBot?

Add "User-agent: page-preview-tool" followed by "Disallow: /" to the robots.txt file at the root of your site. To enforce it, block requests whose user agent contains "page-preview-tool" at your WAF. In Transfon Security that is one User Agent block rule.

Is robots.txt enough to block SalesViewerBot?

No. robots.txt is voluntary, so SalesViewerBot may not follow it, and anyone can send SalesViewerBot's user agent, so a fake SalesViewerBot ignores your rule. Enforce the rule where requests arrive, at your WAF, and check the source network.

Should I block SalesViewerBot?

Advertising bots review landing pages, check ad placements and classify pages for brand safety and contextual targeting. Blocking ad verification bots can stop your ads or your inventory from serving, so allow the ones your ad partners use.

Related bots

All advertising and marketing bots · Full bot directory

See Which Bots Visit Your Site

Transfon Security identifies every bot in this directory in your traffic reports, flags fake search crawlers, and lets you allow, block or rate limit each bot.

Stay ahead of the publishing curve

Privacy, security, monetization, and performance insights. A few emails a month, no spam.

By subscribing you agree to our privacy policy.