Have you ever wondered what site visitors do on your website? If you’ve ever wanted to discover how far down a page they scroll, you don’t have to wonder anymore. If you want to know how many visitors click on linked texts or action buttons, you can.
With a site heatmap, you can track these behaviours and more. Learn how valuable this tool is for your business or professional website with this comprehensive guide. If you don’t have to determine and incorporate it on your website, the best website design agencies can easily take care of it for your business.
What Is a Site Heatmap?
If you Google website heatmap, you’ll get a long list of results. Some offers for free tools and guides to heatmaps will appear. But you’ll also see too many options to choose from.
You’ll also see a definition of a heatmap as a visual tool used to track and generate interaction data. This tool varies colors from cooler to warmer tones to indicate the level of interaction. The warmer a color (e.g., orange or red), the more interaction that portion of a webpage receives.
There are many types of heatmaps, too. Each type offers different kinds of interaction data for you to explore. Ideally, you know exactly what data you need, making it easier to choose a heatmap type.
Each Type of Website Heatmap Tool
There are four major types of a heatmap. Each of these types is broken down in detail for you below. You’ll also learn who and how you can best benefit from each specific type.
Click Map
A click tracking site heatmap tracks where visitors click on anywhere on a landing page. This provides valuable data on whether customers interact with specific calls to action. For example, if you’re getting fewer clicks on a subscription button for an email newsletter, you need to know.
Scroll Map
You can use this information to help your buttons stand out more. You can use scroll maps to do something similar, too. A scroll map tracks how far down a webpage visitors scroll.
To evaluate page length and explore the impact of the page fold, scroll maps are essential. A scroll map can inform the actual user experience if you produce long-form sales or marketing content. Scroll maps are great for optimizing a website.
Hover Map
Hover maps help you assess where visitors leave their mouse cursor and how they move it across any given landing page. This gives you accurate historical interaction data to see where their attention is called first. If you’ve designed a page’s content to draw action, you need this tool.
Although click tracking helps, a hover map extends the data generated. It helps correlate other interaction data and confirm potential behavior patterns from site visitors. Alone, it is less reliable as a source of information.
Eye Tracking
Eye-tracking maps take hover maps a step further. They require external hardware to function and are usually inaccessible for your basic website. These are often used in specific studies for learning about human behavior.
If you have the time or resources, investing in eye-tracking software can greatly boost your interaction data. Of course, using a reliable site heatmap provider like decibel.com is the first step. Without the other heatmaps described here, you won’t know if your eye-tracking investment is worthwhile.
What the Best Heatmap Tools Have to Offer
If you’re not yet convinced about why you need a website heatmap tool, let’s cover a few benefits. You can get a basic heatmap website tool-free (although the best ones are worth an investment).
1. Boost Your CTAs
Calls to action are essential for any website. Even if you don’t sell a single thing but want user engagement, you’ll still use a CTA. A site heatmap can show you just how effective your current CTAs are.
Because web design includes calls to action, heatmaps can generate valuable data. If you hyperlink text and want to check on your backlink portfolio, a heatmap can show you. If you want to evaluate your current clickable lead magnets, a heatmap can show you.
2. Improve User Experience
You can also do more than evaluate single aspects of a webpage like the CTAs. If you’re looking to elevate your user experience with page scroll and load time, a heatmap can help. If you find users lingering on areas of a page you hadn’t designed for, change it.
If users click or scroll for certain features of a page, develop your site for that. Instead of making users scroll to the page’s end for a resource, offer a popup. If certain images are getting clicked, but they don’t link anywhere, fix it. Make your site more intuitive to improve the visitor experience.
3. Decrease Cart Abandonment
For websites specifically crafted to offer goods, heatmaps help. One of the biggest issues for e-commerce is cart abandonment. This happens for several reasons and understanding why can save your business.
If you need more popup reminders or incentives, a heatmap can demonstrate it. It may also reveal gaps in the user experience that impair a visitor’s purchase path. Using a heatmap can uncover obstacles you never anticipated, making it easier to stop cart abandonment.
Learn About Your Users and How to Take Action On Data
Collecting user data is the way of the future for any digital business. No matter your company size, you’ll benefit from a heatmap if you sell goods or services online. Gathering consistent, unbiased data is next to impossible without tools like a site heatmap.
Once you find a reliable heatmap provider like decibel.com, you still need to take action on that data. Find out more about how to act on user data with our other articles. Explore new ways to elevate your business and expand its growth.