Have you ever considered insight into customer behavior? What do they do and why? Or why don’t things happen the way you want them to? Then it’s time to see where they click, how long they scroll and get to know their real behavior! As a result, you can easily improve the user experience. You can now use not only a quantitative but also a qualitative tool for the analysis, which is nothing more than a heatmap.
And why is this good for you? Get quickly, easy-to-understand data. Based on these, you can easily change the poorer-performing parts of your website. The better you know how people behave, the better you can optimize your webpage and the user experience. Of course, this also contributes to the conversion.
The Contrast Between Quantitative And Qualitative Details
In quantitative research, you can usually see numerical data. This will show you how well your website has performed over time. You can see the conversion rate, bounce rate, or e.g. leaving the cart. But you can only see from the figures that performance has improved or deteriorated over a period of time. But you will not understand the reasons behind the numbers.
Source: Freepik.com
Thus, qualitative data collection is needed. Using a heatmap can help you to understand the numbers. This will allow you to follow the full path of the site visitor. Its behavior becomes easy to interpret. You can get virtually insight into what your visitors are experiencing on the website. What did they like, where were they stuck, and so on? If you understand them, you can easily increase both the conversions and the user experience.
Now Let’s Move On To Heatmaps!
It is practically a visual storytelling tool. Facilitates easier understanding of numerical data. The heatmap also shows the negative and positive properties of the website. It also becomes visible when a visitor clicks on a location that is not clickable. With this in mind, the website can be easily optimized and the user experience is guaranteed to be better!
Information can be interpreted visually using colors. The darker colors are the ones that show the busiest places. They are marked in red or orange on this tool. Less visited places are displayed in a light color. Such can be e.g. also yellow or light green. To make this simple to understand, here’s a heatmap.
Source: Capturly.com
It is clear that the colors also outline busy and lost places. This makes it easy and effective to get information about areas of the site that are working well and poorly. All you need to do is find the ideal tool type and enjoy the spectacular data! Now let’s look at the main heatmap types that can be very helpful in developing your webpage and its user experience.
The Main Types of This Qualitative Tool
To select the right tool you need to know what you want to examine. You can even use all sorts of them, but it’s worth applying them in a targeted way. Find out what kind fits your problem, here is a brief introduction. This will assist you in determining when to use which one.
First, let’s look at a click map that is probably known to everyone. You can keep track of where visitors clicked and where they didn’t. You can easily filter out broken links or buttons. The most clicked and neglected areas will also be visible. This type of heatmap helps to increase the conversions and the user experience.
Next is the scrolling map, which uses colors to visually show how long visitors have scrolled on your page. Not only can you see how long they are scrolling down. You can also easily recognize how much time is being spent on a particular scrolling stage. This makes the places where visitors spend more time visible. By the way, the buttons, links, or important information should be placed here.
Source: Capturly.com
And finally, a few words about the mouse tracking map and the segment heatmap. The former can be important because moving the mouse is often the same as moving the eye. So the visitor moves their mouse to what interests them. The latter shows where each visitor is coming from. At the same time, you can see where those coming from each source are clicking.
What Are The Benefits of Using a Heatmap?
First of all, of course, you will understand the reason for the behavior of your visitors. You’ll find 404 pages, non-clickable CTAs, or clickable but hard-to-notice buttons. You will also know which areas of your website are the most effective. When placing an internal link or CTAs, this tool provides guidance on where to do this. If you pay attention to all these little things, you can significantly improve the user experience.
And once we’re here, it’s also important to pay attention to where and what image you’re placing. It is worth using some images on the webpage that show a face or eyes. Just think about it! If the face or eye in the picture is facing a CTA, you already have a winning case. People will automatically look at and move their mouse where the eye looks in the picture.
Source: Webfx.com
You have to pay attention to all of the above, as it is often said that a lot of little things go a long way. To get the best user experience, you need to pay attention to a lot of small and big things. The appearance of the website is completely different on desktops or phones. After all, we often come across websites that work great on a desktop computer and then fall apart on the phone.
This will obviously scare away visitors, which you probably wouldn’t be happy about either. The problem is that nowadays a significant part of people manage their affairs and purchases by phone. The lesson, then, is that the heat map should also be used to optimize our website for your phone, and not to forget the user experience with your phone.
Summary
So if you would like to have a quality website for yourself, you really need quality data. No matter how perfect the product or service you provide, if your site doesn’t win the liking of your visitors. Nowadays, a heatmap is an essential tool for a proper user experience and for optimizing a website. Use it to save time and energy, while also providing you with valuable information.
This qualitative research tool can be the right hand for either you or a marketer. It will help you make the best decision that will help your site continue to grow. All you have to do is decide what you want to examine and which heatmap is right for you. Understand the behavior of your visitors, generate a better user experience, and outperform your competitors!
