10 Proven Ways Heatmap Software Improves Website Conversions

Heatmap software is critical in improving website conversions. Why? Because it provides customer-centric insights. 

In the online market, businesses that are customer-centric are 60% more profitable than businesses that are not.

Using heatmaps to track factors such as usability, compare A/B landing pages and content engagement across channels optimises online conversions by addressing issues faced by real users. 

How heatmaps benefit your customers

Customer experience is one of the most important factors in business success. 

Website heatmap software like Matomo offers unique insights into customer behaviour that is then used to improve their experience, usability and engagement. 

Data analysis captures information on how many people complete a sales funnel or bounce from a website. Behavioural analytics like heatmaps can show you why they bounce.

This benefits your customers (and therefore your bottom line) because it puts the focus on them and their needs.

10 ways heatmap software helps increase website conversions

#1. Improve UX/Usability 

Heatmap analytics improve usability by identifying where you are losing customers on your website.

Forrester research indicates that improving user experience can improve conversions by up to 400%, and on average every $1 spent on UX has a return of $100. 

For example, you may have a CTA button but customers never click it to reach the payment page. 

Heatmaps show you how customers interact with your website naturally so that you can adjust it according to their needs.

Using heatmap analytics to improve usability boosts conversions because it improves customer experiences. 88% of online consumers say that they wouldn’t even bother returning to a website after a bad experience. 

#2. Website design and content structure 

Another way that heatmaps can improve conversions is to analyse your website design and content structure. 

You might be wondering how often a specific ad or a banner was displayed and viewed by your visitors on any of your pages and how often a visitor actually interacted with them. These two parts of the analysis are called content impression and content interaction.

Ideally, your website elements such as banners, listings, buttons and thumbnails will entice customers to click and find out more. 

Heatmaps and click maps analyse

1. How many impressions the content has (e.g. a banner), and
2. What percent of users that see the content click on it 

For example,  you may have a banner with high impressions but low click-through rates. Tracking content interactions optimises your website by showing which elements or CTAs need more visibility. 

#3. A/B testing

Heatmaps provide invaluable data on which landing pages are converting the best. Not only that, but session recordings and heatmap data can show you exactly why one is converting better so that you can replicate the results to increase conversions on other landing pages.

Tracking heatmap updates on different versions of the same sales page will help confirm creative solutions faster than feedback alone. 

Ultimately this kind of comparison increases your ROI faster because you are not guessing why some customers are converting and others are not. 

#4. Conversion Funnel

Using heatmap software in sales funnels lets you visualise user behaviour at each stage of the conversion process. 

For example, if many customers are dropping off a payment page, heatmaps can indicate whether it is a usability issue such as pop ups, lack of clarity with payment buttons or something web developers haven’t seen from the back end. 

These analytics improve conversions by reducing friction in sales funnels as much as possible. 

#5. Content engagement across channels 

Optimising websites across all channels is now expected for online businesses. 

Bad mobile optimisation annoys 48% of online shoppers, and if your web page takes longer than 3 seconds to load, 53% of visitors will simply click away. 

You can use heatmaps to improve engagement by tracking mouse activity, clicks and scrolling. This helps improve conversions by confirming 

• How invested a user is in the page 
• How easy it is to navigate your website and content on different devices 
• What is your most viewed content and what to push more of 
• How users generally move through your website on different devices 
• How clear your messaging is (e.g. high click through rate but low engagement could indicate they aren’t finding what they’re looking for once they click on a CTA)

#6. Above the fold analysis 

Although a well-used web development term, above the fold is still one of the most important factors in heatmap analysis. 

Above the fold analysis gives you insight into a customer’s first impression of a page. 

An example of above-the-fold heatmaps in action could be a page with a video explanation. Say you have a landing page with a video below the fold that explains why someone should buy and has a CTA button underneath. If there are a lot of page visitors but very few people scrolling below the fold, you can see why hardly any visitors are watching the video or engaging with the CTA button. 

Insights like this would inform further development such as including important video content above the fold or updating header copy to encourage visitors to scroll down the page more often.