How to improve your site with Heat Maps

We went through 1,000,000+ Heat Map Clicks and learned a lot

Feb 25th, 2015

With Heat Maps, you can see exactly how visitors use your site.

Instead of guessing, you’ll know exactly how to transform the design, flow and layout of your website to make visitors (and your bottom line) happy.

Within a week, you’ll get super actionable information that you can use to generate more leads and sales from your site.

Today, we’re going to give you the 3 steps to set up your own Heat Maps and get the most out of them.

Step #1: Pick your first page to test

Don’t test everything right away — that will lead to analysis by paralysis. Instead, focus on one or two of your most important pages to set up a Heat Maps campaign. If you have a blog, focus on your homepage. If you have an ecommerce store, set up a heat map on your best selling product’s page.

Step #2: Picking an objective

Your first step is to choose a goal for each page. Let’s use your homepage as an example. What is the #1 thing you want every visitor to do on your homepage?

Examples of your #1 thing might be:

• Sign up to an email list
• Download an App
• Schedule a meeting
• Subscribe to a trial period

Write your goal down on a piece of paper. If you are setting up heat maps on multiple pages, pick an objective for each page. You probably want to start off with one page until you get the hang of it.

Step #3: Use your Heat Map to get more conversions

Run your heat map for at least one week. (If your site receives fewer than 10,000 visits a month, allow your heat map to run for 3 to 4 weeks.) Now it’s time to look at the Heat Map to make the information as valuable as possible. That way, you can transform the design, flow, and layout of your website for better results.

Questions to ask for analysis:

• Is my #1 objective the most clicked / hottest spot?
• What 3 areas are being the most clicked?
• What hot spots were unexpected?
• What type of medium received the most clicks (images, video, text, buttons)?
• Which images received more clicks than others on the same page?

Taking action:

• How can I repurpose the hot spots to achieve my #1 objective?
• What hot spots / links can I remove that distract from my objective?
• How can I add more of the content (images/video/text) that my audience engages with?

Now, what should you do with the heat map information after you’ve let it run and analyzed it?

Begin by making small changes that are within immediate reach. For example, remove underperforming images and links in the sidebar or menu.

While the data from your new Heat Map may seem obvious, it can help you see what needs to change. The most powerful way to use a Heat Map is to use an existing “hot spot” on your heat map to achieve your objective. If an area is already receiving a high number of clicks, leverage it to point to the content or action you want your visitor to take.

Make sure you don’t miss out on any valuable clicks

With Heat Maps Pro, you can record more than 1,000 clicks per campaign on a page.

Click here to try out Heat Maps Pro for free. Cancel at anytime!