Websites & CRO
Heatmap
A visual overlay showing where visitors click, move, and scroll on a page, with hot colors marking the most-used areas.
Definition
A heatmap is a visualization that aggregates visitor behavior on a page — clicks, mouse movement, and scroll depth — into a color-coded overlay. Warm colors show where attention and activity concentrate, while cool or blank areas show what's being ignored, making it easy to see how people actually use a page.
In depth
Heatmaps come in a few flavors. Click maps show where people tap or click, including clicks on things that aren't links (a sign they expected something to be clickable). Scroll maps show how far down the page people get, revealing where they drop off. Move maps track cursor movement as a rough proxy for where eyes go. Together they turn vague questions like 'is anyone seeing our offer?' into a picture you can read at a glance.
They matter because analytics tells you what happened but not why. A heatmap shows you that visitors never scroll to the form, or that they keep clicking a headline that isn't a link, or that everyone ignores the section you thought was important. That's the kind of insight that turns into a specific, testable change instead of a guess.
WellBuilt uses heatmaps as a starting point for hypotheses, not as proof on their own. A scroll map showing a big drop-off above the form is a reason to move the form up and test it — not a finished conclusion. We pair heatmaps with session recordings and then validate the fix with an A/B test, so we're acting on evidence rather than a pretty picture.
Worked example
On a remodeler's project page, a scroll heatmap shows that only 30% of visitors reach the estimate-request form near the bottom. The team moves a shortened form higher up, and form starts climb.
Websites & CRO
Want this run for you, not just read about?
Turn the traffic you already pay for into qualified leads with pages built to convert.