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Your website is live – designed to your exact specifications. Potential customers are flooding your site with hits, the result of your diligent marketing efforts.
You’re confident in your business. You’re confident in the value you’re offering to your customers.
On paper, the numbers look good. Your site’s traffic is up.
But what are your customers really looking for? What if you knew exactly what they wanted?
What if you could cut down on bounce visits and checkout abandonment?
By using software like Hotjar, Mouseflow, or FullStory, you’ll get almost super-human x-ray-like insights into your site’s activity– potentially bolstering your understanding of your audience and boosting sales in the process.
Best of all – there are no superpowers required.
The only real challenge is picking which session recording service to use! So, we thought we’d take a look at three of your options and look at the advantages and disadvantages of each.
Let’s get started!
Hotjar
See What Your Audience Is Drawn To With Heatmaps
Hotjar’s Heatmaps feature visualizes the activity on your website so you can see what buttons and pages are getting the most attention. This works via a “hot” and “cold” scoring system – areas that are frequently clicked on will display as “hot” areas (warm colors), while areas that are not so popular will be visualized as “cold” (cool colors).
This feature also tracks and reports movement and scrolling behaviour, which can be extremely helpful in revealing exactly where users are becoming disinterested. A feature like this gives you a lot more insight into how you can optimize your content or design as opposed to traditional numbers-based site analytics.
You’ll be able to download and share the Heatmaps generated by Hotjar too – perfect for measuring your site’s performance over time, or for bringing to meetings.
Track User Behaviour With Visitor Recordings
This is where things get a little more interesting.
Hotjar’s visitor recordings feature lets you playback recordings of user sessions on your site. This means you can see exactly where they’re moving their mouse, how long they’re spending on each page, and what they’re inevitably drawn to.
From here, you can organize these recordings by adding notes and tags, making them readily available for reference later. Doing your site optimization homework has never been easier.
Identify Drop-offs
Hotjar also gives you the ability to see exactly where your users are dropping off in your checkout or registration process. This works by simply defining what sequence of activity you’d like Hotjar to track.
For example, maybe it takes them too long to find the option to book an appointment online.
With traditional site analytics, you’d have no idea where you might be losing customers or what might be deterring them from checking out.
Thankfully, Hotjar offers a complete clarification of this process. You’ll be able to see full graph-based views of your site’s sequences and track performance through drop-off percentages and session counters.
Keep Tabs On Your Forms
Your site users generally won’t mind filling out a quick survey or questionnaire. But, ask too much from them, and you’ll likely see your forms being left blank or even ignored entirely.
Hotjar has a way to help you out here, too, with their Form Analysis feature. You’ll be able to see complete breakdowns of each form or entry box, letting you see how much time is being spent on each and where your users are dropping off.
Maximize And Minimize Frustration With User Feedback
Hotjar also offers a number of user engagement features that maximize transparency between you and your customers, and vice-versa.
Through several feedback functions, you can solicit user opinions on your site’s design, answer their questions via automated dialogue boxes, offer surveys, and much more. These forms are fully customizable, and Hotjar offers a wide range of options to fit your specifications.
Pricing
Depending on the number of site visits you’d like to track, Hotjar’s price points scale accordingly and can become quite expensive at the higher tiers. Thankfully, they offer a basic (free) plan to get you started, which can be used for free as long as you’d like, albeit with limited features.
Basic Plan – FREE – collect data from 2,000 pageviews a day with limited reports, unlimited users, and data storage for 3 months.
Plus Plan – $29/month (USD) – collect data from 10,000 pageviews a day with unlimited reports, unlimited users, data storage for 6 months, and a 15-day free trial.
Business Plan – $89-989/month (USD) – collect data from 20,000 pageviews a day and up with unlimited reports, unlimited users, data storage for 1 year, no Hotjar branding, advanced features, and a 15-day free trial.
Mouseflow
Being direct competitors, Mouseflow matches nearly every feature that Hotjar offers – although, they may work a little differently.
This includes Heatmaps, Visitor Recordings, Drop-off Funnels, User Feedback, and Forms. You can even demo their visitor recording feature, which is pretty cool.
The biggest difference between the two services lies in the pricing.
For starters, Mouseflow uses a credit system for their service. This means you’ll still be paying monthly, but every month, you’re allotted a specific number of credits depending on your plan.
Each Mouseflow credit tracks one user session. This is unlike Hotjar, where there are no credits and Hotjar samples the number of sessions you’ve paid for automatically.
This means you’ll have to manage your credits as a resource when using Mouseflow. You can purchase more if you need to, or even distribute your credits to your liking by setting a recording rate.
Pricing
Like Hotjar, Mouseflow also offers a free forever plan, which is a great way to try things out before you commit. If you’re torn between the two, you’ll be able to sign up and use them both and see which one works best for you and your business.
One thing that can be potentially misleading when comparing Hotjar’s pricing to Mouseflow is the terminology. Hotjar’s pageview figures are based on daily visits, while Mouseflow’s plans are measured in monthly figures.
Free Plan – FREE with tracking for 100 sessions monthly, analytics for 1 website, 1 month of storage, Session Replay, Heatmaps, 1 Funnel, 1 Form Analytics, 1 Feedback form
Starter Plan – $29/month (USD) with tracking for 2,500 sessions monthly, analytics for 1 website, 3 months of storage, Session Replay, Heatmaps, 3 Funnels, 3 Form Analytics, 1 Feedback form
Growth Plan – $99/month (USD) with tracking for 10,000 sessions monthly, analytics for 3 websites, 6 months of storage, Session Replay, Heatmaps, 10 Funnels, 10 Form Analytics, 5 Feedback forms PLUS Multiple Users, API, Phone Support, Account Manager
Pro Plan – $399/month (USD) with tracking for 100,000 sessions monthly, analytics for 10 websites, 6 months of storage, Session Replay, Heatmaps, 30 Funnels, 30 Form Analytics, 10 Feedback forms PLUS Multiple Users, API, Phone Support, Account Manager, Custom Development
Enterprise Plan – (price varies) with >100,000 sessions monthly, analytics for unlimited websites, 3-12 months of storage, Session Replay, Heatmaps, Unlimited Funnels, Unlimited Form Analytics, Unlimited Feedback forms PLUS Multiple Users, API, Phone Support, Account Manager, Custom Development
Mouseflow Vs. Hotjar
Here are a few points of comparison:
Data Limitation
Hotjar offers unlimited Heatmaps, Recordings, Forms, Funnels, and Feedback options as long as you’re a paying customer, which starts at $29/month (USD) for the Plus plan. Mouseflow limits the number of Funnels, Forms, and Feedback options unless you’re paying over $399 (USD) for the Enterprise plan.
Phone Support
Mouseflow offers phone support at the Growth plan and up ($99). Hotjar does not offer phone support.
Integrations
Both platforms offer integration with many different web platforms. However, Mouseflow seems to offer many more integration options. Mouseflow also offers access to its API for customized development at the Pro Plan tier ($399 USD) and up. Hotjar does not appear to have API options available as of this writing.
FullStory
Of the three web analytics solutions we’re looking at today, FullStory is definitely the most distinguished. It’s not trying to be Hotjar or Mouseflow, but is similar – it just functions differently.
From the FullStory dashboard, you’ll be able to track clicks, activity, and users through their easy-to-use interface. The difference is, these recordings aren’t only video-based – they’re indexed and organized through FullStory, which creates a comprehensive database of how users are browsing your site.
Once their service has spent some time analyzing your site, you’ll be able to search your own database for specific pages, links, and resources to track activity.
It’s a bit difficult to explain, but you can get a better idea of what this looks like on their website.
Features
Live User Tracking
With FullStory, you can even view how your customers are using your site while they’re using it. It may sound creepy, but the insights you could gather from this feature might be invaluable.
This makes it easier than ever to troubleshoot or determine what aspects of your site could be improved in order to better the end-user experience.
FullStory’s recording is so thorough that it will even report when users click rapidly on something out of frustration or confusion, recording and categorizing these events as “rage clicks.”
View Page Insights With Click Maps
Much like Hotjar or Mouseflow’s Heatmap features, FullStory offers an accurate and insightful way to see where your site viewers are clicking.
With FullStory, you’ll also be able to view specific click trends by using their Inspection Mode. This lets you browse your own site – as it appears to your customers – and simply click on an element (image, link, button, etc.) to view its performance.
Share Statistics, Add Notes, Stay Organized
FullStory also supports notation and commenting so you and your team can organize and share your findings with one another. They also support third-party app integration, meaning you can export your data to platforms like Slack, HipChat, Trello, and more.
Comprehensive Stats And Reports In many Forms
Another great feature of FullStory is just how thorough it is.
You’ll have all the standard options like Click Maps and Session Playback in addition to pie charts and funnels representing the statistics behind every search term, page, link, and button of your site.
There are also a lot of options for organizing and keeping tabs on your users, including custom user attributes. This makes grouping and identifying behavioural trends in your customer base a lot easier.
Pricing
FullStory offers three different plans, as well as optional add-on feature packs that extend functionality.
Free Plan – FREE with tracking for 1,000 monthly sessions, 1 month data storage, 3 User Accounts, Session Playback, OmniSearch, Searchies, Identify API, User Attributes, Dead & Rage Clicks, Integrations, FullStory TV, Session Sharing
Professional Plan – $199/month (USD) with tracking for 25,000 monthly sessions, 1 month data storage, 20 User Accounts, Session Playback, OmniSearch, Searchies, Identify API, User Attributes, Dead & Rage Clicks, Integrations, FullStory TV, Session Sharing, Inspect Mode, Click Maps, Blocking, Error Clicks, JavaScript Console, Live Customer view, Reflection API, User Exporting
Enterprise Plan – (price varies) for high-volume sites. All the features of the Professional plan plus Account Manager, Priority Support, Security Review, Custom Agreement.
FullStory Vs. Hotjar And Mouseflow
With their free plan, FullStory offers invaluable insight at no expense to you, so at the very least, it’s definitely worth your time to try it out and even run it alongside something like Hotjar or Mouseflow.
The main differences between Hotjar and Mouseflow are feature-based. In general, FullStory seems to offer more functionality and more insight into every aspect of your site, even beyond session recording.
FullStory gives you access to graphs, pie charts, and creates a comprehensive database for you to explore and learn from, while Hotjar and Mouseflow seem shallow in comparison.
Regarding price, FullStory is relatively on par with Hotjar and Mouseflow if you adjust for comparison. FullStory’s Pro Plan offers more than double the amount of sessions tracked per month for $199/monthly (USD) when compared to Mouseflow’s Growth Plan, which will run you $99/monthly (USD).
However, FullStory does not offer Heatmaps – at least, not in the color-coded “cold and warm” style of reporting that Hotjar and Mouseflow offer. This may be important to you.
In addition, FullStory’s data retention time is the lowest of the three services – with data expiring after only one month, even with their Pro Plan ($199/monthly, USD). Even Hotjar’s Basic (free) plan offers data retention for up to three months.
In conclusion, coming to a decision about these three platforms will largely depend on which one suits your needs. However, they all offer free plans, so choosing might not be so difficult, if you have to choose at all.
We hope this post has been informative!
For more tips and tricks in the online business world, keep up with us 24/7, five days a week – here at the Yocale blog!
