Cheaper Eye Tracking Increases Relative Value of Heatmaps
There are many who swear by eye tracking heatmaps, saying the visuals are effective and can help us to understand where a viewer is looking as they peruse a website. And of course there are many that say that while a heatmap may show us exactly where someone looks, it doesn’t show us what they are thinking while they do it. Fast Company has written an article that lands on the heatmaps-are-effective end of the spectrum, discussing how inexpensive software applications can be found with a little detective work.
Eye trackers are expensive – we know this. But the price for knowing what part of a website attracts a viewer’s gaze is worth it to some, especially curious companies. Heatmaps can help a business figure out whether a design is user-friendly or confusing, and at the same time show what visitors find most appealing. Until recently eye trackers and the accompanying equipment and software could cost anywhere from $10,000 to $15,000 a system. Developments like the $50 DIY EyeWriter, however, are changing the game.
GazeHawk is another new startup that has developed a system that will give a company all the benefits of eye tracking without the cost. Charging $50 per tester, GazeHawk will hire participants to interact with your site and then track where the eyes are going. Fast Company calls the results impressive – “a full-color heatmap that provides great feedback on your site’s design through high-quality visualizations.”
Now, we know that heatmaps are a waste of money to some, but that’s view is correlated with higher costs they used to require. If eye tracking is indeed getting cheaper and more accessible, perhaps we can see heatmaps in a new light? If it’s cheaper, is it then worth it? Surely the results show us something. It’s just that before, the cost outweighed the benefits. But with cheaper eye tracking solutions, perhaps the cost and the benefits are more appropriately aligned.
Of course, the more testers you add, the more accurate the results, so costs have a potential to go up again to an extent. FastCompany does bring up an interesting point that sort of gets at the whole heatmap debate: for them, the study is not so much a test of a design, but of which stories are most appealing to readers.
If heat mapping is cheaper and the focus is on content, perhaps it’s worth it after all.
Business Essentials: Eye-Trackers to Test Your Company’s Homepage
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- David B