TL;DR
A heatmap of a website is a color-coded data visualization tool. It helps website owners and companies to understand how their visitors interact with different areas of their websites, i.e. where the “hotspots” or “coldspots” of the website are located. The data visualization is done in real-time. On the basis of this information, you can then further optimize your website and increase your conversion rate, knowing that, for example, important content or actions are not reached or seen by your visitors, as they are in a “cold area".
How heatmaps work
Heatmaps use colors to visualize the intensity of visitor interaction on different sections of the pages of your website.
A color scheme from warm to cold is used to display this interaction data:
The warmest color indicates the highest visitor engagement
The coolest color indicates the lowest visitor engagement
They help a website owner figure out
Which parts of a page have the highest and lowest visitor engagement,
Where on the said web page people are clicking the most,
Whether or not the visitors are actually clicking on the CTA,
Whether they reach the bottom of the fold (by scrolling all the way down the page)
And many other examples of visitor behavior insights
Types of Heatmaps
Click maps - for Desktop devices, they show where on the page visitors click
Movement maps - for Desktop devices, they show in which areas of the page visitors move their mouse on
Tap maps - for smart phones and tablets, they show where on the page visitors tap (similar to Click maps)
Scroll maps - for all devices, scroll maps show until what position visitors scroll on a page
