Eye Tracking - What A User Is Looking At.

What are people looking at when they are on your website? I just read a new study on eye tracking in relationship to websites. This has always been an area of interest for me. Years ago they did this same type of study with drivers. They would track where a driver was looking as they were going down the road in order to improve sign placement. Today, similar technology is used to track where a person's eyes are focused when they are viewing a website.

So what are people looking at when they are on your site? "Using statistical analysis and eye tracking data across a broad-spectrum demographic provides the researcher with numerical sums based on number of observations and length of observations of different elements on any site page." Yeah, OK, so what did they find out?

"Single-variant testing is the simplest to initiate and track. However it's time-consuming and may lead to unsubstantiated conclusions. Multi-variant testing is a more efficient means of determining which site appearances and features deliver optimum results, i.e. the highest conversion rate." Uhhhhh OK, so what did they find out?

"However, multi-variant testing is more complex than changing a single variable and waiting to gather the A/B test results. It could take months to optimize a site for conversion. Further, single-variant testing often requires the tester to make certain assumptions that may or may not be true." YAwnnnnn - OK, this is getting pretty tiresome. Can't I just read the last page to see the results? NO I can't because the report concluded nothing about what people are looking at. In fact it went on and on just like the excerpts above do. All it did was go on about the proper methods of measuring and how to establish baselines. What a total waste of my time. They owe me money or something! Talk about link bait.

Anyway here's what other researchers have found and can pretty much be summed up in a few bullet points.

• Top left 1/4 of the screen is prime real estate
• If you want people to read and not scan, use smaller fonts
• Headlines make or break articles as well as click trough rates
  
• Users overwhelmingly look at a website is an "F" pattern

Here's a great video from YouTube showing a typical eye tracking test. Seth Godin also has a video of an eye tracking session on his website.

Looking at these videos, it gives you a better understanding on how people browse. Like Seth says, "...websurfing is a hunting activity." You need to make sure that what you have to offer is readily available to the hunters.