Seen on screen: did people even see it?

What it is

A Seen on screen card on your dashboard: for each element you marked, on each page, how many page views saw it and what share of that page’s views that is, with the least-seen element called out.

Why it matters

A sign-up box nobody clicks might be badly worded, or nobody might scroll that far. Knowing that only 30% of visitors ever see your pricing table tells you to move it up before you rewrite it.

How it works

1. Add the small seen.js add-on next to your quietstats tag (it sends no pageviews).
2. Give each element you care about a name: data-qs-view="Pricing table" on the section, box or button.
3. When at least half of a marked element is on screen (or it fills half the screen, for tall sections), the add-on sends its name once for that page view. At most 20 names per page view.
4. quietstats divides the times each element was seen by the page views of its page, so you get a seen rate per element and page.

Privacy: what is and isn’t collected

Collected

• The name you gave the element (max 60 characters), page path and day
• Never scroll positions, how long something was on screen, what anyone types, or anything about the visitor

Never collected

• Cookies, localStorage or anything else stored on the visitor’s device
• IP addresses or user agents (used in memory, then discarded)
• Anything that links a visitor across days (the visitor ID resets daily)

How quietstats works, and the legal caveats →

Rows and limits

• Optional add-on: script.js stays 845 bytes
• Only elements you mark are counted
• Seen means half on screen once; it does not mean read
• Not affected by dashboard filters
• Rows: 1 written per marked element seen per page view (20 at most); 2 reads per dashboard view

“Rows” are database rows written, which is what our hosting is billed on. Reads are not rows written. Methodology →