ClickTale - Understand Your Visitors Better by Spying on Them

Hey there,
I’m from RobotReplay. Actually we do record passwords and make no secret of it. Our intention is not to steal your data, but allow you to watch users navigate ‘behind the login’. Still, we have had problems with people using this feature with bad intent.. but it’s a fine line providing security and needlessly hindering your users. I’d be interested in other people’s thoughts on this subject.

Really? I’m afraid of some sites now. How do I check if it uses it?

Well, that’s the thing though. The only people able to add this functionality to a site are as a rule the same people that already have your password’s anyway (the site admin) so the risk is low. The problem comes when someone at that company has access to the website who shouldnt, or who doesnt have access to user information. The good news is, these types of tools generally may not be used on banking sites or anywhere where financial information is stored.

@Julie:

Sites may say so in their privacy policy, so check there. Some sites I noticed don’t mention it anywhere but looking through the site’s code I found it.

@Alexei:

Yeah, I don’t see banks and other secure sites using this as, well, it’s not necessary. What the user needs to try and understand is to:

a/ trust the site they’re entering personal info on
b/ create unique passwords that are not used elsewhere (and use a password manager like roboform).

Btw, I didn’t know your site tracks passwords. I would find that the most scariest among everything else as many people tend to use the same passwords everywhere.

@mark

Yeah it’s a fine line we’re walking and I don’t know what the best solution is. A lot of people really like this feature. I guess another thing to consider is that if somebody can install RobotReplay on a site, there are plenty of other ways they could steal your password too - even if RobotReplay didn’t exist.

I wonder if it would be worthwhile to offer a signup page to block your site from the RR database irrespective if someone tries to create an account for it to record information. This way, site admins could pro-actively secure themselves against this kind of an attack. We could do this fairly easily.

@Alexei:

lol, no doubt people would like the feature to record passwords so they can exploit it where they can. I think you should offer a filter for site owners to block sensitive areas, or maybe charge a lot more for the feature to deter people from using it, or perhaps best just remove it so people don’t feel like they being spied on.

So many sites and companies spy on there users now that you start wondering where to go…

Interesting article, Mark, thanks for sharing! It’s definitely worth “spying” on your browsers if you are seriously into web design and SEO. Take a look at the book “Don’t make me think” if you are in any way skeptical. Controlling the behaviour of surfers is key to having a successful site.

um, this is interesting. I don’t link this from a PR point of view, but from a management point of view it’s good.

Wow that is pretty awesome, thanks for sharing!

I think this is a fantastic idea from both a business point of view, and from a customer point of view.

As a business, I want to know precisely what my customers interests are so that I can utilize my efforts as efficiently as possible.

And from a customer point of view, I want to know that the web site I’m perusing will be totally dedicated to catering to my needs.

However, it makes me shudder to think I’m being watched… it feels kind of like knowing I’ve got a binocular-clad stalker hiding behind a tree, watching for my every move. I find the whole thing rather creepy. Does anyone else feel creeped out, knowing that they’re being watched by this type of software?

I guess like everything else, it has it’s pluses and it’s minuses. Thanks for posting this!

I run a website and I implemented the same script. I understood my visitors better and it increased my sales two-fold. I find this a good thing. I’m sure none of my visitors know about it.

Ever since I read this I was checking my favourite sites I visit, mostly blogs. I noticed most not having this code. I went to the site and it seems you have to pay for it. I guess that’s why they stayed away too?

some of the website i have created in the past used the same script. However on my personal website, I do not use it. I don’t remember having to pay for the feature before, is this something new?

@Angie: Well, for ClickTale at least, it seems the very basic version is free, and the more recordings package cost money. I would suppose the free version is for personal sites (for fun?), and the paid versions are for people who wants to earn a good profit.

http://www.clicktale.com/pricing.html

The idea that someone could record every single movement, or password, when visiting a website is definitely concerning and almost borders on creepy. While it could improve the services currently available to your customers; it’s also possible that if customers/visitors become aware of it, they may feel that it violates their trust and privacy. Before implementing a service like this, you would have to weight the pros and cons, really carefully.

Thanks for the info! It’s definitely something to be aware of:)

I agree with you chauncey1. I now carefully check each site’s privacy policy now before signing up with them. I definitely want to know how I’m being recorded, and I will leave the site if it’s something I’m not comfortable with.

I agree with Lia - it does creep me out, and chauncey1 makes a good point about customers feeling like their trust and privacy being violated, that said, if I feel I have to use my time and energy (I have so little of either), scouting through privacy policies, I’d rather just not give that site my business at all… I can go down the street, and have a smiling sales clerk take my cash without question.

Hmm .. Sounds pretty big brother to me.
I can see the importance of knowing how effective your site is and how people are actually using it, but I get a little nervous knowing that information about me can be so readily available to people.

I really don’t mind a web site knowing which pages I visit (it makes sense to change or rid the ones that aren’t so popular), but when the owner of a web site knows exactly where my cursor is hovering at all times, it’s too much like he’s sitting beside me, reading over my shoulder. It’s very uncomfortable - I don’t like it - not at all.

Interesting idea, not sure if I would use it

@ Joy
i agree with you, why does a website owner need to know what you are doing at all times anyways??

@hershykisses: It’s pretty much there for the owner to understand where you click, so they can place content/ads in the ares you frequently see. What I don’t like is that even keyboard entries, like if you’re entering passwords, can be recorded.

I really like it, lets you know if your website is getting the word around on the internet.

I’m website owner and I make much more money by using such scripts. People click my ads more often, my advertisers are happy and I’m happy cause I make more dough. I don’t track passwords though as I don’t need to.

There seems to be a lot of sites/apps that do this, right now I use StatCounter for my website, but will have to check this one out for a couple weeks to compare which is better. Thanks for the article!!!

it’s an interesting concept, but how applicable could this be? for most of my online browsing I just let my mouse hover wherever it happens to be especially when reading something. Keeping track of the mouse movements of my visitors doesn’t sound all that revolutionary.

Time to click is pretty useless too. What if the visitor is reading your article and then decides to click. What are you doing, seeing how fast he can read?

This is definitely worth checking out though..

Yeah, Vashi, I hear what you’re saying about just leaving the mouse where it lay when reading something, but when shopping, it’s a whole other story. When I’m shopping, I’m clicking links for better descriptions and larger images, and there have even been a number of times when I’ve hovered my mouse over the image - ready to click it - when I’ve realized it didn’t say what I thought it did, so I changed my mind about clicking on it. I’ll be that itself would be really valuable information for a web site owner to know (whether or not I hesitated).

Joy makes a good point too, about it being like someone reading over the shoulder. Like I said, the thought of the software tracking my every move gives me the heebie jeebies. I’m having some really mixed thoughts on it.

I have seen sites that have had those heat maps. In fact I think I got some google heat maps from attending ad-tech last spring.

I have never even thought of implementing this into my sites. However it could be a very smart thing to do.
Currently I am using statcounter. So I am in the basic area of tracking. I will save this page and look into placing it on my site. It will help somthing I am working on alot more.

This seems like a pretty cool idea. My only concern is that the service is hosted on ClickTale’s servers, which means that they have access to all my visitor’s data (including personal info). I would prefer to have this data stored locally. Then again, maybe I’m just paranoid.

@Nelly: If they just give the script to people they’ll probably loose a lot as they won’t be able to have subscriptions plans.

Honestly, spying on people is a dirty thing to do and I’m not sure if I like the idea. Invasion of privacy anyone?

How does it work?

This is quite shocking to me! I cannot believe a site would even think of implementing this and invading my privacy. I guess it’s true what they say that even on the internet you cannot be safe when just browsing, and not submitting information or downloading anything. Wow, I’m can’t believe all this.

Holy, Nelly, I never thought of that… the fact that it’s sitting on ClickTale’s servers. So not only would the web site I’m browsing know stuff about me that they have no business knowing, so would ClickTale, and I didn’t even choose to surf on over to the ClickTale site! The more I read about this, the more it scares me and the less I like it.

Something else for me to worry about now! My goodness.

Is letting companies know what I’m looking at, for how long, passwords etc a fair trade for me that, as Lia wrote above, “I want to know that the web site I’m perusing will be totally dedicated to catering to my needs.” I don’t think so.

It seems that companies are going out of their way to invade our privacy nowadays. There’s no way to escape. And it appears that Google is the greatest perpetrator of them all (http://www.genetibase.com/blog/2007/06/10/google-rated-bottom-for-privacy/). So if Google’s doing it, what’s the big deal about lousy little website owners tracking their visitors’ behaviour (and keeping track of the passwords that the site has assigned to them anyway). I don’t find this that disturbing, relatively speaking.

Having had a small family operated business for a few years now, we are feeling that it’s about time that we get it up online. I was very pleased to come across this article, for this type of software seems like it would not only be easy to set up, but also affordable. Something like ClickTale will allow me to keep my business operating in a manner that’s conducive to profits.

Interesting program, it’s a bit expensive though.

As a retailer & blogger I’m intrigued by the idea. I’d love to get that sort of feedback as to what my readers are looking for.

I like the unique stats it gives. This is truely a great program, but I wouldn’t want to waste my money on this.

Thanks for all your input people!

this is definally a good idea its always nice to see how long ppl r stayin on ur site but sounds like alot of coin for a small business, it should be cheaper to promote it better.