Written by: Lynn Cadet
Edited by: Lillian Castro
Reviewed by: Christina Lewis
TL; DR: Hotjar recently acquired PingPong to increase its UX research capabilities and add to its mission of helping companies deliver better digital experiences led by user empathy. The data analytics company has renamed the PingPong integration Hotjar Engage. Its Engage tool allows businesses to streamline recruitment and interview qualified users on their product experiences through moderated interactions. With the addition of Engage, Hotjar now offers a comprehensive view of data insights for engagement and product development catered to customers.
The UX industry has become increasingly prominent as user experience moves to the forefront of digital strategies. It’s no surprise that UX design is one of the fastest-growing sectors in the world at the moment. The world’s digital landscape is transforming with new technologies emerging every year, and this presents the need for people who can shape how users interact with them.
For designers to understand what users want, they need UX research. UX research helps keep people at the center of the design process, creating room for better user experiences. Capabilities, such as user testing and data insights, allow designers to grasp consumer behavior and what is needed to make a product user-friendly. Leveraging platforms with data analytics features can help teams better understand customer needs and see the parts of their products that work. Hotjar offers users a specialized platform that provides them with behavior analytics and feedback data. And the company has recently upped its UX capabilities with a new addition.
“With the acquisition of PingPong, Hotjar customers will have access to additional user testing capabilities and be able to make quicker changes based on direct user feedback and have the proper tools to build empathy with their users,” said Mohannad Ali, CEO of Hotjar.
Acquiring PingPong took Hotjar’s platform to the next level, equipping the data analytics company with UX-specific research functionality and tools. This merger adds value to Hotjar’s stacked lineup of visual heatmaps, feedback, and user engagement tools to make its platform even more comprehensive. Hotjar has integrated PingPong into its product experience platform and renamed it Hotjar Engage. Mohannad explained the details behind the acquisition.
“Hotjar started using PingPong for user research and interviews last year. After discussing more with the team, we recognized similarities in PingPong’s mission with ours to bring better UX research & user product testing capabilities to its customers. Additionally, we are both remote, bootstrapped companies, so there was clear value alignment as well,” said Mohannad.
Integrating Hotjar Engage for Direct User Feedback and Critical Insights
More than 1 million businesses in 180-plus countries trust Hotjar to help analyze their product and user experiences. Its Ask and Observe products consist of tools tailored for surveys, feedback, heatmaps, and recordings. Hotjar Engage joins this list of tools to provide an outlet for companies to connect with their customers directly and update their UX strategies.
“Hotjar Engage adds a critical layer of insight to customers’ product development strategy by directly testing products and features face-to-face with the people who matter the most, the end users,” said Mohannad.
Hotjar Engage brings a specialized element to the design process by giving companies a communication channel to set up face-to-face meetups with users. Companies can receive direct feedback from the people for whom they make their products, enhancing the product experience for everyone. Hotjar Engage enables this by allowing Hotjar customers to schedule, run, record, and share user interviews and testing, a core component of product development and a pivotal complement to Hotjar’s existing functionality.
“The most exciting part is empowering product teams to find, prioritize, and implement the changes with feedback from users. With access to a pool of 175,000 testers, product teams can easily find the right people to test new products and features,” said Mohannad.
Hotjar Engage allows companies to make informed product decisions and do so effectively. It streamlines the recruitment process by screening users for qualification and automating the scheduling and hosting of moderated interviews for the best results and critical insights. Companies can build better and save on costs by using Hotjar to ensure customer satisfaction with their products.
“Hotjar’s goal is for our customers to be able to build a product people love, and our product experience insights allow them to do just that,” said Mohannad.
Finding Product Opportunities with PX Insights and User Testing
Hotjar enables companies to discover key insights to create products that customers will enjoy. Products must be relevant to the target audience and easy to use, but accomplishing those two things isn’t always easy. This is where Hotjar steps in. Its three-step process gives users all the tools they need to maximize their product development based on customer perspectives.
“There is an increased value with the integrated platform because customers now have 3x times the user insights. Product marketing teams have better context with more details and can build a more holistic picture of what is needed to increase personalization and engagement,” said Mohannad.
With Hotjar’s holistic view, companies can leverage the right data to find valuable product opportunities for customers and reduce the time for brainstorming and research. Its Ask, Observe, and Engage tools all work together to provide different angles of the customer journey through a digital experience.
The Observe tools allow businesses to see how users interact with their web pages and identify areas for improvement through heatmaps and recorded playbacks of user sessions. Then they can survey with the Ask tool and use Engage to create a highly targeted and descriptive hypothesis for design analysis.
“Without these initial insights, organizations can end up spending more time and money necessary while having less confidence in the user’s experience. Being able to see what users do, hear, and have a full conversation tie together the entire product experience from start to finish is critical,” Mohannad said.
Empowering Customers with the Solutions They Need
People are at the center of everything Hotjar does, and its vision of empathy drives this mission. Businesses must understand their customers to create the best product and design, and Hotjar empowers them to do that with its solutions. Mohannad said the Hotjar team strongly believes in building a deep sense of empathy for its customer’s goals and priorities.
“We keep the customer at the center of our product strategy and constantly ask for feedback to ensure we are on the right track. Just as we encourage our customers to do, we build our road map alongside our customers — based on their behavior,” said Mohannad.
Product teams can use the Hotjar platform to relate to their customers and develop digital experiences that fit user needs. Hotjar encourages companies to lead with empathy, so they can identify the features that matter most to the customers who matter the most. Products built with the consumer in mind will be the most successful.
Mohannad said the PingPong acquisition is only the beginning of improvements as Hotjar seeks to inspire change through empathy.
“The PingPong acquisition is continuing to build innovative solutions for better digital experiences and prioritizing user feedback in the process. We have a lot more in the pipeline for 2023, including new features and team growth. We’re excited to improve and expand our product experience insights in the next year,” said Mohannad.
