Visitor Replays FAQs

Why are there fewer store visits in the Visitor Replays app compared to other sources?

The Visitor Replays app may not record all the visits to your store due to the following reasons:

1. The Visitor Replays app has an active web bot/crawler checker and filter.

   Being a 3rd party app, Vitals doesn't directly detect store visits as bots/crawlers do. So what we can do with the limited access and functionality we are allowed by Shopify is to detect and analyze the activity of each visit and filter out activities that are most likely bot behaviors. For example, a page opening with no mouse or keyboard activity and leaving in under 10 seconds can result from a bot.

   The filter/checker is put in place so that these bot/crawler visits do not eat up your monthly page views allocation, and attempt to filter only organic visits from your store.

2. If your store has the Shopify's Customer Privacy settings set up, the Visitor Replays app will only start recording visitors when they provided consent.

   To follow Shopify's Data Privacy Guidelines, the Visitor Replays app will not record if the visitor didn't provide consent to accept cookies. For more information about this, you may refer to our Help Center here: Consent requirements for various apps

3. The visitor's browser has browser plugins installed that disable collecting browsing data or running scripts. Browser plugins such as ad blockers or other privacy plugins that disable Javascript from being triggered would not enable the Visitor Replays app to record the session.

Why do duplicated/incorrect page elements show up in the recordings?

The Visitors Replays app doesn't work as a screen recorder. It saves the whole structure of the page and then sends it to our servers, together with the mouse movement trail, click locations, and the text being typed.

Sometimes, you might see duplicated or incorrect elements in the recordings, such as in the screenshot below. This usually happens when the original HTML structure of the page is corrupted but is still rebuilt in the player. This can't be replicated identically.

The good news is that your actual store doesn't look like this, and your visitors will never see it this way.

I noticed in the recordings that my font is different than the font used in the live store. Is that an issue?

If the store is using custom or licensed fonts, our Visitor Replays app will not render them but will use the default fonts instead to avoid violation of copyright agreements. But rest assured that the visitor who visits the pages will see the live active font on their visit.

When will my credits be refilled?

Under the Hobby plan, all Vitals merchants get 5,000 pageviews recorded per month, all stored for 30 days. Higher plans can provide a higher number of pageviews. For more information, you can visit our Pricing Plans page here: https://vitals.co/pricing

When you run out of credits, the credits will be refilled on the next 30-day cycle, from the Vitals app installation date. You can see this information inside the Visitor Replays app:

How long are the Visitor Replays recordings stored?

The recordings inside the Visitor Replays app are stored for 30 days starting from when they were reocrded. After the period, the recording will be automatically deleted.

I already used up all of my page view credits for the current cycle. If I delete some of the recordings, will I gain more credits?

No. The Visitor Replays app's PageView credits only refill every 30 days according to the credit refill date that appears at the top.

I have the Vitals Countdown Timer App Enabled on my Store. Why is it not seen changing dynamically in the Visitor Replays app's recordings?

As the Countdown Timer app continuously changes every second, it may take a strenuous load on the server if this dynamic behavior is also continuously recorded. Hence, we decide to limit its recording in the sessions inside the Visitor Replays app.

Why videos and some content is displayed as a black box (or white box)?

Videos are usually displayed in iframes. This means that Youtube, Vimeo or other video players will not be loaded in the Visitor Replays recordings. 

Other 3rd party content may also be displayed in iframes. Due to the structure of the iframe, they cannot be rendered in a recording. This includes, but not limited to:

• chat windows
• video players
• payment pages
• third party forms
• third party web-apps

Is it possible to exclude specific elements on my store to be seen inside the Visitor Replays app?

Since the Visitor Replays app captures all elements in the store's HTML structure by default, it will also capture elements that may infringe customer privacy (like email address fields, for example). 

if you are familiar with identifying CSS selectors on your store to get a name of a specific element, you can have the Visitor Replays app exclude those identified CSS selectors from being recorded by placing them inside the app's settings:

Why are some orders made on my store not tagged in the Visitor Replays app as recordings with orders?

There are a couple of possible reasons why recordings inside the Visitor Replays app might not get tagged with the "Order completed" tag:

1. The orders might have been completed starting from an email (like an abandoned cart/checkout email or marketing email), and the visitor was sent directly to the Checkout page when he clicked the email.

   Since our app does not run on the Checkout page (due to security and privacy reasons), our Visitor Replays app will not record any sessions from there.

2. The visitor's browser has strict privacy options.

   Browser plugins such as ad blockers and other extensions that block/disable Javascript and the like are highly likely to block recording tools such as the Visitor Replays app.

Why am I seeing asterisks instead of the correct characters being entered by the visitor inside text fields?

To follow Shopify's Data Privacy guidelines, content typed by visitors on text fields normally indicates personal information being entered, like email addresses, phone numbers, or other personal/payment information, and therefore our app will not display them for the visitor's privacy.

Is it possible for the Visitor Replays app to record only visits from a specific country?

No. All visits will be considered for recording as long as they accepted cookies (if the visitors are from countries with GDPR Policies in place) and/or the visit is detected by the app as an organic visit (doesn't constitute to a bot-like behavior)

What does "Skipping Activity" mean?

To save you time in viewing your visitor recordings, the Visitor Replays app skips the sections where the visitor did not interact with your store but it is still opened on their device (ex., They might have switched to another browser tab, closed the computer/phone, etc).

Suppose you would like to watch the full recording without skipping anything. In that case, you can untick this particular option while you're watching a recording in the lower-right of the screen recording player:

Can I have a specific visitor not to be recorded by the Visitor Replays app?

Not at the moment. All visits to your store will be recorded by the Visitor Replays app, depending on your store's Customer Privacy settings and the visitor's location. For more information on how Visitor Replays app works when visits from GDPR regions appear, you may refer here: Consent requirements for various apps