Google Analytics shows what happens. Clarity shows how it happens.
A single metric is rarely enough to understand a website. Google Analytics helps teams understand traffic, sources, events and goal completion. But one key question often remains: how do visitors actually move through the page?
This is where Microsoft Clarity adds value. Heatmaps and session recordings show where people click, scroll, pause or miss important content. Web design becomes less guesswork and more observable improvement.
Why visual tracking helps web design
A converting website is not only about design and technology. What matters is whether visitors understand the offer quickly, build trust and see the next step clearly. Clarity helps test these questions against real behavior.
The official Microsoft Learn FAQ describes core features such as session recordings, heatmaps and insights. For us, these features are useful because they provide practical signals for improving landing pages, forms, calls to action and page structures.
How we use Clarity together with Analytics
Google Analytics shows which channels bring visitors and which goals are reached. Microsoft Clarity adds visual observations to those numbers. For example, we can see whether an important CTA sits too low, a form creates friction or content is visited but barely read.
This combination is especially valuable after launch. Instead of treating a website as finished, we can keep improving it based on data and behavior. That fits our approach: websites should not only look good, they should create enquiries and support growth.
Use it consciously and communicate clearly
Tracking needs to be used deliberately, and Clarity has one important change to note. Since 31 October 2025, Microsoft requires a valid consent signal for visitors from Switzerland as well. Without consent, Clarity sets no cookies. The consequence: sessions can no longer be reliably stitched together across page views, and features such as funnels or complete recordings are limited.
In practice this means Clarity does not replace consent management, it depends on it. Running Clarity properly means connecting it to your cookie banner via consent mode and accepting that some visitors will not be captured. The numbers are then a sample rather than a complete picture. For understanding where users get stuck on a page that is usually plenty; for exact reach figures it is not. Microsoft documents the technical details in the Clarity cookie consent documentation, and we wrote up the Swiss legal situation in cookie banners in Switzerland.
Beyond that, we configure tools sparingly, fit them into the existing analytics setup and communicate their use transparently. Clarity is not a replacement for strategy, it is a practical tool for better web design decisions.
Together with clear page structure, SEO and GEO, this creates a website that can be found, understood and improved over time.