Read a store heat map of sales and stock

Help center / Planning shelves

A heatmap tints each placement on a planogram, or each fixture on the store map, from light to dark by the metric you choose: units sold, stock on hand, or sell-through. It shows at a glance which shelves move product and which hold stock that sits.

Turn on a heatmap

1. Open a planogram, or open Store map.
2. Choose Heatmap overlay in the planogram toolbar or the map toolbar.
3. Pick a metric: Units sold, Stock on hand, or Sell-through.
4. For Units sold and Sell-through, pick a Heatmap window of 7, 30 or 90 days. Stock on hand has no window because it is always the current count.
5. Read each cell's label for the exact figure, such as "12 sold", "40 on hand" or "38%". Choose No heatmap to turn the overlay off.

The three metrics

• Units sold: units recorded in Sales & stats over the last 7, 30 or 90 days, counting today. Voided sales are left out.
• Stock on hand: units counted right now.
• Sell-through: units sold divided by units sold plus units on hand, over the chosen window.

How each view counts

• On a planogram, each placement shows its product's figure for the whole store, because sales are recorded against the store rather than a single shelf. A product placed on two shelves shows the same figure on both, so a planogram heat map compares products, not shelf positions.
• On the store map, a fixture's sales add up the products in its linked planogram, each product once. Its stock is what has been counted at that fixture's own stock location, and its sell-through uses those two figures.
• Colors are relative to the strongest cell in the same view, so the darkest fixture is the busiest one in this store, not a fixed target.
• Hatched cells have no data: nothing counted, nothing sold, or no linked planogram. Under Units sold, a catalog product with no sales in the window reads "0 sold" in the lightest shade rather than hatched.

What is a heat map in retail?

A retail heat map is a picture of a store or a shelf colored by a number, so strong and weak areas stand out without reading a report. Some systems build one from cameras or sensors that track where shoppers walk. headoffis builds its overlay from the sales and stock counts your team records, so it shows what sold and what is on hand, not foot traffic.

How to read a heat map

Start with the darkest cells, then the hatched ones, then compare the two ends of the scale. The darkest cell holds the largest value in the current view. Every other cell is shaded by its share of that value.

What do heat map colors mean?

The overlay uses five states. Hatched means no data. The four shades run from light to dark:

• Lightest: below 25% of the strongest cell, including zero.
• Second: 25% up to 50%.
• Third: 50% up to 75%.
• Darkest: 75% or more.

A single color running from light to dark is what cartographers call a sequential scheme, the kind ColorBrewer recommends for ordered data. Each cell carries a text label, in line with the W3C guidance that color should not be the only way information is conveyed.

Units sold or sell-through

A sales heat map built on Units sold rewards volume: a product you stock deep will often top it. Sell-through rewards speed against stock, so a small facing that sells out fast can outrank a bestseller with a full backroom. Read both before you move a product.

Worked example

This is an illustration, not real store data. One planogram holds three products, viewed over 30 days:

• Product A: 60 sold, 20 on hand, sell-through 75%.
• Product B: 30 sold, 90 on hand, sell-through 25%.
• Product C: 0 sold, 15 on hand, sell-through 0%.

Under Units sold, A is darkest, B sits at 50% of A and gets the third shade, and C is lightest. Under Sell-through, A is again darkest, B is at a third of A's 75% and gets the second shade, and C is lightest. The labels keep the raw values, so B still reads "25%", not "33%".

How to find slow moving products

Set Units sold to 90 days and note the light cells. Then switch to Stock on hand, which turns the overlay into an inventory heat map. A product that is light for sales and dark for stock is using shelf space it has not earned in that window. Check its sell-through before you cut its facings, since a recent delivery can make stock look high for a few days.

Compare fixtures on the store map

To measure shelf performance across the floor, use the store map instead of a single planogram. Each fixture's color combines the products on its linked planogram, so you can see which runs of shelving carry the store. Link a planogram to every fixture you want compared, and count stock at each fixture's location, or those fixtures stay hatched.

Common mistakes

• Treating the darkest cell as a goal. It is the top of this view only. A slow week makes a different cell the darkest.
• Comparing shades between views. A dark cell on one planogram and a dark cell on another can stand for different numbers. Compare the labels instead.
• Reading hatched as zero. Hatched means nothing was recorded. Count the stock or link the planogram first.
• Expecting shelf-level sales. A product on two fixtures counts toward both on the store map, because its sales are store-wide.

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