So you’re ready to install Heap! Before jumping into our installation guides, we recommend reviewing the items listed below to plan the best Heap implementation for your organization. If you’re reading this for the first time and you’ve already set up Heap, don’t worry – you can configure all of these things post-install as well.
Determine your Project & Environment Model
Your Heap account is structured in a set of projects and environments. Projects can be thought of as blank slates that are completely independent of another. Environments are subsets of projects that share definitions (events, segments, and reports), but do not share any data.
When you sign up for Heap, you automatically get one Main project with two environments: Production and Development. During implementation, you’ll need to decide if this default setup satisfies your requirements, or if you will need to add more.
As an initial test to validate that your data is being sent properly, we highly recommend initially sending your data to your Development environment as a test.
Generally speaking, most businesses find that keeping all of their data in the Main project and using the two default environments to separate their production and testing data works best. This setup allows you to analyze all of your user interactions in one place. This is essential for tracking each user through their journey converting from a visitor to a customer, using different products, and interacting across different platforms.
Using Heap for web and mobile?
If so, we recommend sending both web and mobile data to the same environment. This gives you the ability to analyze interactions by the same user across all platforms, allowing you to construct a complete picture of the customer journey.
Here are a few cases where it would be best to add additional environments or projects:
- You have a complex staged deployment process. In this case, we recommend creating environments that align with each stage in the process, such as Local, Integration, Functional, UAT, etc.
- You have an internal application used by employees only, and you don’t want that data to appear when analyzing your users. In this case, you should use a separate project to house data for that application.
- You have global sites or apps for different countries. A setup with a single project and multiple environments is best suited for this, so you can share common definitions, but keep analysis separate.
- You have a set of brands or products that do not share a common user base, such as owning multiple businesses. In this case, you’ll want to set up multiple environments and projects for each business.
Complete steps for setting up new projects and environments can be found in Projects and Environments. If you’re planning to use multiple environments, note that you’ll need to copy the correct environment ID from Heap into your app during installation.
You currently cannot rename the Main project in Heap.
Data Privacy Legislation Compliance
Heap is GDPR compliant and can be configured to meet HIPAA and COPPA compliance standards. If you need to meet GDPR, HIPAA, or COPPA compliancy standards with your implementation of Heap, we recommend reviewing our FAQs on Data Privacy prior to installation.
Ready to get Heap?
The first step to installing Heap is to create your Heap account. Once you’ve done so, your installation snippet will be provided for you to install Heap on your website or app. From here, check out the list of links in Installation for your platforms of choice.
Once you’ve installed Heap on each of your platforms, head over to Setting Up Heap to get your Heap account up and running and start analyzing!
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