Backward Flow

Backward flow is an analysis that starts from an ending event or page and walks into the past to see where users came from just before that point.

Forward flow asks “where does the user go after this point”; backward flow asks the inverse: “where were they before reaching it.” That reversed direction is what makes it valuable for important destination pages such as checkout or a thank-you page, because it shows which routes actually end in conversion and which pages act as gateways more than you expected. The common trap is mistaking a page's high share in a backward report for its importance; the home page and search results almost always sit at the top of any backward analysis because they are hubs, not because they are a special route. Backward flow is descriptive, not causal: it says where the user came from, not that the page caused the conversion.