Last Updated on February 13, 2024 by Nasir Hanif
Before getting into the need for interactive walkthroughs for your application, it is important to understand what they are. Interactive walkthroughs help you in navigating a web app or a website. Appearing as balloon tips, they emphasize certain elements on the website that prompt users to take action.
Interactive walkthroughs have been successful in changing the way a user interacts and understands a complex app or site. They help in executing tasks in a user-friendly, step-by-step, and visually appealing way. A walkthrough can be:
Table of Contents
Input-based:
This type of walkthrough is interactive and informative. The end-user provides the input required by the walkthrough to proceed forward and carry out the planned task. Input-based walkthroughs accommodate different types of user responses that can be anticipated to complete a task. They are very convenient for user onboarding and training.
Automatic:
This type of walkthrough proceeds automatically from one step to the next, without any user input. The time gap can be set by the walkthrough designer. Automatic walkthroughs are best-suited for demonstrations and product tours.
They are implemented with the help of exclusive software in the following way:
- The walkthrough designer recognizes the flow for an intentional use case for an application.
- The informative components like highlight effects, contextual help symbols, static messages, and more are applied through the proprietary software.
- It can be designed, created, and produced across different pages and modules of the application.
- According to the end user’s input, the same walkthrough also houses alternative workflows for the same task.
Why Interactive Walkthroughs?
Product tours are one of the most common forms of onboarding users. A product tour is a series of tooltips or modals that exhibit different characteristics of the product. However, they are not very successful in satisfying your users. This is due to the fact they provide the users with a lot of information in one go. This leaves them confused and distracts them from the main task.
On the other hand, walkthroughs encourage the users to interact with the product or application, increasing efficiency. They are a far more engaging tool and since businesses are continually looking for straightforward, creative, and user-friendly ways to help end-users in using their applications, interactive walkthroughs have become very popular and relevant.
Products, applications, and tools have their own specific walkthroughs. They ensure the following:
- Faster learning
- Greater intended app usage.
- A better understanding and knowledge about the applications’s features
- More productivity
An interactive walkthrough solves two important problems of an organization: They teach new users how to use its application or tool, and they train the existing ones to access newly released features via tooltips, chatbots, and pop-up prompt bubbles. They also identify and highlight the exact interface controls and guide the users towards them. On the basis of the user’s requirements, these walkthroughs can be added or removed anytime.
Interactive walkthroughs draw the audience’s attention towards events like product launches, sale periods, flash sales, brand partnerships, and more. This makes sure enough traffic is produced for business-critical and time-sensitive events. You can also analyze their effectiveness based on the analytics they provide concerning their usage.
Benefits of Interactive Walkthroughs for SaaS Products
Decreased support costs:
On-screen guidance and workflows help your support teams. They allow users to figure things on their own.
Better adoption:
One of the highest priorities for SaaS products is product adoption. Users won’t renew their subscriptions if they are not using your products. Guided interactive walkthroughs make your application easier to use and keep your users loyal to your brand.
Faster onboarding:
Interactive walkthroughs are a simple and innovative way to introduce new users to the application, and they can start using it immediately.
Improved feature utilization:
You do not want to waste your time and money on developing features that never get utilized. Designing a creative interactive walkthrough will encourage your users to make use of every feature.
Users do not want lengthy instructions anymore, interactive walkthroughs are the new-age guidance manuals. Onboarding users and supporting the existing ones can prove to be a challenging task. If users do not find your software appealing and easy to use, they might not come back and you will end up losing a customer. Creating an interactive walkthrough will make this task easier for you and will help your business grow.
