How to Use In-App Tutorials to Educate your Users and Increase Product Adoption
What are in-app tutorials and how they can help you improve user onboarding and product adoption?
In this article, we’re going to talk about:
- How in-app tutorials help improve your user onboarding process
- Best practices when creating in-app tutorials
- Tools to use to create tutorials code free
We’ll also cover some great examples to inspire you.
TL;DR
An in-app tutorial is an interactive guide that runs on top of your user interface and is meant to provide guidance and in-app training within your product.
- In-app tutorials provide self-paced learning, get new users to experience value faster, and drive user engagement that ultimately leads to higher retention.
- Best practices when creating in-app tutorials:
Keep your in-app guides short and simple to NOT overwhelm users
Test different formats (branched tutorial using modals, step-by-step tooltip guide, video tutorials, etc)
- Personalize the content to each use case
- Make them interactive by letting users choose their path
- Trigger them contextually using segmentation
- Make tutorials available on demand by adding them to your in-app resource center
- Always track performance against your goals and see where you can improve
- Collect feedback after engagement to understand what’s working or not
There’s a plethora of no-code onboarding tools out there if you are looking to get started with in-app tutorials, but you might want to look at Userpilot vs Appcues vs Userguiding:
- Userpilot is the best tool for building personalized and contextual onboarding in-app tutorials and it will give you access to the largest range of UI patterns to use when building your tutorials. You can also build an in-app resource center to include your guides and get access to advanced analytics and segmentation. The lowest plan starts at $249/mo without relevant feature limitations.
- Appcues would be your go-to tool if you need to build tutorials for mobile. The downside of it is that it heavily limits the functionality available in the lowest (Essentials) plan. If you need checklists, more than 10 events, or more than 5 user segments, you’ll need to upgrade to the Growth plan (starting at $879/mo payable annually).
- Userguiding is your tool if you are on a budget. If all you’re looking for is a relatively easy way to build simple onboarding flows, this could be a great choice for you. However, people looking for more analytics, customization, or complex integrations should probably look elsewhere. Plans start at $99/mo but offer limited functionality.
Get started with in-app tutorials without the need to code. Try Userpilot!
What is an in-app tutorial?
An in-app tutorial is an interactive guide that runs on top of your user interface and is meant to provide guidance and in-app training within your product. These could be video tutorials that run in-app or step-by-step guides (also known as app walkthroughs or interactive walkthroughs).
Why should you use in-app tutorials in your user onboarding experience?
The main purpose of in-app tutorials is to drive feature and product adoption. This is what any product team would want. If you are part of the customer success, product management, or customer support team you want your onboarding experience to guide users to get value from your product and stick around.
That’s where in-app tutorials come in.
Provide self-paced learning
It’s hard for us humans to absorb a lot of information in one go. This is why long, boring product tours don’t work. You can’t expect a new user to sit through a never-ending series of tooltips that walk them through your product’s entire user interface and explain each element in one go, and also remember everything.
An in-app tutorial, on the other hand, provides granular bits of information and guides users on how to engage with the product, at their own pace.
Get new users to experience value faster
Getting users to the Aha! Moment is crucial. But what’s more important is to get them to also experience that expected value.
You see, the Aha! Moment is mostly about users realizing that there might be value in using your product.
The potential of value is what makes them sign up. They then need to get to the activation point too.
In-app tutorials help get the users there and experience value faster, as they offer the needed in-app training that shortens the learning curve and keeps new users engaged.
Drive user engagement
Engagement is everything when it comes to convincing a new user to stay. If they simply stare at the first screen they see, then they won’t last very long. You need them to click, to scroll, to type — to interact in some way.
A good in-app tutorial encourages those interactions. It prompts and guides users to do something and means they’re more likely to actually do it if what you are guiding them to do makes sense considering where they are in their journey.
Clicking on a checklist item, for instance, triggers specific experiences that lead to activation. A checklist works both for new users and for more advanced users that could benefit from discovering other features they are not using. You just need to add specific tasks based on where the user is in the journey.
Increase customer retention
Tutorials are meant to offer in-app guidance where and when the user needs it across the entire user onboarding process. When done right, these interactive walkthroughs help remove frustration caused by steeper learning curves and make it easier for the user to actually use the product.
The more they engage, the more the product becomes part of their life and the more value they get.
Using tutorials to onboard users at every stage of the user journey will ultimately increase retention rates since users don’t churn when they experience repeated value from a product.
Best practices when creating an in-app tutorial
So hopefully now you understand why in-app tutorials are so crucial when it comes to driving product adoption.
But what makes a good in-app tutorial? How do you make it as effective as possible?
That’s what we’re going to look at now.
Keep your in-app guides short and simple to NOT overwhelm users
All your in-app tutorials should be on point, focusing on driving users to engage and adopt key features of your product, one at a time.
Your users don’t need to know about those secondary features (at least not yet) and so you can make your in-app tutorial more focused. Start with the goal of each tutorial and make sure to guide users on how to reach it.
These goals will be based on where the users are in their journey and where they need to get next. This can be reaching the activation point, adopting a new feature, or learning how to use some advanced features of your product.
Here’s how Userpilot does it for example.
The welcome modal focuses on setting the right expectations from the tool and guiding users to take their first needed action to get closer to value. This is everything new users need to know.
Once they successfully installed the Chrome extension builder, they see a success message that guides them to take the next step and build their first flow.
Rather than giving new users all the information up-front, Userpilot focuses on encouraging them to add the Builder first. This is the first step they need to take otherwise a new user can’t really use and experience value from the tool.
Get started with in-app tutorials without the need to code. Try Userpilot!
Test different formats
A modal, a tooltip, a video, anything can be part of your tutorials that drive customer success. Since users are different they will prefer different types of in-app communication.
You should always test what works best in achieving the goal.
For example, is adding a modal with a clear CTA enough, or should you also use a checklist?
To get your answer, you can use A/B testing and compare your goal completion rate for users who see and engage with a checklist and the ones who don’t.
Note: not all tools will allow A/B testing so if you want to try this out you should check Userpilot as this is one of its features.
Personalize your in-app tutorials to each use case
Most SaaS products will have a few different use cases or user personas. It’s safe to say that these use cases will often have different needs from your product. So giving everyone the same in-app tutorial is never going to work.
Instead, you should create a separate and personalized in-app tutorial for each and every use case. Then you just need to trigger the right one for each user that signs up for your product.
Of course, to do this you need to make sure you know which use case your users belong to. The best way to do that is to ask them using a micro survey either during the signup process or on your welcome screen.
Then use the information collected to create different user segments and trigger different tutorials for each.
Make tutorials interactive by letting users choose their path
You can create a different interactive walkthrough for each user segment but you can also use a more engaging approach and let users choose their own path as they go.
Both walk new users around the product, highlighting various features, and act as useful in-app tutorials. But there’s a key difference. One lets users feel they are in charge of their experience.
Basically, the interactive nature means that users pay more attention, retain more of what they’ve learned, and start seeing value more quickly.
On top of that, letting users choose their path helps in getting them to experience value faster, by skipping irrelevant steps.
Take a look at how ConvertKit does it.
They ask users a simple question: “Where are you joining us from?”. Since the onboarding experience will be different for a user that is just starting out compared to a user that already has a contact list and is moving from another tool, ConvertKit lets users choose the best path for them.
When a user selects one option, they will be presented with different options, that are relevant to their use case.
Trigger in-app guidance contextually
One of the issues with front-loading information to new users is that they’re likely to forget it all within ten minutes of using your product.
That effectively means your onboarding was a waste of time, plus your users will still be in the dark when it comes to using your product.
The solution is to make your in-app tutorials more contextual.
What does that mean in practice? Well, it means that you should only tell a user about a particular feature of your product when they need to know about it.
Let’s say you are launching a new feature and want to help users adopt it using an interactive walkthrough. Would it make sense to trigger this for users who haven’t engaged with key features yet to reach the activation stage?
Of course not.
Instead, use segmentation to make sure your message is shown only to relevant users.
Contextual onboarding can make your in-app tutorials far more effective, and drive product adoption as a result.
Get started with in-app tutorials without the need to code. Try Userpilot!
Make tutorials accessible on-demand
Using product usage data you can understand when and where your users need help. But triggering app tutorials when you think the user needs them is one way to go.
I’m not saying that doesn’t work. In most cases, it will be the best option.
But to make sure users actually engage with it, adding your interactive walkthroughs to an in-app resource center lets them access it as many times as they need and when they need it.
Track performance and improve
Building interactive walkthroughs, app tutorials, and guides is about promoting user engagement and adoption across the entire user journey through user education.
And how would you know if they are effective if you don’t track performance?
One way to understand the effectiveness is to set up goals you want your users to reach. For example, engaging with a specific feature or reaching activation.
Once you have these goals set up, make sure you connect each product walkthrough or video tutorial to a specific goal. This way you make sure you are not building guides without a purpose and you also measure their effectiveness.
Improve your guides based on user feedback
Last, but not least, you should always collect feedback from your users and improve.
Same as with building in-app tutorials, your feedback needs to be granular and contextual.
What does this mean?
Use different types of surveys at different points in the user journey to understand user experience but also where users struggle and a new tutorial would be helpful.
For example, let’s say your user has just finished engaging with your onboarding activation app walkthrough and reached a new milestone.
You’d want to know what their experience was like. You can ask them using a simple micro survey.
Best in-app tutorial examples
I’ve already covered some examples while going over in-app tutorials’ best practices but here is a collection of some of the best tutorials that follow them too.
Userpilot in-app video tutorial plus a step-by-step guide
Userpilot is a great tool for building tutorials for your users and triggering them at the right time. So it makes perfect sense that we also practice what we preach.
I already showcase how we guide new users to get started so here is a video tutorial example meant to encourage users to build their first flow.
We use a modal with a short video embedded and a simple CTA that prompts users to take action. When they click on Start building, a step-by-step interactive onboarding walkthrough build using tooltips will trigger to take new customers across each step explained in the video.
Why is this a good example:
- uses different types of content
- is contextual: the modal is triggered for new users for the first time they engage with the app page
- it’s short and focused on one goal
Get started with in-app tutorials without the need to code. Try Userpilot!
Kommunicate in-app tutorial guiding users step-by-step
Kommunicate is a customer support automation platform that enables users to build their own AI chatbots without any coding.
When onboarding its users, Kommunicate deploys interactive walkthroughs that guide users on how to customize their chat widget. Step-by-step instructions are given in simple copy and only trigger once the user has engaged with the previous step in the series and follows the instruction.
For example, when a tooltip pops prompting the user to insert text, the next tooltip will only show once the user has performed the action.
Why is this a good example?
- lets users engage and learn at their own pace
- it’s short and easy to understand
- and is focused on one goal: widget customization
Tolstoy uses multiple video tutorials for different use cases
Tolstoy is a platform aimed at boosting digital adoption by leveraging video in customer onboarding. Videos are proven to drive engagement, boost knowledge retention, and increase conversion.
They created different video tutorials and interactive guides for specific use cases instead of one guide to rule them all. Human faces help to add an element of personalization, and this granular approach helps users get exactly what they need from the platform, fast.
Why is this a good example?
- granular approach: different use cases
- small bits sized videos help users process information easier
- visual learners are prioritized and this works since the tool itself is a video creation platform for guides
No-code onboarding tools for building in-app tutorials
There’s a plethora of no-code onboarding tools out there if you are looking to get started with in-app tutorials. To make your job easy, here are three choices based on your budget and needs.
If you want an in-depth comparison of Userpilot vs Appcues vs Userguiding you can check it here or get the summary below.
Userpilot- best tool for personalized and contextual onboarding in-app tutorials
Userpilot was built specifically for SaaS product teams that want to improve their user onboarding experience and boost user activation. You can build a huge variety of user onboarding experiences and in-app guidance flows without needing to code.
But the best part?
With Userpilot you really get the best value for your money.
Compared to Appcues and Userguiding, Userpilot gives you access to the largest range of UI patterns to use when building your tutorials and the segmentation options are the most advanced.
Pros&Cons of Userpilot
✅ UI patterns are not limited by plan – you get access to all of them on every single plan, meaning you get value even with the Traction plan (this is the entry-level one)
✅ Engaging walkthroughs and onboarding tutorials- build interactive walkthroughs targeted to distinct user segments.
✅ In-app help – build a resource center offering self-service support to your users, customize it with your branding, and select from a range of help options to boost user satisfaction (i.e. videos, in-app flows, chat, and more)
✅ Advanced analytics and segmentation- analyze product usage and in-app flow engagement and build unlimited user segments using the data.
❌ Browser/web app only – Userpilot won’t run on mobile devices/applications.
❌ Not appropriate for small startups on a shoestring budget (<$100)- Userpilot is a powerful, mid-market to enterprise-level tool. So $249 a month might be too expensive for really small startups. See Userpilot pricing here.
Get started with in-app tutorials without the need to code. Try Userpilot!
Appcues- best tool for building tutorials for mobile apps
Appcues used to provide onboarding templates, which made it easy to use the tool. However, it provided a predefined way of thinking about onboarding all while having a higher price tag than other onboarding software. As of the time of writing (end of 2022), Appcues has removed its onboarding templates – without really replacing them with another solution.
Appcues allows you to design flows that make onboarding processes a breeze. These flows are what you use to create product tours and other in-app communication with users.
Pros&Cons of Appcues
✅ Can be used on web apps and mobile apps too.
✅ You can use predefined flows or build your own using a good range of UI patterns. Check Appcues features here.
✅ Allows basic segmentation and event-based flow triggering.
❌ It heavily limits the functionality available in the lowest (Essentials) plan. If you need checklists, more than 10 events, or more than 5 user segments, you’ll need to upgrade to the Growth plan (starting at $879/mo payable annually, which means you need to fork out more than $10,500 to start using Appcues for more use cases. Check Appcues pricing here.
❌ Appcues doesn’t have a resource center feature, meaning you can’t use it to offer self-service support to your users.
Userguiding- best tool when you are on a budget
UserGuiding is a lower-cost, entry-level product adoption tool offering a range of features to help companies onboard new customers and boost product adoption.
UserGuiding excels at building simple onboarding experiences for users. It includes a no-code builder, segmentation options, and easily added UI patterns like hotspots, tooltips, and modals.
Although it also has some other goodies like a resource center and analytics, the meat of this product is its onboarding flow builder. If all you’re looking for is a relatively easy way to build simple onboarding flows, this could be a great choice for you. However, people looking for more analytics, customization, or complex integrations should probably look elsewhere. 
Pros&Cons of Userguiding
✅ For small startups or independent businesses, the price is an attractive element to consider.
✅ A good variety of UI patterns to choose from when building flows and guides
❌ There are many bugs and performance issues when using the tool. The UI is also fairly tricky to navigate.
❌ It has limited functionality, particularly on the basic plan. There you only have a small range of features available – all with the UserGuiding watermark/branding.
Conclusion
A well-made in-app tutorial will always work best compared to a product tour and it will help guide users through your product interface with ease and engage with valuable features without friction.
If you’re looking to improve your user experience, an onboarding walkthrough tutorial is the way to go. Get a Userpilot demo to get started.
Get started with in-app tutorials without the need to code. Try Userpilot!
