Whatfix vs Userlane – Which is Better for Interactive User Guides?
Which is the best tool for creating interactive user guides – Whatfix, Userlane, or another in-app onboarding tool?
With so many options to choose from, it can be difficult to select the right no-code tool. To make the right decision, you must consider your budget, tool requirements, and other necessary factors.
This article will explore the essential features of an interactive user guide tool and guide you toward the most suitable option for your business needs.
Let’s get started.
TL;DR
- To educate customers on your product, an interactive user guide is ideal. The latter uses different UX patterns to effectively guide users on how your product works. Interactive user guides can take the shape of full product tours and interactive manuals.
- Interactive user guides host a number of benefits, including increased product adoption, reduced customer support and success costs, and short time to value.
- A tool is necessary to create interactive user guides to reduce reliance on software developers. However, not all tools are made equal.
- Your chosen tool must be fully no-code, offer impressive UX patterns, enable segmentation, and allow tracking of product usage analytics.
- One powerful product adoption tool is Whatfix which is suitable for both employee and customer onboarding.
- It simplifies the creation of in-app guides and allows you to contextually trigger them. You can also track the performance of your user guides with Whatfix. However, some users have reported bugs and the analytical features are basic.
- Userlane is a no-code platform that empowers users to create interactive user guides. These guides, known as “lanes,” are simple to create, and you can integrate gamification elements to make them more interesting.
- Nonetheless, Userlane’s integration capabilities are not impressive, and some of its UX patterns are more basic when compared to other similar tools.
- If you’re searching for a substitute for Whatfix and Userlane, Userpilot is an excellent option to consider. It’s a strong platform for product adoption that provides remarkable UX patterns, in-app checklists, advanced segmentation, and in-app resource centers.
- One of Userpilot’s strengths is that it offers excellent value for its cost and is simple to set up. However, it’s not intended for mobile apps, and can’t be used for employee onboarding.
- Ready to discover what Userpilot has to offer? Schedule a demo today.
Looking for the best tool for interactive user guides? Search no more!
What is interactive user guides?
An interactive user guide is a set of UI patterns designed to work together and help customers understand how to use your product.
There are two main types of user guides: full product tours (which tend to be more detailed and time-consuming), and interactive manuals (using tooltips and real-time guidance to provide more contextual help to your customers).
Interactive user manuals are an excellent way of engaging and educating your users, helping them to get the most out of your product, and improving user onboarding and feature adoption.
Why should you care about interactive user guides?
All product managers want to delight and engage their customers. A big part of that is making sure your users know how to get the most from your application (and in the modern world, that means more than creating a support documentation page).
Fail in that mission, and you risk damaging customer loyalty. Here’s why building interactive user guides is important:
- Interactive user guides improve user onboarding and drive product adoption. How? By helping real users get value from your product through engaging with interactive content relevant to them.
- Contextual and personalized interactive guides will shorten the time to value and reduce friction in the adoption of your product.
- In-app guides are part of a self-serve onboarding strategy and they reduce support and customer success cost while increasing customer satisfaction. Users just get access to help, when they need it.
All in all, interactive user guides are the backbone of a successful onboarding strategy and should be a must for your user experience,
Why do you need tools for building interactive user guides?
Wondering why you even need a tool to create interactive user guides? There are several reasons why you may need one:
For most software companies, creating interactive manuals from scratch is the wrong approach. Why?
Rather than reinventing the wheel, your developers should prioritize their efforts around enhancing your software – making it faster or more visually appealing – and regularly shipping updates that delight your customers.
Here’s how using a tool can help:
- With the low technical barrier to entry, anyone – from operations to customer success managers – can quickly create an interactive tour, which means you can reduce reliance on software developers.
- Rather than a “one size fits all” approach, you can trigger user guides contextually – so based on the specific actions the customer has taken, targeted support is triggered to help them navigate and use the product more effectively.
- There are dozens of variables you might want to adjust, from small changes to copy to tweaking the design. In a custom-built tool, this represents a significant amount of work – in a no-code tool, it’s incredibly simple.
- Customer adoption tools make it easy to see which version of an interactive user guide performs more effectively with A/B testing (and adapt your approach accordingly).
You shouldn’t question the necessity for a tool to build interactive user guides, but you need to understand what functionality you should look for in a tool and which tools are the best.
Must-have features for building no-code interactive user guides?
Not all tools are built the same. Some offer different advantages over others while some will simply get you basic functionality but at a low price. It depends on your budget and needs which will be the best tool to build interactive user guides.
Here’s what to look for as the main functionalities when picking a tool to build in-app guides:
- Good range of UI patterns to use for building your guides.
- Ability to customize each interactive guide to fit your brand and style.
- Segmentation so you could trigger the guides to the right audience at the right time. A one-size-fits-all approach won’t bring you the desired results.
- The ability to trigger the user guides when specific in-app events happen is nice to have and will help you build more contextual in-app experiences.
- Minimum product usage analytics, to be able to track how users engage with the product, and where they get stuck so you can build relevant user guides to help them.
The above list is not exhaustive but it’s a starting point. Depending on your product, you might also need automated localization, A/B testing capabilities, advanced analytics or security, and more.
Whatfix for interactive user guides
Whatfix is one of the top digital adoption platforms around and a driver of innovation in this space.
Whatfix offers a well-made product that allows you to create user flows, knowledge bases, and task lists to get new users engaged and learning. On top of this, their analytics platform is easy to understand and helps you keep track of behavior analytics, guidance analytics, and user feedback all in one place.
To drive product and user adoption, you need to provide continuous value to your users and provide contextual help across all stages of the customer journey.
Whatfix helps your enterprise company achieve that by unlocking the full potential of user segmentation and in-app guidance.
Here is what you will get with Whatfix product adoption functionality.
- Create contextual in-app guides to make users get the maximum value of your product.
- Provide omnichannel support without skyrocketing your customer support goals.
- Powerful analytics to try new ideas based on real-time data and find ways to optimize the customer experience.
Pros of Whatfix?
There are many advantages when it comes to choosing Whatfix. Here are its pros.
- Easy to create flows, even for non-technical team members.
- Allows you to develop knowledge bases for self-help solutions.
- Ideal for both customer and employee onboarding.
Cons of Whatfix?
But at the same time, Whatfix has some cons so it’s better to get an overview if you’re thinking of buying it:
- User experience issues, including bugs and sometimes spotty customer service.
- Fewer analytical features and views than you might like.
- Lacks in-depth style customizations.
- It’s difficult to integrate some of the scripted code in the admin integration sections without the help of a Whatfix support team member.
- No free trial option despite it being stated on the homepage.
- It’s targeted at enterprise accounts so small companies might get ignored.
What users say about Whatfix?
Overall, Whatfix is a good tool and customers are happy with the product. Here is what their customers say about the product.
Our Whatfix Customer Success Manager Kritika has been amazingly responsive to our questions and creative in finding solutions.
Their team really helped us during a project we were doing, and I think they would be great for any company looking for help. This is a must to onboard customers and drive retention.
Though Whatfix is considered a solid tool in the market some people have complaints. Mostly they are related to complications for non-technical people and instability.
Here is what they say:
We were promised a lot of features that weren’t as easy to use as they made it seem when we signed up.
The tool itself is challenging for the less technical people to use the tool, as you need to know the css classes to show flows and steps.
unexpected issues and roadblocks in implementation that can cause delay or a need for an alternate approach
Is Whatfix the right fit for your business?
Though Whatfix is a good tool for user/employee onboarding and it’s used by many companies, there are still some logical reasons why you might look for an alternative:
- It’s designed for enterprise companies and the pricing reportedly starts from $1,200/per month. So it’s not something you’ll be delighted to buy if on budget.
- Whatfix doesn’t support NPS surveys so you can’t collect user feedback and measure customer loyalty
- Though you can create onboarding flows, tooltips, and beacons with Whatfix, there are many cost-efficient tools in the SaaS market that provide the same or even more functionality with customization options at a much lower cost.
Whatfix pricing
Whatfix doesn’t have any pricing plans on its website. Instead, you’ll need to speak with one of their team members to get a custom quote tailored to your needs and organization.
Otherwise, you can request a free trial to see if Whatfix works for you.
There is a better tool for your SaaS than Whatfix!
Userlane for interactive user guides
Userlane is a code-free digital adoption platform that allows you to create in-app interactive content to guide new users and increase product adoption.
Userlane brands itself as a digital adoption platform so no surprise that it comes with powerful features to drive product adoption.
Now let’s see how you can benefit from Userlane’s product adoption functionality:
- Create interactive walkthroughs, the so-called “lanes” to provide guidance to both new customers and employees.
- Track user behavior and make content decisions based on that data.
- Integrate with other tools to make the onboarding process more effective.
- Provide intuitive on-demand assistance, improve customer experience, and ensure long-term retention.
These make Userlane a great option to provide in-app guidance to your customers to shorten the learning curve and adopt your product entirely. However, you’re limited to only interactive walkthroughs with little customization offered.
Pros of Userlane?
Userlane is a popular digital adoption tool and comes with many benefits. Here are its pros:
- Lanes are easy to set up and implement.
- Easy to add gamification elements to your onboarding.
- Includes real-time analytics so you can identify behavior trends and act on them.
- Doesn’t require technical knowledge as it’s mostly code-free.
Cons of Userlane?
However, this tool has some flaws so it’s better to get an overview of its cons if you’re thinking of buying it:
- Not that many integration options. As of now, it has integrations with Confluence, Zendesk, and KnowledgeOwl.
- Some of the UI patterns, like hotspots and tooltips, aren’t as functional as users might like.
- Offers only interactive walkthroughs, known as lanes.
- Works only in the dashboard and can’t be launched in a Chrome extension as most of its competitors, like Userpilot does.
What users say about Userlane?
When it comes to reviews, customers are mostly enjoying a positive experience with Userlane. Here is what they say:
What I find most helpful about Userlane is its simplicity. In that I mean, it’s just easy to start using it out of the box and they continue to add great features all the time.
The tool is really intuitive to use and self-explanatory. Even multi-language support can be handled easily with hardly any effort. I also like the analytical options provided. Last but not least the service team is very supportive not only with technical questions but also in learning how to make the most out of the tool for our specific use cases.
We are using Userlane since almost two years and are always happy to implement the newest features. Big kudos to the Customer Support and Customer Success Team. If you need help, they help you almost instantly and provide easy-understandable solutions. I seldom worked with such a nice organization.
But at the same time, some customers are complaining about the lack of user-friendliness and the steep learning curve for complete novices.
Here is what they say:
Sometimes it is quite complicated to build a guide within our software. But I think this depends on the structure of our software with so many iframes within iframes…
In general, Userlane offers far more advantages than disadvantages.
However, if there should be improvements from our point of view, then the analytics could be further expanded. They currently reflect a good status of the use of guided tours, but could be a little more detailed at one point or another.
The only thing that for me is frustrating at times, is that the actions bar is now located vertically on the screen, versus its previous location across the base of the screen.
This is not user friendly where needed to scroll up or down the page, which was possible previously, but not so easy now. Also the actions bar covers some of the page content, so have to regularly move the actions bar from left to right and vice versa
Is Userlane the right fit for your business?
Userlane is a good tool but it’s not perfect and might not be the right tool for everyone. Here is why you might think about exploring an alternative tool:
- You can only create interactive walkthroughs to guide your new customers and everything is done in the native dashboard and not using a Chrome extension builder.
- It doesn’t offer an in-app help center and there is no capability to provide self-service support.
- Can create user surveys but with limited functionality and no analytics included.
- Pricing is high as it mainly targets enterprise accounts with more than 500 employees.
Userlane pricing
Userlane’s pricing is not public and you should reach out to their sales team to get a quote.
But keep in mind that it is based on two things: the number of guided users and the product features you want access to.
There is a better tool for your SaaS than Userlane!
Is there a better alternative for interactive user guides?
Whatfix and Userlane are good tools for interactive user guides. We’ve seen how they compare to each other and what you can achieve with them. Call us biased, but if you’re looking for something better, Userpilot offers more value for your money than these tools.
Userpilot for interactive user guides
Userpilot is a powerful product adoption platform that enables you to quickly build personalized, flexible, contextually relevant in-app experiences targeted to different user segments – all without writing a line of code.
Product adoption describes the process of getting users to the point where they are experiencing value from your product.
Userpilot is a powerful product adoption platform that enables you to quickly build personalized and contextual in-app experiences targeted to different user experiences – all without writing a line of code.
It’s a great option for enterprise users too since it’s SOC 2 Type II certified and offers robust features for large-scale usage.
Here are some of Userpilot’s product adoption features that you may find helpful:
- A broad range of UI patterns to build fully customizable, contextual, and interactive in-app flows: modals, slideouts, tooltips, hotspots, driven actions, banners, and more. And – most importantly – you are not limited by plan when it comes to how many UI patterns or designs you can build.
- Advanced in-app checklists with built-in gamification elements like progress bars or ”automatically marked complete” tasks: checklists also come with analytics so you can track who is interacting with them and how.
- Fully interactive walkthroughs walk users through engaging and adopting specific features of your app.
- The self-service in-app resource center lets users search your knowledge base directly inside the app, access chat, and support but also launch guides and tutorials when they get stuck.
- User feedback tools allow you to collect insights to improve the product and the user experience, thus leading to a higher product adoption rate. You can also collect NPS data and tag responses to uncover patterns into what makes users stick, or build micro surveys for more granular data. Then you can use all the feedback collected to build user segments based on the answers and personalize the path to higher product adoption for each segment.
Want to see Userpilot in action? Get a demo and improve product adoption with contextual and personalized in-app flows that actually help users.
Pros of Userpilot?
Userpilot has a number of advantages, especially for mid-market SaaS companies looking for a robust but at the same time very easy-to-use, no-code tool for user onboarding, product adoption, and simplified product analytics. Let’s have a look at the pros of using Userpilot:
- No-code builder – Userpilot comes with an easy-to-use Chrome Extension builder.
- Multiple UI patterns – choose from a range of options to build customized flows: modals, slideouts, banners, tooltips, hotspots, and checklists are all at your disposal.
- 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 flows – 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).
- Experimentation – built-in A/B testing for flows lets you explore and quickly iterate based on direct user behavior.
- Powerful feedback options – integrated NPS surveys with analytics and response tagging unlock insight into how your users feel.
- Advanced analytics and segmentation- analyze product usage and in-app flow engagement and build user segments using the data.
- Event tracking and feature tags – tag UI engagement (clicks, form fills, hovers) and group them into one custom event to track what really matters.
- More value with integrations- unlock value faster with built-in integrations with popular tools like Segment, Amplitude, Mixpanel, Kissmetrics, Intercom, Heap, and more.
Cons of Userpilot?
There are, however, some downsides to Userpilot as well:
- Browser/web app only – Userpilot won’t run on mobile devices/applications.
- Doesn’t support employee onboarding. The tool is better suited for customer onboarding than for employee onboarding as you can’t build in-app guides on third-party tools.
- Missing integrations – doesn’t have built-in integrations with some tools, but it has webhooks, and HubSpot and Zapier are coming soon.
- 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.
What users say about Userpilot?
Let’s check what real users like about Userpilot.
Userpilot is an incredible, user-friendly software that allows us to create unforgettable experiences for our clients! From basic to complex experiences, we have been able to do them all with ease! I would highly recommend this software to anyone who wants to provide their clients or users with the best product tour experience. The possibilities of what you can create are endless! – Tayla G.
Userpilot is simple to set up, use, and does not require any dev – which means instant publishing. This is critical for us as a SaaS company that releases new features frequently; we need the ability to inform our customers of changes quickly, and doing this in our platform through Userpilot allows us to reach the right audience, at the right time, in the right place. There have been many awesome extra features we’ve discovered since coming on board, and it’s been great to see new features released frequently. The tool itself is intuitive and reliable. Having used similar products previously that were clunky and buggy this has really made us happy with our decision to move to Userpilot. – Melina K.
Get more value for your money with Userpilot!
Userpilot pricing
Userpilot offers great value for money compared to other similar tools on the market. Even its entry-level plan (Traction) provides all the necessary features without any usage limit.
The price-to-feature ratio is the best for Userpilot. Other cheaper tools in the market would definitely not fulfill your needs, and others like Pendo would be out of budget. Userpilot sits in that sweet spot. – Saurav S.
The pricing differentiation happens mostly on the service level (e.g. custom domain hosting, dedicated Customer Success Manager, SLA) and is based on the number of Monthly Active Users (MAUs) your company has.
Here’s the detailed Userpilot pricing:
- Traction: For up to 2500 users, this plan is $249/ mo.
- Growth: For up to 10,000 users, this plan is $499/ mo.
- Enterprise: For large-scale businesses, these plans begin from $,1000/ mo.
Conclusion
At this point, making a decision between Whatfix and Userlane should be simple. However, it’s difficult to determine which tool is superior since both have their advantages and disadvantages. The choice of tool ultimately depends on your product and current requirements.
If you’re looking for unbeatable product value, opt for Userpilot. Book a demo today to witness how Userpilot can help you create interactive user guides easily.
There is no better tool for your SaaS than Userpilot!
