--- tag: product --- # Product Tours Overview ### What is a product tour? > "Product tours—sometimes called product walkthroughs—introduce users to a new product and help them find their bearings. They can be used to introduce new users to your UI and guide them to take meaningful actions that bring them closer to their aha moment—increasing product activation, adoption, and retention rates. > > But a poorly executed product tour can quickly frustrate new users, preventing them from discovering your product's core value and making them more likely to abandon your product too soon. The key is to focus on your product’s value and user goals, instead of dragging users through every feature." > > [**Appcues**](https://www.appcues.com/blog/product-tours-walkthroughs-ultimate-guide#:~:text=Product%20tours%E2%80%94sometimes%20called%20product,%2C%20adoption%2C%20and%20retention%20rates.) --- ### Why use a product tour? 1. **Compelling users to take specific, meaningful actions in your app** - Instead of leaving users to figure out your app on their own, product tours influence user behavior by explaining why each step is important and guiding to take critical actions within your product. Is your product tour pointing users towards taking one of these steps? 2. **Guide users towards their aha moment** - An aha moment is when users first realize the value or USP that your product provides. This isn't always something they'll discover on their own. A product tour can help make sure users discover the value of your product as quickly as possible. --- ### Qualities of a good product tour? 1. **Sequentialism** - Don't just show users a random collection of tooltips without any clear structure. Each step in your product tour should be clearly defined, and each step should move users further down the path to activation 2. **Be precise and focused** - Explaining every little feature will only lead to frustrated and annoyed users. Make sure you're only highlighting the features necessary for users to experience your product's core value 3. **Keep it short and sweet** - New users are keen to get started using your app. Respect their time by making sure your tour isn't overlong. Unnecessary steps only add friction to the onboarding process and should be removed. *Less is more—3 to 5 steps is usually plenty for an onboarding flow* 4. **Finish strong** - The best product tours clearly explain the next step a user should take. Don't leave them hanging—make it easy for them to take the next step by answering the all-important question: “Where should I start?” --- ### Types of Tours *[How to pick the right product tour UI?](https://www.appcues.com/blog/product-tours-ui-patterns)* [**Tooltips**](https://www.appcues.com/blog/tooltips) - Tooltips are small overlay boxes that point out specific features or elements within a SaaS product. They offer a highly contextual way to guide users through your app, without being overly prescriptive (unless desired). They can be either action/non-action-driven, meaning users have to perform the requested task before moving onto the next tooltip or just follow them in sequence without performing an action. ![](https://i.imgur.com/K9gIHg0.png) ... [**Modals**](https://www.appcues.com/blog/modal-dialog-windows) - Modal windows come in all shapes and sizes and can be configured to pop up over your UI or to take over the whole screen. Their larger size allows you to include more detail than you can in most tooltips, which makes them perfect for extra elements like images or video. `Note that because large modals are inherently disruptive, they can easily become intrusive and detract from the overall user experience. Use them wisely!` ![](https://i.imgur.com/PhN9KNd.png) ... [**Hotspots**](https://) - Hotspots are small, lightweight dots or icons, sometimes animated, indicating that users should click on the hotspot to learn more about the feature being highlighted. They can also be combined with other patterns—it's common to see apps employing a combination of hotspots and and tooltips. Since users must click on a hotspot to activate each step in a product tour, users can ignore the information if it isn't needed. Their small size and subtlety make hotspots perfect for lightweight onboarding experiences or for when you want users to explore an interface on their own. ![](https://i.imgur.com/bA7L5kM.png) ... --- ### The importance of data and iteration If users don’t find your product tour valuable, you don’t just have a product tour problem—you have the beginnings of a much larger user engagement problem. That's why it’s so important to continuously monitor the performance of your product tour, analyze your data, and repeatedly iterate on the experience to make sure you’re not just educating users, but also steering them toward desired actions. ***If your users are dropping-off and not finishing your product tour, [take a look at this article](https://www.appcues.com/blog/build-effective-product-tours) to help:*** 1. Identify the drop-off point 2. Find your solution --- ## Key Steps in Creating a Product Tour on Raise 1. **Pick your location** - Where is your tour taking place? Where does it begin and where does it end? Remember, its a good idea to end your tour with an action (or list of) that your user can take. 2. **Define flow/action** - What is the focus of this product tour? Is it to introduce a new feature, give an introductory tour, or walk them through a specific task? Define your flow. 3. **Breakdown into 3-5 manageable and informative steps** - Short and sweet. Lenghty product tours never work and will lead you to losing users and money. So, define the flow/action and split it into a few (max) short steps. 4. **Leave some level of autonomy (more a breadcrumb trail than full hand-holding)** - This should answer the question of "how does it end/what to do now?". Holding hands sometimes negatively impacts the users emotion of comfort and autonomy. For example, if building a cap table takes 100 micro hand-holding steps, the user will end up feeling "Crap, this is a super complex product. I can't do this by myself!". So, let's avoid that. 5. **Build It** - Think your tour is ready? Time to start building it out and testing it on users... 6. **Review Data and Iterate** - The journey never ends. Make sure you collect and analyse data as your product tours might not be working as you intended... ---