What's the most effective way you've found to introduce/launch new features within the product UI?

There are three main ways that I like to announce features in-product. Please note: I do not recommend you do all three at the same time unless you want your users to find you incredibly annoying. Each has their own time and place, but I find each to be effective in their own way. I've ranked these from least disruptive to the user to most disruptive to the user below:  Contextual announcements: One of the most seamless ways to help customers discover new features is to include the announcements ...Read More

Introducing new features in-product is often the best way to drive awareness and adoption, because it's in context of the user's workflow and timed when they're actually thinking about your product (vs. email, social, etc.).  Generally speaking, you want to: 1. Make users aware there's something new 2. Provide a product usage fast-lane to users who already 'get it' and want to try 3. Provide additional detail to users who need more hand-holding Here's what that looks like:  Make users aware that ...Read More

Using the product UI as one of your marketing channels for a launch can be so effective because you are meeting your customer where they are. It also reduces friction in the customer journey and lends to more seamless adoption.   However, you must be very careful with marketing directly in the product UI because it’s easy to abuse the channel and create excess noise for your customers. Remember, at the end of the day, you want your customer to find value in the product and not be bombarded with ...Read More

Incorporating in-product experiences into a launch can boost awareness and adoption, and it's a great way for customers to discover new value. Plus, it gives you the chance to get immediate feedback on what you've just rolled out. But it's important to remember that creating valuable experiences is key—most users aren't fans of being marketed to directly within the product. The best approach I've found for introducing and launching new features within the product UI is through a clear, structure ...Read More

At Atlassian, we've found that in-app feature announcements work really well as you have the ability to reach the user when they are in the context of your product vs perhaps checking email and thinking about something else. Here are some tips to make your in-product announcements more effective: Be highly targeted: Unless you're announcing a major feature or product that is useful to every type of user (which is rare!), it's most effective and definitely less annoying to customers, if you targe ...Read More

Product UI real estate is a powerful, contextual tool in introducing new launches. Your customers are most engaged and most likely to take action on your new launch when they are already in the product. And this is especially true for a self-service model because frequently this is the only way customers will find out about a new launch. Depending on how your product is built or your product and engineering capacity, you have many options to highlight a launch in the UI. You can use “new” featur ...Read More

This is a question near and dear to my heart because at Pendo, we use our own product to announce our new products and features in our application! Nowadays there are lots of ways to leverage in-app communications to announce new products and features. A basic way to get started is an in-app notification or announcement via a guide. You can also reserve a spot in your help center or resource center to highlight new features. One thing that has become especially popular when you want to encourage ...Read More

There are a few different ways you can do this (and also a lot of tools out there that can help! Pendo, Chameleon, and Braze as examples.) The top three that I've seen include: A push notification or in-product pop-up will get the most urgent visibility for a new feature. You could also use a banner or in-app message can help you get visibility for the new feature without 'interrupting'. The least obtrusive would be to include in a self-service feature manager, e.g. if your app offers the abilit ...Read More

Intercom - I love their product! You can create announcements on the bottom right of your UI, or as large nearly full screen overlays... but it's not intrusive and looks separate from product notifications. A guided tour using an external tool like WalkMe.... or develop something similar internally Butter bars within the UI that sit at the very top of the screen and hyperlink text that goes to a blog post This one is cheating because it's not technically the UI, but create a personalized log in ...Read More

It depends on the scale of the launch, but I would generally use the following process:  Get Specific on Your Target Audience:  Customer Segmentation: Identify key segments such as new users, power users, or specific industries. Tailor the launch to resonate with these groups.  Journey Timing: Consider where customers are in their product journey to tailor the introduction appropriately. JTBD and Regional Nuances: Focus on the specific jobs to be done and any regional differences to ensure relev ...Read More

There isn’t a one-size-fits-all approach to introducing new features. The most effective strategy depends on the nature of the feature and how it integrates with the rest of your product. That said, I’ve found that a combination of four tactics typically works well: In-App Announcements: This is a no-brainer. These ensure that users are immediately aware of new features the next time they log in. Pop-ups or banners can highlight key benefits and encourage users to explore the update. However, it ...Read More

We typically use one of two options, depending on the business and customer impact of the feature. For new features with huge upside or the potential to cause a lot of customer confusion if not explained carefully, a more disruptive, in product modal is effective. Design it with a strong headline and a visual element and show it to customers upon login. Customers will be "forced" to engage with the modal and any subsequent pages before taking an action or closing out. Modals provide a reasonably ...Read More

New product features seamlessly integrated and intuitively weaved within a product UI can be key levers for user adoption and satisfaction - starts with strong customer discovery, intuitive design and robust feature build. There is no band-aid fix for poor design. Once you've built the right product experience, you can start to think about shaping user habits. Think personalization, omnichannel engagement and reduction of cognitive burden when you think of approaches to drive user stickiness. He ...Read More

I'm a big fan of in-app guides and tours. And from my personal experience, it usually outperforms email. Everything should be crafted with the best user experience in-mind. After you come up with a wireframe for the flow, ask yourself these questions: How does the user discover this in-app tour? (is it hidden behind a trigger, such as navigating to a certain page?) Does this guide/tour compete with or compliment other tours? Is the tour broken up into bite-size pieces? (I recommend less than 6 g ...Read More

My one piece of advice on this though is to make the announcement about the WHY and not the HOW. Too often teams focus on showing people the feature (through a feature tour or tooltip etc.) but that really misses a key step, which is to get someone excited about how the change can add value to their life and work.  Here is my suggested framework for in-product announcements (having worked on this for many years): 2-3 weeks before launch: provide a heads-up / short teaser to let a user know a cha ...Read More