Sometimes when I open an app on my phone or laptop, I am presented with hints or pop-ups on new features I can now use since I last opened the app.
The problem is, I often launch apps to do a specific task I have in mind and I’m not in the mood to look at new features right away. I may want to look at them after the task is complete but not right now.
So what do I do when I see those prompts and updates? I dismiss them.
In a lot of apps, once I dismiss these updates or hints, they are gone forever. This can be particularly frustrating if I am trying to find them at a later point.
For example, in the MS Teams screenshot above, the pop-up about OneDrive is blocking my chats history. Upon seeing it, I clicked the close button immediately because OneDrive is not why I opened the app at that particular time. Fast forwarding to a few minutes later after my task was complete, I tried to look for the OneDrive tip but I could not find it.
I am not sure if this is deliberate but there should be a way to access these items at later times.
However, some apps do a better job of this. For example, On Webflow, you can view the updates once you dismiss them by clicking on your profile menu and accessing ‘Updates’. This is good but not great as I still had to do some work to find it as it was not obvious.
Arguably, once I dismiss the pop up, it should show an animation of it being hidden and where I can find it later.
If showing me tips and updates at the point of the app launch is not a good time, then the next question is “when is a good time?”
I believe a good place to show a user recent updates is on a loading screen. This can be particularly helpful as the user has nothing to do except wait. Whilst they are waiting you app developers/designers can insert a message about new things that have just been launched. Most loading screens are empty like the webflow one below so it can be a good use of real estate.
The hint can be shown when the user is doing the exact task. For example, in the OneDrive screenshot, a better time to present me with the prompt is when I actually clicked on OneDrive. Funny enough, MS Teams can detect when you are scrolling through a chat to find something, and prompts you to use the shortcut “ctrl + f” to search the chat (which is great).
When a user is about to log in, updates about new features can also be shown below the log in modal as it can help the user remember when they need to do that task later on as they navigate through the app.