Repeat customer for your Mobile App

Problem

Aghast, you are not getting repeat customers despite all essential ingredients of success in your app such as unique and innovative idea, alluring designs, excellent user experiences, and tons of features with useful functionality!

This sort of frustration is common for many entrepreneurs in the App market. Therefore, I have dug up some statistics on the usage patterns of the mobile apps. The resulting data were revealing astounding truths.

“More than 70% users are downloading mobile apps and use them only once and never open again.”

Solution

Therefore, I have started to look at the real world examples of successful apps and start them to use after downloading. I concluded that most of them have one common thing and that was effective onboarding techniques to guide the first time users. You may ask that what are the onboarding techniques and what role they play in the success of the mobile application.

The introductory designing technique that introduces new user to the new app and teaches them to use it and get whatever they want from the app itself is call onboarding techniques. Today I have a pure intention to introduce you with some of good onboarding techniques in this post in brief.

Create Effective Onboarding

Before creating onboarding designing you should know that what they accomplish in your app.

1. Onboarding techniques give value proposition of your app through presenting key benefits of using the app and show why you have spent money on its

2. Immediately engaging users to use the app by introducing them with the main features of your mobile app

Thus, it is mandatory that your onboarding should begin as soon as your new user launch the app whether finishing the installation process or begins inbuilt app use at first time. Since our primary goal is to engage user as quickly as possible so they never think of abandoning app or lose interest finding app usage tough or app useless anyhow, we should be short-and-sweet for onboarding designing.

Now, let’s see some effective and prevailing onboarding techniques in present era and past era.

Classic Onboarding Techniques

Tutorials: This is an age-old technique use on the desktop and web application to familiarize the users with the application and help them to use it in correct manner. However, for mobile applications we should think a bit in different way and keep tutorials very short and focus on the either a single and primary goal or focus on the only handful of important characteristics or features of the mobile application. I think five to seven screens are enough for tutorials.

Walkthrough: This is somewhat rigid technique, but good at the blank slate problem. As it needs filling up some essential information before starting the app usage at first time, and helps us to offer personalized and authenticate experiences. Here least is the best so ask only the most essential and innocent information from the users.

Modern Onboarding techniques

Screen overlay: This onboarding technique is useful particularly where we want to draw attention of our users on the key UI elements and we can accomplish it through providing helpful information about it.

We can perform this task using de-emphasizing designing techniques for the elements, which are of less important and by highlighting certain useful elements. I term this one a modern technique because here users are getting entry into the app immediately as soon as authentication/sign-up finishes. Therefore, users have enough room to either take help of screen overlay tour or start exploring app by their own ways and by their own wits.

Progressive Discloser: This also calls as inline hinting as designer explains or give useful hints as the user is exploring the app and need more information regarding to particular feature or functionality. This onboarding technique is the most sober and intuitive one as it never interferes user experiences at all.