Behavioral product strategist and gamification designer. This is my public hypertext notebook, sharing my thinking in motion at various stages of development.

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New users do not yet have the vocabulary to understand the app

Imagine that you are in a foreign country where you don't speak the language. You're hungry and you need to ask someone on the street where to buy some food. You don’t have the words to say it, but you can probably rub your stomach and people will know where to point you.

If the app has sufficiently unique features or design, then encountering those will be like hearing words from a foreign language. If the features or design are familiar carryovers from other products that people are used to using, then they will make sense immediately. People start using an app with different prior skill levelsPeople start using an app with different prior skill levels
One of the companies I work with, GuidedTrack, is a simplified programming language that allows subject matter experts to create web applications, interactive slideshows, and experiments with no prior coding skill. Since it's all done through text rather than a GUI like Qualtrics or Google Forms, it speeds up program construction and gives it some extra power.

If someone starts using it with prior coding experience in any language, they probably already understand core concepts like "use ind...
, so it’s important to learn how much variability is present so you can improve.

In order for new users to experience a successful AdoptionAdoption
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of an app with unfamiliar vocabulary, you need to first find a common language through which both the app and the user can communicate. Speak to the user with a shared vocabularySpeak to the user with a shared vocabulary
New users do not yet have the vocabulary to understand the app. They understand the product through the lens of their own goals and what's familiar to them. The company will generally have its own goals, like increasing the frequency of engagement. However, we can't just tell people to use the app every day. The user needs to have a reason to do so, articulated in terms of the user's own goals.

When working with clients, I often Use a badging system as a method of actionable user research to...
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More often than not, that language is the user's goals. If you are able to show the user how the unfamiliar features relate to their goals, then those features will suddenly make much more sense. This is why The most successful app adoptions come from a projectThe most successful app adoptions come from a project
#stub

New users do not yet have the vocabulary to understand the app. A big mistake that many people make when they try out a new app is that they’ll try to understand features in a very abstract sense. They will try to understand what it is without knowing what it is for. When people make this mistake, Adoption goes down. Projects allow the app to Speak to the user with a shared vocabulary. They put functionalities into context, closing the feedback loop on learning the usefulness of said f...
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