Skill #25: Nudging Users to Action Through Contextual Help
As technical writers, we help users learn processes or complete particular tasks. And we offer this help in several ways, including documentation, video tutorials, or learning management systems.
But get this: through gentle nudges and clues throughout the users’ journeys, technical writers can help users achieve their goal without sending them straight to the help site.
How? Through contextual help: the micro-copy, in-app guides, and info tips that developers and user experience designers include in their product to nudge users to action.
You’ve seen examples of contextual help. Think the copy that appears below free form fields, instructing you to enter certain content; or guided steps introducing you to a new interface.
This is contextual help. And you—the technical writer—are best equipped to create it for your company.
That’s why, in this episode, we have Kacy Ewing on the podcast: fellow graduate of the University of North Texas and tech writer out of Austin, Texas—though soon moving to Brooklyn, New York to begin a new tech writing job with Bloomberg.
Kacy has created several forms of help resources—including contextual help—and, in this episode, shares the skills you need to excel in creating contextual help for your employer, as well, including:
- how to position yourself in the user experience process
- how to practice your contextual help writing
- Where to find the best examples of contextual help
Show Notes:
Creators and Guests
Host
Jacob Moses
Jacob Moses is the founder and original host of The Not-Boring Tech Writer podcast, which he launched in 2016 to celebrate tech writers and push back against the stereotype that technical writing is boring. He studied technical communication at the University of North Texas, and his first gig out of college was as a tech writer at Rainmaker Digital (formerly Copyblogger Media). Since then, he's carried the skills and values he cultivated as a tech writer into community development and real estate. Today, Jacob is owner of Care Block Development, a real estate development company that acquires, rehabs, and manages historic buildings in Denton, Texas. Pairing historic preservation with thoughtful improvements, Care Block honors the culture of the neighborhoods in which it works to create lovable places for the people it serves. He's also the owner of Sardinha, a premium tinned seafood pop-up pushing premium tins in Denton. If you need a tinfish plug in Denton, Jacob is your guy.
