Our product team faced a persistent challenge: despite investing significant resources in developing new features, user adoption rates remained low. Through targeted user experience research, I worked to uncover the root causes behind this problem and implement a solution to improve our feature launch process. The results were transformative: where major updates previously had low to medium adoption rates yet generated overwhelming customer support tickets, our new approach reduced the amount of support requests to single digits while achieving very high engagement (>80% of users) with release communications and widespread feature adoption.
Background
We observed a troubling pattern: new features would launch with minimal fanfare and even lower adoption rates. Users seemed unaware of new functionality, and when they did discover it, they struggled to understand its value or how to implement it effectively. As a result, development resources were being underutilized, customer satisfaction wasn't improving as expected, and our customer support team was fielding numerous confused inquiries whenever we did manage to communicate new features.
Research Methodology
My research aimed to answer a few critical questions: Why weren't users adopting new features? What obstacles stood between feature release and user engagement? How could we bridge the gap between our development efforts and user value realization?
To answer these questions, interviews were conducted with existing users, focusing on active users who have used the platform for at least 6 months. We did not have the data for it, but anecdotally noticed that around the half-year mark after onboarding, users would either struggle to keep up with new features or simply not be aware of them.
The interviews were semi-structured. Users were asked about their experience and knowledge of recent new features. Then, the interview shifted to their preferred learning styles and communication channels.
Key Findings
There were four major barriers to user adoption of new features:
Documentation Deficits: Users often turned to our support channels for help with new features due to a lack of adequate documentation. It was oftentimes too shallow, not covering the full scope of the new functionality.
Communication Void: While we had a monthly newsletter, it never explained features in enough detail to understand their value or how to use them. There was no systematic release notes process either, leaving users oftentimes to discover functionality on their own, before there were any proper release notes.
Lack of Visuals: Over and over, users expressed that they preferred visual explanations of new features. Video-based learning was particularly popular, to understand real-world usage of the new functionality and follow along with a step-by-step demonstration. However, our current library of video content was of poor quality, for example due to being filmed on big monitors, making it hard to read the text on smaller screens.
Activation Complexity: Due to the permissions system of the platform, most new features required manual activation by an administrator by adding the correct access rights to all applicable roles. While this is not a complex process, our communication was often unclear of when and how exactly to setup permissions and roles.
Implementing a New Process for Feature Releases
My first step to remedy the issues raised by our users was to setup a new process for feature releases. From now on, writing release notes and documentation is done during the QA phase of development, instead of ad-hoc after the feature is released or when the customer support team gets overwhelmed. Together with the product team, we also established our changelog page as the central hub for all new features, and moved our monthly newsletter subscribers over to this new feed.
The release notes themselves were refocused on user benefits, and included clear instructions on how to enable and use the new feature. Eye-catching headers designed in a bento box style were added to the release notes, showing users the value of our updates in an easy-to-understand infographic.
For major releases, we also started creating video content that explained the new features in detail. Recognizing users' strong preference for visual learning, as well as their critical feedback on our old video content, we invested in new video production tools and techniques. As for the videos' content, we focused on first introducing the new feature's purpose and benefits, then giving a step-by-step demonstration of how to use it. The production values were deliberately higher than usual, creating engaging content that users would want to watch rather than feel obligated to review.
Lastly, I started a project with the development team to improve the permissions system of the platform. The goal was to allow administrators to give the platform permission to automatically enable new features for all users, without needing to manually set up roles and permissions. This would eliminate the activation complexity barrier entirely.
Results and Impact
The most dramatic change occurred in customer support ticket volume. Where major feature releases previously generated an overwhelming influx of confused inquiries that strained our support team, our new approach reduced feature-related questions to virtually zero. For our most recent major dashboard update, we received only a single question about the feature itself.
Our release communications also achieved exceptional engagement rates. Analytics showed that nearly every user opened and read our release notes after seeing the header in the platform or receiving the email, indicating that we had successfully captured user attention and delivered information in an accessible format. More than one-third of users also watched our accompanying video content, demonstrating its value.
In follow-up meetings with our customers, we found a high adoption rate of the new dashboard compared to our anecdotal baseline, while also receiving positive feedback across the board on the new release notes and video content. Users expressed appreciation for the clarity and usefulness of our communications, especially the video demonstrations.
Conclusion
What initially appeared to be a feature adoption problem was actually a communication and user education challenge. Valuable insights were gained through this research, especially around the impact of proactive preparation and communication of new feature releases. Our efforts in the pre-release phase dramatically reduced downstream support burdens, while increasing user adoption and understanding. The new processes we implemented have set a new, strong foundation for future feature launches.