Why Use Guided Walkthroughs in Dynamics 365 CRM?

Guided walkthroughs provide step-by-step assistance directly inside Dynamics 365. You may have seen similar tools in other applications as popup bubbles that highlight features or help panes that provide instructions while you work. These types of walkthroughs can be especially useful when introducing employees to a new system. Rather than relying entirely on a trainer, users receive guidance directly where they are completing their work. Guided walkthroughs can help organizations:

• Provide a consistent onboarding experience
• Give users opportunities for repeated, in-system practice
• Answer common questions before users need to ask them
• Support adoption during new Dynamics 365 implementations
• Reinforce business processes as users complete their day-to-day work

The guided help functionality is built into Dynamics 365 Unified Interface apps, allowing organizations to create training that's specific to their Dynamics environment.

Prerequisites for Creating Guided Help

Before creating custom help panes, there are a few prerequisites to consider. The Dynamics 365 environment must support the custom help functionality. Users creating custom help panes also need global Create, Read, Write, Delete, Append, and Append To privileges for the Help Page table. The System Administrator and System Customizer security roles include these privileges. Custom help panes and guided tasks must also be enabled in System Settings. Once walkthroughs are ready, security roles determine which users can view them. Users need Read access to the Help Page table. This gives administrators flexibility over when and where guided help appears. For example, you could create a security role for new users that provides access to onboarding walkthroughs, then remove that role once onboarding is complete.

Creating a Custom Help Pane

Once custom help is enabled, users with the appropriate permissions can begin editing the help pane within a model-driven app. Dynamics 365 provides several options for presenting guidance, including:

• Free-form text
• Numbered and bulleted lists
• Links to additional documentation
• Balloons
• Coach marks
• Collapsible sections
• Images
• Videos

Using a variety of these elements can make training more contextual and easier for users to follow.

Use Balloons to Highlight Specific Features

A balloon can point users toward a particular feature on the screen and provide instructions when selected. For example, users may not realize that multiple views are available within Dynamics 365. A balloon can be positioned near the view selector to highlight it and explain how to switch between views. This gives users guidance precisely where they need it without requiring them to leave the application.

Link to Additional Documentation

A help pane can also include links to supporting documentation. If a user needs more information than you want to include directly in the walkthrough, you can provide a link to a more detailed resource. Consider configuring these links to open in a new window. That way, users can review the documentation without losing their place in Dynamics 365.

Add Training Videos

Videos can be embedded into the help experience to provide additional instruction. For example, you could include a video explaining how to edit filters on a Dynamics 365 view. Depending on how you configure the video, you can control options such as autoplay and full-screen viewing. Videos can be hosted externally and displayed through the help pane, making more detailed instruction available while users are working.

Provide Visual Guidance with Images

Images can also be incorporated into custom help. This can be useful when you want to demonstrate what users should look for or illustrate how a feature works. Images used within these help panes must be converted to Base64 before they can be embedded. For example, an image could demonstrate how to edit columns in a view, giving users a quick visual reference alongside written instructions.

Use Coach Marks to Draw Attention to Important Areas

Coach marks provide another way to highlight important areas of a Dynamics 365 form or list. For example, you might use a coach mark to call attention to the timeline on an account record. The walkthrough could explain that users can use the timeline to track communications and activities, such as notes, appointments, and emails. Rather than providing lengthy instructions, a coach mark can simply direct attention to an important area that users should become familiar with.

Organize Detailed Instructions into Sections

Sometimes a process requires more information than a single balloon or coach mark can provide. Sections let you organize larger amounts of help content while keeping the pane manageable. Sections can contain elements such as text, links, numbered lists, and bulleted lists. They can also be collapsed so that detailed instructions don't overwhelm the user. For example, you could create an "Account Form Instructions" section containing steps such as:

1. Enter the account name.
2. Include the unique account number.
3. Add the appropriate contact information.

Lists can also be indented to create a hierarchy and make more complex instructions easier to follow.

Tailor Walkthroughs to Different Applications and Tasks

One of the most useful aspects of custom help is the ability to create guidance that reflects what users are actually doing. Help topics are unique to the application. This means users working in a sales app can receive different guidance than users working in a customer service app. Help can also vary between lists and forms because users perform different tasks in each context. Likewise, different tables can contain their own guidance, allowing instructions for accounts to differ from instructions for contacts. This gives organizations an opportunity to build walkthroughs around specific job roles and business processes rather than giving every employee the same generic training.

Plan Your Guided Help Before You Build

Before creating walkthroughs throughout your Dynamics 365 environment, consider where contextual guidance will provide the most value. Start by identifying pain points from previous onboarding experiences. Where have employees struggled when using CRM? Which processes regularly lead to questions or mistakes? Then consider:

• Which application the user works in
• Which table or form they're using
• The user's job role
• The specific task you're trying to teach
• Common challenges users have encountered in that process

Avoid putting too much information into a single help pane. Breaking guidance into focused sections can make it much easier for users to absorb. Guided help is also language-specific. If your organization supports users in multiple languages, you'll need to create appropriate tutorials for each target language.

Create More Consistent Dynamics 365 Training

Guided walkthroughs can transform Dynamics 365 itself into a training resource. Instead of teaching a process once and expecting users to remember it, organizations can place instructions directly alongside the tools employees use to complete their work. By combining contextual text, balloons, coach marks, documentation, videos, images, and structured instructions, you can create a polished training experience tailored to your organization's applications, job roles, and business processes. Used thoughtfully, guided walkthroughs can support onboarding, encourage system adoption, reinforce consistent processes, and provide continuing education long after an employee's initial training is complete.