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In user testing TrailBehind, many people asked for some sort of "Help" section. After I got a couple of requests for this feature, I dutifully spent some time drawing up basic instructions for all the various functions on TrailBehind.

The Help tab I added to the site (the "?" tab on the home page) has been well-received, and I've had fewer commmon questions from users. But as it turns out, that hasn't been the major benefit of creating Help Docs at all! The main benefits ended up being 1) simplifying the website and 2) gaining a better understanding of TrailBehind.

When you are learning anything, reading about the subject helps, getting taught helps, and practicing helps a lot. But what helps the most in learning something, is teaching someone else. I found that writing Help Docs had the same effect. When you are teaching something - a game, a craft, or helping someone with their homework - you have to have a very good understanding of how something works. Moreover, as you teach, you start to recognize the holes in your own knowledge.

In writing TrailBehind's Help Docs, I started to notice how hard it was to explain the site concisely. For example, I was watching myself write up explanations about how you could upload content to the site. You could add a link to the map Reddit-style, write a report on the site, plan a trip to a place, comment on a place on the map, upload a GPS file, etc. Not only did I notice how complex this was, I also noticed that despite having all of these features, people weren't really using them much.

So, the process helped me come to a fast conclusion that I needed to ditch some beloved features, and integrate some other. It's a hard thing to do - to drop a trip-planning feature or a threaded comment feature - that you have been lovingly cultivating for months. And it took this very visceral experience of trying to simply explain something that wasn't simple at all, to make the move.

The Help Docs have been nice, and people like them. But truly, they have had more of an impact on the website indirectly than directly, just by causing me to think deeply about every button and widget on the site. And I don't mean some intangible change in my brain.

Since getting this insight from writing up short Help Docs, content uploading has picked up, other features aren't getting lost in the shuffle and are being used more, and people are spending more time using the site.

There are other factors in play here, but this has been a very good experience for me and for TrailBehind. If you haven't taken the time recently to try and explain all the features on your site, jot down a few words and see where that takes you. You may find similar features to merge, good ideas lurking in bad code, and a dozen more ways to please your users.