Just-in-time Feature Surfacing

Last week I was in a coffee shop when I overheard someone ask their friend if they successfully connected to the Wi-Fi. In disbelief, they continued, explaining that their phone asked them to share the Wi-Fi password.

Apple released the ability to share Wi-Fi credentials in 2017 with iOS 11. This person did not seem to know about the release of this feature. Until that day, maybe they did not need to know about this feature.

The fact that, despite not knowing that this feature existed until that moment, this person instantly knew how to leverage it is an impressive feat in user experience design.

This idea of surfacing features just in time seems like a powerful concept. It can bring the appearance of magic to a device or application ("how did it know to ask me for the password?"). While it will not make sense in every context or application type, this magic and whimsy may move someone from a user to an evangelist. Thinking of the Wi-Fi credential sharing feature as an example, I wonder, next time this person goes somewhere with a friend, will they try to reproduce the magic trick? Will they tell their Android friends that they should use an iPhone to be a part of the magic too?

I am not sure of the guidelines of when or how to best leverage this just-in-time concept. However, after experiencing this interaction, I wanted to make this post as a reminder for myself to seek out opportunities to leverage this concept in the future. Is there a way that I could expose a user to a feature just-in-time such that they feel some magic was involved? In such a way that they are in disbelief that it worked? In a way in which, while in a crowded coffee shop, their amazement would be on display?

Do you have examples of being exposed to a feature just-in-time? Have you tried to include it in anything you've built? If so, how did it go?


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