User Manual Template

Product Managers often write the User Manual for their product. This may be the final version or an input to a technical writer. Here is a template I have used to get started on numerous occasions.

Contents of a User Manual

Call out your audience. A product may have used by multiple types of users who may have a distinct user journey. Ideally, have a User Manual for each of the user type.
Name and intro the product. The official name, aka names (ever struggled with Mac OS X names and its actual version number when searching google for a solution for an issue?), version, logo, icon and a brief note on what the product does in the context of the audience user type
Quick Start. A shortest, most direct userflow with no exception flow to get started, do a ‘hello world’ action and exiting. A tl-dr or ‘for impatient’ version. Best to use screenshots a lot with labels and annotations
User Flows. If there are multiple userflows, address each of the user flow per chapter. Start with a brief note on the flow, what it entails, what it accomplishes, and what could go wrong during the flow. Best to use screenshots a lot with labels and annotations
List of Error messages. And possible cases and next steps
Contacting Support or public forums where additional help can be sought
FAQ. Have one even if you have to start with just 1 questions but keep it growing

Meta

Have a uniform structure and template (user should know form the page layout, margins, colours, design what the page is about)
Have useful footers (page, product name and version)
Give meaningful titles to images
Have an index of image
Always assume your user is a novice who will follow your manual down to the last word
Do hand over the drafts to someone who is not familiar with the product and seek feedback if the information was useful enough
Choose Portrait mode (Word doc) if your users will print it more often and a Landscape mode (Powerpoint presentation) if your users will look at it onscreen more often

Have fun writing!

Feature Image Courtesy Peter Merholz (Attribution-ShareAlike 2.0 Generic (CC BY-SA 2.0) ).

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