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Let’s be honest, sometimes we just like to vent our frustrations in conversation. \u00a0The next time you are stuck and not sure what to say to someone, ask them to tell you a story about a time where they were completely driven insane by poorly written installation instructions.<\/p>\n
People of all nations, from all walks of life, at one point, have wanted to find the fella who wrote that instruction manual and torture him endlessly.<\/p>\n
Poor instructions (e.g. too long, too short, skipping steps, making major assumptions about the reason for the fix, etc.) plague the market and plague the consumer. \u00a0Sometimes, your customer might even decide to forego\u00a0your product entirely, if your installation instructions are badly presented, or worse if they don’t even exist.<\/p>\n
We all know what happens when instructions are lacking, but that does not stop companies from doing it. \u00a0I relate to you an\u00a0example of frustrating, badly presented installation instructions\u00a0for replacing the mechanism that locks and unlocks the trunk of a hatchback.<\/p>\n
I closed the hatchback of my car one day and lo and behold it refused to open the next time I attempted to unlock it. \u00a0I tried an endless number of troubleshooting tips, but nothing worked. \u00a0Finally, I came to the conclusion that it needed a new trunk mechanism. \u00a0I ordered one; it arrived; I was set to go.<\/p>\n
The most important step to do in an instruction manual really is the most important step to cover. \u00a0And in this experience, my troubles began early. \u00a0As I mentioned above, my trunk would NOT open. \u00a0But the instruction manual (as well as every online forum I accessed) ASSUMED that the trunk would not close. \u00a0And thus “Step 1” simply stated: “Stand at the back of the car. \u00a0Pop open the cover inside the trunk to access the mechanism.”<\/p>\n
There was just one small problem, the cover is impossible to access when the trunk is closed. \u00a0But the instructions said to simply pop it off! \u00a0It is irritating when a company assumes that only the easiest thing is wrong. \u00a0What good are the instructions then? \u00a0I searched and searched online for the instructions for my problem. \u00a0But apparently, no one else’s trunk breaks closed, just open.<\/p>\n
The steps I needed to do no longer correlated with the “instructions” I had. \u00a0I began to invent my own. \u00a0This is another negative result of poor instructions: the consumer has to make it up as they go along. \u00a0I put the back seat down and crawled into the car to get to the trunk area. \u00a0To give you a visual, the car is a Mini Cooper. \u00a0I had to work on my side, stretched out, using one arm, a flashlight that was precariously balanced, and no real idea how to open a cover that was supposed to be opened when standing outside the car\u2014when the trunk was open.<\/p>\n
I had to work on my side, stretched out, using one arm, a flashlight that was precariously balanced, and no real idea how to open a cover that was supposed to be opened when standing outside the car\u2014when the trunk was open.<\/p>\n
I eventually popped\/yanked (same difference :)) open the cover and accessed the mechanism. \u00a0Next problem: the trunk wouldn’t open save for a few inches because HELLO, it was broken in the locked position\u2014not the open position.<\/p>\n
At this point, I just wanted the darn trunk to be open! \u00a0So I did what any self-respecting, irritated, bad instruction manual follower would do: I bent, banged, twisted…then bent, and banged some more\u00a0until it was a mangled piece of metal. \u00a0I didn’t care because I had a new one to put on. \u00a0After approximately five hours, the trunk was open! \u00a0I attached the new mechanism and voila, the trunk closed like gangbusters\u2014no thanks to lousy instructions.<\/p>\n
When a company neglects to consider all of the reasons a repair or part change might be needed, consumers feel insulted. \u00a0What makes instructions good in the first place is\u00a0the degree to which they communicate what is happening in the real world.<\/p>\n
The entire process is all connected. \u00a0If I had had some better instructions, I would have saved myself some hassle. \u00a0Better yet, if I had been able to view a more detailed rendering of what this process looked like from my angle, the process would have gone much more smoothly. \u00a0My request is not lofty. \u00a0It is unlikely that I am the only one whose trunk would mysteriously break from apparently the “wrong” side.<\/p>\n
Installation instructions for building materials can be even more frustrating than my trunk latch. \u00a0 \u00a0Chances are some quick conversations with your sales and support staff and some calls to your best customers will result in a nice list of common mistakes people make installing your products.<\/p>\n
What if there was a great animated installation video you could have shown them that would have prevented all of those problems?<\/p>\n
Would they be more likely to become a repeat customer?<\/p>\n
Will you spend less time doing damage control and taking tech calls?<\/p>\n
Would your brand image and recognition be elevated?<\/p>\n
i think the answer is yes!<\/p>\n
Regards,<\/p>\n
Jason Yana<\/p>\n
[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_text admin_label=”About the author” saved_tabs=”all” background_layout=”light” text_orientation=”left” text_font_size=”14″ use_border_color=”off” border_color=”#ffffff” border_style=”solid” global_module=”3895″]<\/p>\n
About the Author :<\/p>\n
Jason Yana has 2 decades of experience in architectural technology, 3d graphics and construction marketing. This unique combination provides highly-effective visual representations of building products that fuel marketing and support efforts.<\/p>\n
His award-winning body of work informs, inspires and educates building product customers.<\/p>\n
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Everyone Has a Story About Frustrating Installation Instructions Let’s be honest, sometimes we just like to vent our frustrations in conversation. \u00a0The next time you are stuck and not sure what to say to someone, ask them to tell you a story about a time where they were completely driven insane by poorly written installation […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4670,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_et_pb_use_builder":"on","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[12,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4668","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-building-product-marketing","category-visual-marketing-blog"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/visualconstructionmarketing.com\/2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4668","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/visualconstructionmarketing.com\/2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/visualconstructionmarketing.com\/2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/visualconstructionmarketing.com\/2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/visualconstructionmarketing.com\/2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4668"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/visualconstructionmarketing.com\/2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4668\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4673,"href":"https:\/\/visualconstructionmarketing.com\/2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4668\/revisions\/4673"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/visualconstructionmarketing.com\/2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4670"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/visualconstructionmarketing.com\/2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4668"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/visualconstructionmarketing.com\/2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4668"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/visualconstructionmarketing.com\/2014\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4668"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}