Highlighting Community Functionality for New Members

[WillM]

OK, here's another big picture topic to talk about in regards to the Alteryx Community, as we discussed in our Competitiveness in Community thread. One of the big things that was brought up regularly in our previous discussions was getting people to have good habits from the start, instead of correcting the "wrong" way of doing things. That got me thinking about what we could do to help with that on the community side of things.

What areas of the community do you think would have been helpful to know about as a new member that you maybe didn't discover until later? Are there any particular aspects of the community that you think should be highlighted early in the member experience?

This isn't a topic that we've really focused on too much in the previous threads, but is still very relevant to the discussion.  So for this one, all are welcome, but I'm tagging in some of the community members that participated that joined slightly more recently than our lifers 😉. Any thoughts on this @atcodedog05 , @hanykowska , @AngelosPachis? Hope to hear from you and many others in the thread!

[AngelosPachis]

Hi @WillM ,

Thanks for tagging us and getting us involved in this conversation. As I joined the community early in 2020 I don't consider by any means that I have explored all aspects of it yet nor that I am perfectly aware with where all the gems are hidden. My contribution to the topic can only be based on my journey in this community so far and that can be summarised in 3-4 bullet points :

○ Weekly Challenges

○ Learning Paths

○ Interactive Lessons

○ Discussions Pages

Out of the four, I believe that learning paths and interactive lessons are the two that people I talk to are less familiar with and I think they are those that can be highlighted for new community members. They are a great learning resource and really give you a very strong foothold when you begin using Alteryx, which can later help them get more involved in Weekly challenges and in the discussion pages.

[hanykowska]

Thanks @WillM for voluntelling us 😉

I've been around for about two years now and I think that community page has already changed quite a bit. The landing page with action words directing to specific sections certainly help with navigation, although maybe it would be good to also have a walkthrough of what's available? Just like @AngelosPachis I think there are some hidden gems I haven't come across yet.

I think one of the cool things especially for people new to alteryx might be use cases to show what's possible and how people actually use the tool in their jobs.

I was introduced to it for the purpose of weekly challenges and that's what I've been using most of the time. Next is definitely academy for me (certification and interactive lessons) - and I feel much more comfortable with that section compared to discussions. To be honest, I am still not sure what are the best practices around here in the discussion topics and what are the generally agreed-upon rules to follow (I like rules, whatcha gonna do 🤷🏼‍♀️).

I also keep forgetting about Knowledge page which is brilliant with the tool mastery series.

Hope this helps!

[atcodedog05]

Hi @WillM and everyone,

Happy New Year 🙂

Thank you for the tag. Sorry for replying late, I was out on vacation.

Even I started my Alteryx community journey early 2020. And this is a great topic and is going to be very helpful to many. Alteryx Community is totally filled with a lot of resources. I havent explored everything yet, but I do have few things which is discovered in the later parts which I feel I wish I knew it before.

And as per my observation and digging up. I would like to categorize new users into 2 types

1. Certification aspirants : One of the very common type would be people who register into community aiming for core certification. Because there is no other way you can take it up other than through community. These people might possibly come across Core prep guide where you have a good structed resources list with links. And these people will definitely look into not only learning the concepts but also problem solving skills. So just an assumption that these people would have basic problem solving skills and wont post simple questions on discussion boards.

2. Casual users : These might be people who might be introduced to community by friends, courses or company policies to have an account. These people may or may not be looking for certification but might only be checking out the platform. Hence there is a good possibility that they might not come across the Alteryx academy resources very soon. But very possibly stumble upon discussion board very early(since discussion board is the home page, and there is ask a question at the very top). Then again its true most of the users might be inactive. But a percentage of people will end up posting questions asking how to solve this. Two of the common simple questions asked are regarding vloop-ups and formulas.

Resources that will amplify you learning and experience

1. Learning paths : learning paths are really suggestable for beginner. Getting started learning path provides you with a structured course which gives you in which sequence you can best learn the tools, necessary interactive lessons, tool mastery's and the best which only few might know, it provides hands-on exercises to practice which improves your problem solving skills. By covering Getting started learning path you are gaining concept knowledge as well as problem solving skills. Which other resources really dont give.

2. Adapt Program : Even though registering for ADAPT program might ask you to certify that your job is at risk. The actual ADAPT program content is free and anyone can access it even without registration. If you have more time in your hand you can take ADAPT instead of learning path. It is a great course which guides towards getting certified.

3. Interactive Lesson : Once you have completed with the learning paths you can cover pending tool through interactive lesson

4. Videos : Even though videos dont cover all tools. But it does manage to cover lot of aspects about tools explained in the video. And certification prep videos are really helpful. If you are person who prefers to learn mostly by videos this is the place for you.

5. Weekly Challenges : I would definitely suggest anyone to tackle weekly challenges at the last. Because without the concept and problem solving skills you would be pretty much stuck. If you choose you start and you are a beginner, I would really suggest you attempt beginner level ones only.

6. Blogs and Podcasts (optional) :  Community has a good collection of blogs and podcasts which will gives you previews of exiting things happening around.

7. Weekly Challenges & Discussion boards (Refining skills) : Once you feel are all set you want to refine your skills you can start participating in discussion boards by helping other and weekly challenges all level. And in the process you can observe how others approach a problem and refine your skills. You should always look forward to learning from other this is one of best way to expand your knowledge.

It would be really great if the community team could do something such that users learn something first and try solving atleast a bit before asking questions 🙂

This would really be a better and much mature community.

One of the suggested ways how it be done is whenever someone registers or post a first discussion. I know 

that they get "Ready to take off"(on account creation) or "First Topic"(on posting first topic) and they might get a private message or email something like this.

Spoiler

Suggestion would be to provide a getting started guide where learning and getting familiarized with the Alteryx should be the first task.

This way number of simples questions asked will reduce and improves experience 🙂

Hope this helps 🙂