Customize branded app onboarding

Last updated: April 17, 2025

Make a lasting first impression with a tailored onboarding experience for your branded app. Customization revolves around two key elements: the onboarding carousel and welcome spaces.

The onboarding carousel highlights what sets your app apart, giving a sneak peek of engaging community content, exclusive membership offers, or unique benefits to captivate your audience from the start. It helps drive user retention and conversions by clearly communicating the benefits of joining your community.

Here are a couple of things to know:

• Onboarding screens: You can create up to three screens to keep the onboarding experience concise yet impactful.

• Target audience: The onboarding carousel automatically appears to new members, existing members, and prospects (non-members) when they launch your branded app after downloading. Once users complete the onboarding flow and reach the authentication screen, the carousel won’t reappear for them unless they delete and reinstall the app.

• Instant updates: Changes you make to the onboarding carousel are published instantly to your Android and iOS apps without requiring app store approvals.

To get started, follow these steps:

1. On the top navigation bar, click your community name or logo, or the dropdown icon next to it, and select Branded app.

2. On the Custom app builder page, go to the App onboarding section.

3. Click Edit onboarding section to enter the builder.

The custom app builder is divided into three areas:

• Left sidebar (Manage screens): Allows you to create and manage onboarding screens and navigation tabs, including hidden ones.

• Center preview pane: Shows a live preview of the selected screen. At the top of the preview, you can also toggle between light and dark modes.

• Right sidebar (Editor): Allows you to edit screen content, including images, headlines, subtitles, and button text.

1. In the left sidebar, click Add screen under the Onboarding section. A new screen will be created and will appear in the preview pane.

2. On the right sidebar, customize the following for the screen:

   • Image: Click Replace to choose a new image. You’ll see three tabs:

     • Upload: Upload an image from your device (recommended size: 600 × 600 px).

     • Unsplash: Choose an image from the Unsplash library.

     • Embed link: Embed an image using a URL.

   • Headline: Enter a concise, engaging headline.

   • Subtitle: Add a brief description to support the headline.

   • Button text: Customize the text for the button that lets users advance to the next screen within the carousel.

     • Note: These buttons are only meant for navigating through the carousel and cannot link to custom URLs. Tapping it on the third screen will take users to the authentication screen.

3. Repeat the steps above to create and customize more screens as needed for your onboarding flow.

4. After reviewing your changes, click Preview or Publish at the top right (these options appear based on the admin preview toggle).

   • ❗ Important: Changes to the onboarding carousel will be deployed to all users immediately, regardless of your admin preview toggle setting.

To remove an onboarding screen, locate it in the app builder. Click More actions (three dots icon) next to the screen and select Remove.

If you no longer want to show the app onboarding carousel, you can disable it anytime. Simply navigate back to the Custom app builder page and switch the Enabled toggle in the App onboarding section to Disabled.

You can re-enable the onboarding anytime by switching the toggle back to Enabled.

Welcome spaces enhance the onboarding experience by directing users to a designated space after signing up or logging in. This feature is ideal for introducing members to your app’s core community or content.

• New members: Setting up a welcome space for new members ensures that when they sign in for the first time, they are taken to the designated space, creating a warm and focused introduction to your community.

• Existing members: Setting up a welcome space for existing members ensures that once they sign in to the app or restart the app, they are directed to the designated space first.

To configure a welcome space:

1. On the Custom app builder page, locate the Welcome space section.

2. Using the dropdown menu, select a community space to serve as the landing destination for new or existing members.

3. Click Save changes within the section.