Guided Tours in Configurable Workspaces

  • Release version: Yokohama
  • Updated January 30, 2025
  • 3 minutes to read
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    Summary of Guided Tours in Configurable Workspaces

    Guided Tours in ServiceNow are designed to support user onboarding and training by providing step-by-step instructions within Configurable Workspaces. This feature helps users learn how to perform tasks effectively by walking them through workspace features interactively.

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    Creating a Guided Tour

    To create a Guided Tour in a Configurable Workspace, navigate to All > Guided Tours Designer > Create Tour and complete the form with details such as:

    • Name: The tour’s title (e.g., "Create New Incident Tour on Workspace").
    • Tour Type: Select "Workspaces" and "Manual Selection".
    • Starting Page: The specific workspace page to guide users on (e.g., Service Operations Workspace: Record).
    • Table: The record type for guidance (e.g., incident, always lowercase).
    • Sysid: Use a general ID like "-1" instead of copying URLs with appended unique IDs to ensure the tour works across varying records.

    After setting these, click Create Tour to open the Guided Tour Designer for step configuration.

    Configuring and Updating Tours

    To make tours usable across different record IDs and enable the "Take a Tour" option in the Help Center, update the route parameters by setting isDynamic to True. This adjustment allows flexibility and broader applicability of the tours.

    Tour Components

    • Introduction: Provides an overview of the tour’s purpose and what users will accomplish.
    • Callouts: Step-by-step contextual guidance elements placed anywhere on the workspace screen, with display options including above, below, left, or right of the target area.
    • Callout Steps: Multiple steps can be created across different pages, with configurable triggers (e.g., pressing “Next”) that advance the user through the tour.
    • Conclusion: Notifies users upon completion and can direct them to additional resources or next steps.

    Practical Tips

    • Ensure tour steps do not rely on specific unique IDs in URLs to maintain general applicability.
    • Reorder steps easily by dragging them in the list to optimize the flow of guidance.
    • Identify areas in the workspace that may confuse users and require detailed attention within the tour.
    • Preview the tour before publishing to verify proper display and functionality.

    Benefits for ServiceNow Customers

    Guided Tours in Configurable Workspaces empower admins to create tailored, interactive training experiences directly within the workspace environment. This reduces onboarding time, increases user adoption, and ensures consistent understanding of workspace processes such as incident creation. The ability to make tours dynamic and reusable across records enhances maintainability and user experience.

    Guided Tours is a feature in ServiceNow that assists users in onboarding and training processes. Guided Tours are supported in Configurable Workspaces to instruct users how to use features in your workspace.

    Create Guided Tour in Configurable Workspaces

    To create a Guided Tour in your Configurable Workspace, see Create a guided tour.

    Example: Create an incident using Service Operations Workspace

    The following is an example of how you can use Guided Tours to explain to a user the steps to create an Incident in your workspace. In this example it shows the introduction, callouts, callout steps, and the conclusion for your tour.

    1. Navigate to All > Guided Tours Designer > Create Tour.
    2. Fill in the new guided tour form.
      Table 1. Guide tour form
      Field Description
      Name The name of your tour. In this example, it's Create New Incident Tour on Workspace.
      Tour Type The area the tour is created for. In this example, it's Workspaces.

      Select Manual Selection.
      Starting Page The page the tour is created for. In this example, it's Service Operations Workspace: Record.
      Table The type of record needing guidance. In this example, it's incident.
      Note:

      Make sure the term 'incident' is always written in lower case letters.
      Sys_id
      Note:
      It's important that you set up your tour this way, instead of copying and pasting a new incident URL as workspaces append an additional id such as -1_uid_1, or -1_uid_3, etc. If you use one of these URLs your tour will only work when a new incident matches that uid. Also, it's important to ensure that your steps are captured with the Options of: {"url":"/now/sow/record/incident/-1"}, if you start with these recommendations you should not have to change them, but if you have tour steps with options with the uid appended, change the JSON to: {"url":"/now/sow/record/incident/-1"} and it should work.
      The sys_id for the page needing guidance. In this example it's -1.
    3. Select the Create Tour button.
    4. The Guided Tour Designer window opens with the page that is selected in the steps above.

    Updating an existing Guided Tour

    To enable your newly created Guided tour to work on any sys-id, update the Route Parameters manually. This is essential for enabling the Take a Tour option in Help Center.
    • Select the tour you want to update from the Guided Tour Designer list view. Edit the Route Parameters in the editable form.
    • Among other parameters displayed, the admin can set isDynamic to True.
    This update will enable your Guided tour across different sys-id and invoke the Take a Tour option in Help Center.

    Guided tour introduction

    The introduction established the foreword to the steps mentioned in the Guided Tour and also explains the milestone you will accomplish once all the actions are complete.
    Figure 1. Guided tour introduction
    Guided Tours callout introduction.

    Guided tour callouts

    Callouts direct the user, with step-by-step guidance, to navigate and operate within the workspace. You can drag callouts anywhere within your workspace to give more context on the screen or instruction for the task. You can choose how the callout is displayed in the area you want to provide more information about. The options for the callout displays are:
    • Above
    • Below
    • To the left
    • To the right
    For example, in this scenario, the callouts direct the user to navigate to the list view and look for the Incidents tab. As you create your tour steps list, you can also drag the steps in the list to reorder them.
    Figure 2. Guided tour callouts
    Guided Tours callout list.

    You can create steps on multiple pages and areas within the workspace. You can also configure the triggers that will advance the user to the next step. As the user selects through the tour, the next callout step displays after the trigger is completed. In this example, the trigger is configured to go to the next step on after selecting the next button.

    Figure 3. Guided tour callout steps
    Guided tours callout steps.
    Note:
    As you create your tour, be sure to identify areas that may be confusing or need extra attention.
    At the completion of the tour, the user is presented with a conclusion notifying the provided the tour is finished. Here you can direct your users to check out other tours, or give them follow-up information of what to do next now that they’ve completed the tour.
    Figure 4. Guided tour conclusion
    Guided tour callout conclusion.

    After you have completed creating your tour, you can select to preview the tour to make sure it displays and guides the user properly before submitting.