WalkMe Deployment Showdown: Code Snippet vs. Browser Extension

Let’s talk a bit about getting started with WalkMe. What’s the best way to deploy WalkMe? Via Code Snippet or browser extension? Before we look at this, we really need to understand the target audience and scope of the implementation.

Code Snippet:

If we’re packaging software or delivering on an external customer-facing site, then obviously code snippet is the way to go. Users go to your app and it’s just there. It can be made seamless and appear as part of your application.

Browser Extension:

What about for internal employee-facing applications? The same should be true, yes?

Here I recommend the opposite. For employees, it’s better to deploy via a policy that pushes the web browser extension to all users. As you get WalkMe going in your organization, you will experience organic growth from system to system. Folks will see it running on one app and say “Hey, we need that for our app!”

But the more different application vendors you’re working with, the less likely it is that you’re going to get all of them to be cooperative with you in helping with the code snippet. And this can really slow you down. Here it’s much easier to just use a group policy and push the extension to everyone.

Two Last Caveats:

1. With browser extension approach, you may still have a small minority from time to time who use your applications and don’t see any WalkMe content. These could be employees accessing your cloud-based IT systems via personal devices. Not something your IT Security team is fond of but it can happen.
2. You may come across an application that has both external and internal users. Perhaps a procurement tool or vendor portal. Some of these users can be relied on to have the browser extension and some cannot. In this case, proceed with caution and make sure to not have WalkMe attempt to load content *twice* for the site.

In sum, when deploying WalkMe, it’s not a question of which deployment method is better. They both have their own places depending on the context. I hope this helps. 

#WalkMe #DigitalAdoption