How Scaleway increased product documentation engagement with interactive guides

About Scaleway

Scaleway is a France-based cloud provider that has gained significant recognition across Europe. They specialize in delivering cloud solutions that prioritize data sovereignty, sustainability, and developer-friendly infrastructure. Started in 1999 as part of Xavier Niel's telecom ventures, Scaleway now operates as a key technology provider within the Iliad Group. The company has strategically expanded its presence across Europe with multiple data centers supporting its operations.


The service portfolio offers comprehensive cloud solutions for modern businesses, including:

Scaleway stands out among European cloud providers by offering a unique combination of sustainability, sovereignty, developer focus, and competitive pricing. For organizations that prioritize these aspects, Scaleway presents a strong alternative. Such positioning makes them an ideal partner for businesses seeking regulatory alignment and assurance that their data remains protected under Europe's robust privacy frameworks.


They also succeed because of their commitment to user experience. At the heart of this commitment is their Documentation and Learning team, led by Océane Franc. With a team of 10 writers and training specialists, they serve as the crucial bridge between complex cloud technology and user understanding. They transform technical complexity into accessible knowledge by creating clear, user-focused documentation consumed by thousands of users daily. The approach goes beyond basic product explanations, they blend technical expertise with user experience insights to address real user needs. By analyzing how customers interact with Scaleway's diverse product portfolio, they identify knowledge gaps and develop targeted learning materials that enhance the overall platform experience.


What makes this team particularly valuable is their ability to serve diverse user personas effectively. Whether engaging with experienced developers or IT architects, they've developed documentation that addresses varying levels of technical expertise. This approach has transformed their documentation from basic instructions into a strategic asset that helps customers succeed and maximize their use of the platform's features.

Challenge

The documentation team lacked analytics on how users engaged with their content. They regularly published technical guides, tutorials, and troubleshooting resources without knowing which sections were most helpful or where users struggled. This information gap prevented them from making targeted improvements to enhance the user experience.

“We had no user-level statistics on how people were using our documentation. Someone would read the page, and we wouldn't know if the use case they read was actually efficient for them.” - Océane Franc, Head of Documentation and Learning

This pattern threatened their ability to scale documentation effectively as both Scaleway's product offerings and customer base continued to grow.

Solution

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After the trial-and-error phase, the documentation team understood they needed a new way to fix their insights and maintenance headaches. They searched for a solution that would provide detailed user engagement data while simplifying content updates. This led Scaleway to adopt interactive demos, transforming their static documentation into dynamic, measurable learning experiences.

Building interactive documentation with actionable user insights

For the first time, the team gained immediate insights through interactive demo analytics. They tracked completion rates, identified drop-off points, and saw which sections users engaged with most. This transformed their approach from guesswork to data-driven decision making.

“The product tours have around 50% completion rate, and the billing tour in particular has a high completion rate.” - Océane Franc, Head of Documentation and Learning

Demo metrics revealed clear patterns that reshaped their content strategy. Topics with high completion rates showed what resonated with users, while drop-off points highlighted areas needing clearer explanations.

Speeding up updates with modular content

Now the team updates individual steps in their interactive demos rather than recreating entire video tutorials when interfaces change. This approach dramatically cuts maintenance time and keeps pace with Scaleway's daily deployment schedule.

“If we were to do videos, all the videos would be obsolete in like two or three weeks.” - Océane Franc, Head of Documentation and Learning

These time savings allow the documentation team to enhance content quality and expand their coverage instead of constantly struggling to maintain outdated materials.

Expanding demos across the customer journey

After seeing positive results with their documentation, Scaleway integrated interactive demos throughout their entire customer journey.

This comprehensive approach ensures users receive consistent, high-quality guidance regardless of how they interact with Scaleway's platform or where they are in their learning process.

Benefits

Massive maintenance efficiency gains

“I feel like it's 10 times... perhaps a hundred times easier to maintain.” - Océane Franc, Head of Documentation and Learning

The modular design of interactive demos meant that when a product feature changed, they didn't have to fix multiple content pieces. They simply updated the specific steps affected, maintaining accuracy without disrupting the overall learning experience.

Transition from guesswork to data-driven optimization

With Guideflow analytics, the team shifted from making gut-feeling decisions to optimizing content based on hard data. They could now see which topics users found most valuable, pinpoint where users struggled, and prioritize their work based on actual behavior rather than assumptions.

These insights helped them validate what worked and spot new opportunities. Popular demos revealed areas where users wanted deeper content, while sections with lower engagement clearly needed restructuring or a different approach.

Better team confidence and focus

“It gives us peace of mind and saves us tons of time.” - Océane Franc, Head of Documentation and Learning

These improvements have transformed Scaleway's documentation from a potential bottleneck into a strategic asset that grows alongside the company.

Why Guideflow?

The team needed to transform static content into interactive experiences while gathering user behavior data. Guideflow offered these capabilities in one easy-to-implement package:

Guideflow didn't just fix immediate problems, it created a foundation for customer education that grows with Scaleway's expanding platform. This ensures user success remains a competitive advantage as they continue to innovate.