Did you read the last two blog posts about SAP Enable Now and now you're wondering where to start? Look no further. And in case you missed them, you can read about “Why SAP Enable Now is a Critical Component of all Modern SAP-related Business Transformations” and "Working with Personas in a Learning Organization" by clicking on the links.
In this blog article I would like to provide instructions, links and helpful tips for your first steps with SAP Enable Now. The blog is divided into three main topic areas which are meant to be followed sequentially. If you are a longtime user of SAP Enable Now, you might still find some valuable resources in the last section.
This section details the very first steps from the contract signature to creating the first content. Here are the key deployment steps for your SAP Enable Now Cloud instance:
When your contract is signed, the IT contact person, listed on the contract, will receive a notification email once the SAP Enable Now tenant has been commissioned. This contains your URL for the SAP Enable Now Manager, a user name and password. Please keep this email in a safe place and make sure you have a back-up administrator defined who also has administrator access.
When the admin user first logs into SAP Enable Now, they will be required to change the password of the admin account. It’s critical that this password is also stored in a safe place as it may be necessary to use this admin account at a later date.
You can have a first look at the components and set up of SAP Enable Now in our Infocenter Cloud Guide. If you already want to dive in a bit deeper, you can go through the Getting Started book pages. Note that you need an S-User to sign in to the SAP Enable Now Infocenter to access this content.
At this point you can also sign up for the next Cloud Onboarding Series in your region. This series consists of four sessions, 1 hour each, over four consecutive days covering different topics as seen below. They are provided regularly and you can find the next dates on our SAP Enable Now Community Page.
Additionally, you might want to sign up for our SAP Enable Now Newsletter which will inform you about new releases twice a year.
A vital part of using SAP Enable Now is getting the Single Sign On set up so that the learners and authors have a smooth access experience, i.e. they can access content directly from SAP Enable Now without needing to log in manually. Our support will help you and your IT department with this and we do recommend using the SAP Identity Authentication System together with your SAML 2.0 ready Identity Provider. You can find more information about prerequisites and the process on this Infocenter book page about SSO.
If you have not thought about it already, now would also be the right time to look into Professional Services to help with the implementation and rollout of SAP Enable Now. They can help you through the Enablement Path to get the most out of your subscription.
Before you start with the actual content creation, it's worth considering the customization options and the creation of templates. This is especially the case when you are planning on creating eLearnings with books and book pages; it's essential to utilize templates.
Consider a product training to help you get started - we offer different courses as a self-driven online Learning Journey via SAP Learning Hub or as a virtual or onsite delivered live training.
Ok, now that you have gotten started and have gone through onboarding and training, let's look into the next phase of really beginning to use SAP Enable Now.
Once you have the access and SSO is up and running, it's time to take a look at how to create content. At this point I think it's important to be aware of a strategy also promoted by The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People:
There are so many things you can do with SAP Enable Now that it's actually possible to get lost in the options if you don't define a specific goal before starting. This outcome can be a requirement to support project deployment, a company wide rollout of in-application help or a library for onboarding new hires. Whatever you chose, make sure to write it down and plan backwards from this goal.
The kind of outcome you need defines your next steps - as you can see below, SAP Enable Now offers many different types of content and distribution channels for these deliverables.
We recommend that you chose a specific content type and delivery scenario, e.g. eLearning content, and then concentrate on getting it done instead of trying to use the whole suite of SAP Enable Now capabilities, right from the beginning. Scheduling a scoping workshop with a consultant can help you to understand the capabilities and focus on a specific outcome.
If you are clear about what type of content you want to create and your chosen delivery channel, have a look into the SAP Enable Now Info Center. Navigate to the Component Manual area to learn more about specific delivery channels and modules.
At this point, a product training is super important. Remember the self-driven online Learning Journey via SAP Learning Hub and the virtual or onsite delivered live trainings, available for Standard Authors and Master Authors as well as for Web Assistant Authors and Consultants.
The best way to get going is to treat your content creation process like a project:
The Customer Engagement team is hosting regular "Ask the Expert" sessions per region, where you can join other customers asking questions and getting answers. You can sign up for these sessions on our SAP Enable Now Community Page. You can also use the question feature of the community at any time. Our experts are available globally to answer your questions and we also have partners and customers as active members available to help you.
As a cloud customer, you can reach out to your Customer Engagement Executive to personally get in touch if you have questions about adoption or usage.
Should you encounter technical difficulties, our support is ready to help - check this section of the Info Center for instructions about raising an SAP incident.
Got the basics covered? Awesome, now let's look at the exciting stuff!
Now that you have a solid understanding of how SAP Enable Now works, let me highlight some of its very cool features. Maybe these topics can be an inspiration for you to expand the usage of SAP Enable Now beyond the initial scope and make the most out of your subscription!
By using link tiles in Web Assistant as announcements, you can push out change management messages to your users directly in the target application and at the exact point of need.
These link tiles are created as context help and configured to open in a lightbox. Then simply check the box "Show as announcement" and define how often this lightbox should be shown.
This great feature which came out with the 2011 release has already had a major impact on the translation effort for many customers. In short, you can upload your custom texts from SAP Enable Now into the SAP Translation Hub (separate license required) and they will come back translated. Please read this blog post for further details: Translation and Fallback Language Options for SAP Enable Now Web Assistant.
If you need some inspiration to create cool eLearnings, you can watch the recorded Webinar on this topic but you can also have a look at the scenes and prototyping templates we provide in the Info Center:
Gone are the days of screenshotting and copy-pasting instructions together manually! With the right template, creating step-by-step instructions is as easy as pressing a button. Check out the instructions to customize document templates here. This will enable you to generate branded documents in PDF, HTML or Microsoft Word format easily from existing content, which is one of the main value drivers of SAP Enable Now.
Simulation videos and documents are great, but would you prefer to guide your users to process business transactions inside the live application? If you would, consider the guided tours - available for Web Assistant and Desktop Assistant. They lead your users through the required business process, step by step and in their own time. Once complete, the task is done and the transaction processed. You can even provide links to videos or instructions during the guided tour. A demo video is available here.
These are just a few highlights and more are coming with each feature pack, release twice a year. We'll keep you updated on the Community page and you can also check the Help Page where a What's New document is posted with each release. As a cloud customer, you have the option to check out new features in a preview version up to 4 weeks before the release. Just add -preview to your tenant URL behind your customer name like this: https://customername-preview.enable-now.cloud.sap/.
This concludes the third part of the blog.
I hope this text leaves you with a good feeling about how to get started with SAP Enable Now. To reiterate - the Community and the Info Center provide very good starting points but a product training is recommended for quick upskilling.
Looking forward to the final blog in our series for this month: "Enterprise-wide Capabilities of SAP Enable Now" which describes how to go global.
Take care,
Kristina
In this blog article I would like to provide instructions, links and helpful tips for your first steps with SAP Enable Now. The blog is divided into three main topic areas which are meant to be followed sequentially. If you are a longtime user of SAP Enable Now, you might still find some valuable resources in the last section.
Getting Started
This section details the very first steps from the contract signature to creating the first content. Here are the key deployment steps for your SAP Enable Now Cloud instance:
Key Deployment Steps
When your contract is signed, the IT contact person, listed on the contract, will receive a notification email once the SAP Enable Now tenant has been commissioned. This contains your URL for the SAP Enable Now Manager, a user name and password. Please keep this email in a safe place and make sure you have a back-up administrator defined who also has administrator access.
When the admin user first logs into SAP Enable Now, they will be required to change the password of the admin account. It’s critical that this password is also stored in a safe place as it may be necessary to use this admin account at a later date.
You can have a first look at the components and set up of SAP Enable Now in our Infocenter Cloud Guide. If you already want to dive in a bit deeper, you can go through the Getting Started book pages. Note that you need an S-User to sign in to the SAP Enable Now Infocenter to access this content.
At this point you can also sign up for the next Cloud Onboarding Series in your region. This series consists of four sessions, 1 hour each, over four consecutive days covering different topics as seen below. They are provided regularly and you can find the next dates on our SAP Enable Now Community Page.
Cloud Onboarding Series
Additionally, you might want to sign up for our SAP Enable Now Newsletter which will inform you about new releases twice a year.
A vital part of using SAP Enable Now is getting the Single Sign On set up so that the learners and authors have a smooth access experience, i.e. they can access content directly from SAP Enable Now without needing to log in manually. Our support will help you and your IT department with this and we do recommend using the SAP Identity Authentication System together with your SAML 2.0 ready Identity Provider. You can find more information about prerequisites and the process on this Infocenter book page about SSO.
If you have not thought about it already, now would also be the right time to look into Professional Services to help with the implementation and rollout of SAP Enable Now. They can help you through the Enablement Path to get the most out of your subscription.
Enablement Path
Before you start with the actual content creation, it's worth considering the customization options and the creation of templates. This is especially the case when you are planning on creating eLearnings with books and book pages; it's essential to utilize templates.
Consider a product training to help you get started - we offer different courses as a self-driven online Learning Journey via SAP Learning Hub or as a virtual or onsite delivered live training.
Ok, now that you have gotten started and have gone through onboarding and training, let's look into the next phase of really beginning to use SAP Enable Now.
Getting Settled
Once you have the access and SSO is up and running, it's time to take a look at how to create content. At this point I think it's important to be aware of a strategy also promoted by The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People:
“Start with the end in mind. ”
There are so many things you can do with SAP Enable Now that it's actually possible to get lost in the options if you don't define a specific goal before starting. This outcome can be a requirement to support project deployment, a company wide rollout of in-application help or a library for onboarding new hires. Whatever you chose, make sure to write it down and plan backwards from this goal.
The kind of outcome you need defines your next steps - as you can see below, SAP Enable Now offers many different types of content and distribution channels for these deliverables.
Content Types and Delivery Channels
We recommend that you chose a specific content type and delivery scenario, e.g. eLearning content, and then concentrate on getting it done instead of trying to use the whole suite of SAP Enable Now capabilities, right from the beginning. Scheduling a scoping workshop with a consultant can help you to understand the capabilities and focus on a specific outcome.
If you are clear about what type of content you want to create and your chosen delivery channel, have a look into the SAP Enable Now Info Center. Navigate to the Component Manual area to learn more about specific delivery channels and modules.
At this point, a product training is super important. Remember the self-driven online Learning Journey via SAP Learning Hub and the virtual or onsite delivered live trainings, available for Standard Authors and Master Authors as well as for Web Assistant Authors and Consultants.
The best way to get going is to treat your content creation process like a project:
- Create a project plan with timeline
- Get your stakeholders' support
- Collect management approval for time commitment of authors and SMEs
- Consider if translations are necessary and plan for this effort
- Make sure to get IT support for technical topics ahead of time
The Customer Engagement team is hosting regular "Ask the Expert" sessions per region, where you can join other customers asking questions and getting answers. You can sign up for these sessions on our SAP Enable Now Community Page. You can also use the question feature of the community at any time. Our experts are available globally to answer your questions and we also have partners and customers as active members available to help you.
As a cloud customer, you can reach out to your Customer Engagement Executive to personally get in touch if you have questions about adoption or usage.
Should you encounter technical difficulties, our support is ready to help - check this section of the Info Center for instructions about raising an SAP incident.
Got the basics covered? Awesome, now let's look at the exciting stuff!
Getting Super Excited
Now that you have a solid understanding of how SAP Enable Now works, let me highlight some of its very cool features. Maybe these topics can be an inspiration for you to expand the usage of SAP Enable Now beyond the initial scope and make the most out of your subscription!
Web Assistant Announcements
By using link tiles in Web Assistant as announcements, you can push out change management messages to your users directly in the target application and at the exact point of need.
Web Assistant Announcement
These link tiles are created as context help and configured to open in a lightbox. Then simply check the box "Show as announcement" and define how often this lightbox should be shown.
Machine Translation
This great feature which came out with the 2011 release has already had a major impact on the translation effort for many customers. In short, you can upload your custom texts from SAP Enable Now into the SAP Translation Hub (separate license required) and they will come back translated. Please read this blog post for further details: Translation and Fallback Language Options for SAP Enable Now Web Assistant.
Scenes and Prototyping Toolkits
If you need some inspiration to create cool eLearnings, you can watch the recorded Webinar on this topic but you can also have a look at the scenes and prototyping templates we provide in the Info Center:
SAP Scenes
Branded documents
Gone are the days of screenshotting and copy-pasting instructions together manually! With the right template, creating step-by-step instructions is as easy as pressing a button. Check out the instructions to customize document templates here. This will enable you to generate branded documents in PDF, HTML or Microsoft Word format easily from existing content, which is one of the main value drivers of SAP Enable Now.
Guided Tours in your application
Simulation videos and documents are great, but would you prefer to guide your users to process business transactions inside the live application? If you would, consider the guided tours - available for Web Assistant and Desktop Assistant. They lead your users through the required business process, step by step and in their own time. Once complete, the task is done and the transaction processed. You can even provide links to videos or instructions during the guided tour. A demo video is available here.
These are just a few highlights and more are coming with each feature pack, release twice a year. We'll keep you updated on the Community page and you can also check the Help Page where a What's New document is posted with each release. As a cloud customer, you have the option to check out new features in a preview version up to 4 weeks before the release. Just add -preview to your tenant URL behind your customer name like this: https://customername-preview.enable-now.cloud.sap/.
This concludes the third part of the blog.
Getting Summ... - um, Summary
I hope this text leaves you with a good feeling about how to get started with SAP Enable Now. To reiterate - the Community and the Info Center provide very good starting points but a product training is recommended for quick upskilling.
Looking forward to the final blog in our series for this month: "Enterprise-wide Capabilities of SAP Enable Now" which describes how to go global.
Take care,
Kristina
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