How to Record an App Preview For Your Subscribers

TL;DR

  • Use your iPhone’s screen recording feature to create an app walkthrough to guide new users through your app

  • Your app preview should highlight your programs and cover app-specific features

  • Share your video on Instagram to help new users better understand how to use your app

The key to retaining subscribers is to make sure your customers understand how to use your app and know how to get the most value from it. We’ve previously shared the importance of creating an app overview that lives in your app and details how it works, what you offer, and more for new subscribers learning to navigate your app. It’s also important to detail an app preview on your social media channels — particularly Instagram — to gain and retain new customers!

While putting together an app walkthrough video for Instagram does require some work on your part, you can do so very easily by using the screen recording function on your iPhone in order to highlight your app’s unique features.

How to Enable Screen Recording on Your iPhone:

    1. Open Settings

    2. Click “Control Center”

    3. Click the green “+” icon next to “Screen Recording”

    How to Screen Record With Voiceover on Your iPhone:

    1. Open up the Playbook consumer app to the screens you’d like to share

    2. Pull down the home screen on your iPhone in the upper right corner and click and hold the record icon — you’ll be given the option to turn your microphone on

    3. Click the record button again and swipe up to navigate back to the consumer app screens to begin recording your screen and voiceover. To stop recording, click the red icon in the upper left corner

    Note: You’ll get a three second countdown to navigate back to the consumer app before recording starts!

    Now that you understand how to screen record, let’s jump into the in-app features you should highlight in your video:

    Playbook App Features to Preview

    1. How to Find Programs & Start Workouts

    Walk new users through the programs in your app and offer advice for where to start.

    When you talk about each of your programs, summarize the following:

    • The name of the program

    • A brief description of the program

    • Whether it’s best for beginners, intermediate, or advanced users

    • The length of the program

    • Goals of the program and what users will achieve

    2. How to Use Workout Features

    While you’re discussing how to pick a program and start a workout, be sure to cover a few of Playbook’s unique features, including:

    • Workout Timers: Briefly discuss and show how to set a custom workout timer in the consumer app.

    • Marking Off Sets: Demonstrate how to mark off an exercise while going through a workout in the consumer app.

    • Scheduling Workouts: Remind users that they can schedule their workouts ahead of time! When discussing this feature, be sure to point out that users must enable push notifications to receive the reminder about their scheduled workouts.

    • Favoriting Workouts: Show users how to favorite workouts, and then walk them through how to find their faves later by navigating to their profile.

    Demo these features by going into one of your workouts and starting the workout, then showing how to use the timer and mark off exercises when completed. Then, show how to favorite the workout. Lastly, go into another workout and demonstrate how to set up a reminder.

    3. In-App Messaging

    After discussing programs and workout features, you can shift gears to cover in-app messaging. Let followers know that if they have any questions regarding the programs or workouts in your app, they can either DM you directly (with photos, text, and video) or send a message by leaving a rating and a comment on a specific workout.

    This is a great opportunity to sell the value of your app — remind users that this one-on-one communication provides exclusive access to your expertise that they won’t get anywhere else!

    4. How to Use Discovery

    One of Playbook’s greatest selling points is that with one subscription, customers get access to over 600 creators and 60,000 workouts.

    In your video walkthrough, be sure to highlight the Discovery section of the creator app, where users can find curated selections of featured creators, latest workouts, new creators, and more.

    Scroll through Discovery and also click the search bar in the top right corner to show users where they can type in keywords to find additional creators to work out with.

    Creator Examples:

    Here are a few great creator examples of app preview videos to get your creative juices flowing!

    Watch Playbook creator AJ Hotchkins walk new users through the functionality of his app, starting with his programs:

    Check out Playbook creator Aubrie Edgington’s app walkthrough, which highlights her app’s programs, insights, app features, and more.

    IG Story:


    IG Feed Post:

    Here are a few additional creator examples that are more abbreviated versions of an app walkthrough, highlighting just a few of the above app features.

    Provide commentary on programs, share insights, and more:


    Offer a sneak peek inside your app ahead of its launch:


    Market your app on Instagram while providing a quick app tour:

    For more on how Juice & Toya promote their fitness app, click here.