Nowadays, customers’ experience with your platform matters more than anything else. It’s unlikely that anyone will renew a subscription to a poorly designed product, even if it covers interesting points and offers well-designed products. The product always comes first – it’s as simple as that! The more you invest in keeping the level of your software company product up, the more users you’ll retain.

However, there is a critical moment where your client confirms the right decision they made by choosing your product, and that moment is called the onboarding process. Onboarding makes life easy, and if it’s well done, really, really easy. If users can move smoothly through the process and feel more confident in your company, then they’re less likely to churn. 

Today, we will discuss how to create a user onboarding strategy using a PSP (Product Success Platform) in order to provide all the tools and information your users need when using your software product for the first time. Let’s go!

This article will cover: 

  • Tools & features do you expect to see in a Product Success Platform
  • Why user onboarding strategies are a must-have
  • Planning your onboarding strategy with a PSP
  • SaaS companies who have improved their user onboarding
  • Choosing the right Product Success Platform for your SaaS

What tools & features can you expect to see in a Product Success Platform?

Most PSPs have some common features and tools that are crucial for product success: 

Must-have Onboarding strategies

Onboarding significantly determines whether a customer keeps using your product long-term or churns after a short period. This is what users experience the first time they interact with your product, like love at first sight. If done correctly, your customers will continue purchasing your product and give it the value it deserves. If poorly done, they’ll churn, and what is worse, they won’t recommend it to other customers.

Here are some strategies that, when applied, can ensure your onboarding process is successful:

Product Adoption rate 

It is important to educate your customers about your product. A clear understanding of your product’s value and how it works will increase adoption.

Convert Customers to Paid Subscribers Faster

The quicker the users see the value of your product the better. As a result, they begin to use it as an essential part of their daily processes/tools sooner. 

Prevent churn 

When you educate your customers about what your product does from the beginning, you will retain the ‘right’ users rather than losing them when your product fails to meet their expectations.

Less reactive support and more proactive

Send a welcome email, ask users if they understand everything about your software, and offer expert calls if they have questions. Proactiveness is the key to gaining your customers’ trust.

Want more? Learn the process of adopting a proper onboarding process by Hubspot.

Planning your user onboarding strategy with a PSP

Last but not least, you need to plan the onboarding strategy after defining it fully. A great step-by-step would look something like this: 

  1. Set up and track the important user events that determine the success of your product.
  2. Define user cases and create personalized onboarding content for each one.
  3. Consistent content across multiple mediums: Email drip campaigns, product flows (tours), linking help center articles and videos, in-app updates, etc.
  4. Track the performance of said campaigns and continuously optimize them based on customer feedback.
  5. Ask for customer feedback – to improve tools and processes.

For a complete guide to Product Succes, you can refer to our E-book on implementing onboarding as part of a Product Succes Strategy

SaaS companies who have improved their user onboarding

SaaS companies are increasingly relying on PSPs to create a complete user experience, and some have improved their onboarding process to get better retention and capture new customers. Here are some examples! 

Pekebook

Pekebook is a company that changed the mode of communication in nursery schools. It provides real-time communication about the child’s daily progress in a single tool, which children’s centers require for their day-to-day. With FROGED as their PSP of choice, they now make things easier for each user, accompanying them throughout their entire learning journey with an intelligent onboarding process. 

Read the complete Pekebook case study here. 

LastBasic

LastBasic is a product development and prototyping company based in Spain. They’re focused on making their industry more accessible to a larger audience. LastBasic digitally transforms a traditional sector and creates an approachable service through the development of their platform and marketplace approach to product development. They use FROGED to optimize their customer support to stay close to their customers.  

Read the complete LastBasic case study here. 

Talentoo

Talentoo is a company that digitalizes the HR, personnel, and recruitment sector by offering a B2B platform in which they connect companies from all industries that are publishing job offers.

They use FROGED for their onboarding process and engagement as everything is done in a totally personalized way, with the intention that the user feels accompanied and supported at all times. 

Read the complete Talentoo case study here. 

Choosing the right Product Success Platform for your SaaS

The onboarding process assists users in reaching their “Aha” moments when they begin to use your product. By doing it right, you welcome, educate, and demonstrate your product’s value and transform your users into dedicated customers.

Here are the top takeaways to add to your to-do list: 

  • Focus on onboarding, automation, segmentation, integrations
  • Does it have multiple tools or just one?
  • Is it Product-led or sales-led focused?
  • What is the support team like – do you have to pay extra for support?
  • Is there ‘how-to’ material and tutorials available?

You can also watch Customer Success Influencer, Anika Zubair, explain how to choose the right Customer Success Software for your business. 

Interested in learning more about onboarding? Discover our article “The Changing Game of Onboarding – do you have the right strategy?”