Enhancing the user onboarding experience benefits both the users and the product by minimizing difficulties and enhancing its worth. Gain knowledge on how to improve your user onboarding by referring to this resource.
What is user onboarding?
Customer onboarding refers to the process that newly acquired users undergo to become familiar and comfortable with a product. This process involves various steps such as sign-up, account creation, product demonstration, and tutorials. However, it is not as straightforward as it may seem.
The products that fall under customer onboarding include online and mobile software, apps, and services, such as Hinge, DocuSign, Slack, and Trello. Although some user-experience professionals consider defining onboarding as a complicated task, in reality, it is easy to define. The challenging part is finding the most effective onboarding method that can be applied to different product categories.
Why customer onboarding matters ?
Efficient customer onboarding is vital since it impacts the complete customer experience. A positive onboarding experience can increase user engagement, improve customer retention rates, and ultimately lead to higher revenue for the organization. Effective onboarding enables users to comprehend the product's value, features, and benefits, increasing the chances of loyalty towards the product. Additionally, it can lower customer churn by addressing initial queries or doubts, making users feel confident in their product choice. In summary, customer onboarding plays a crucial role in ensuring a successful product and customer journey.
Establishes trust with new customers right from the start.
Provides a feedback loop for product
Increases time to value and adoption
Prolongs the customer's lifetime value.
The Top 5 Customer Onboarding Challenges
It is challenging to detect when a customer is facing difficulties if you have limited visibility into their journey. In such cases, monitoring and managing a customer's progress becomes arduous. As a result, it is impossible to take proactive measures to assist them if you are unable to identify when a customer is struggling.
Insufficient training is provided to customers, which can result in incomplete comprehension of the product's features. Consequently, certain features may remain underutilized, leading to customers not obtaining the desired value from the product.
If onboarding is prolonged, customers may lose interest since they desire rapid results. Onboarding is considered successful only when the customer can use the product independently, and if they feel that it is taking too long, they may become dissatisfied and abandon the process.
The objectives of onboarding may not be apparent. The aim of onboarding is determined by the goals that the customer hopes to achieve by utilizing the product and collaborating with the team. Onboarding involves introducing the customer to the brand, building a positive relationship, and assisting them in comprehending the product's value. Since each customer's purpose for using the product may differ, it is necessary to identify their specific goals and personalize the onboarding process accordingly.
The presence of roadblocks and silos in your process can be problematic. To ensure a seamless customer journey, all internal teams must have smooth communication with each other, and access to a customer's history. Sharing internal notes and data between all teams can help create a fluid progression throughout the customer's journey.
Effective methods to enhance the customer onboarding process
Initiate the onboarding process as early as possible in the customer journey. As sales prepares to accept payment, they should also prepare their customers for a customer success handoff. At no point should a user wonder what the next step is. Formalizing the handoff with an introductory meeting in which a sales team member literally introduces the CSM to the customer (and then bows out) can show how much you value relationships, and not just your new customer’s subscription or purchase. This handoff should also happen as soon as possible. Or, at the very least, the customer’s kickoff call should be scheduled when the contract is signed. Using the right customer success management software can help make the transition from sales to customer success easy for everyone.
Give Your Users Quick Wins With an Interactive Walkthrough. Sales should not only focus on accepting payment but also prepare customers for the handoff to the customer success team. A formal handoff should be made with an introductory meeting between a sales team member and the CSM, to emphasize the value placed on the relationship with the customer. This handoff should happen as soon as possible, and scheduling a kickoff call at the contract signing is ideal. Utilizing appropriate customer success management software can also make the transition from sales to customer success seamless.
Customize the onboarding process for individual customers. During the sales process, leads typically provide information about their company size and decision-making authority through web forms or surveys. This data, along with any other details collected by the sales team, can be used to tailor the onboarding experience for each customer. For example, if a new customer only needs to use a few features of your product or service, you can focus the onboarding process on those specific features. Once they become comfortable with those features, you can gradually introduce them to other complementary features.
Provide immediate successes to your users by offering an interactive walkthrough. A product tour is a basic feature, but it may not be sufficient for ensuring customer success with your product or service. An interactive walkthrough can be a more effective way to guide customers and help them achieve their goals. To achieve this, you could collaborate with your product team to create an interactive training session within your app or product. For instance, if you offer an email app, you could create a pop-up that prompts the customer to compose their first email. You could include arrows and step-by-step instructions to guide the customer through sending their first email to their CSM. After the customer completes each task, you could use a trigger to send a follow-up email or another pop-up to take them through another task.
Monitor and Analyze Customer Product Usage. It's important to monitor how customers are using your product or service by tracking their activities, such as their login frequency, duration of use, and which features they are utilizing. This information can be used to tailor your communication with customers who are facing challenges or not fully utilizing your product. Moreover, analyzing these data points can help identify common pain points among users and inform improvements to the product or service.
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