Inside Olivine #25
š§ÆMake a great first impression: A step-by-step guide for successful user onboarding with Lindsay Tabas
š Hello from Philadelphia
Hey, Iām Lindsay Tabas, Lady EngineerĀ®, founder of LearnProductMarketFit and host of the Make Sense Podcast, where my guests and I simplify complex issues at the intersection of tech and people so we can design the human experience into the future. For 20 years, I have worn every hat between what customers say and what software developers build, refining and developing the most lean and efficient way for teams to iterate towards product-market fit without getting hosed by development costs and ad spend.Ā
Back in 2019, I taught a graduate-level UX class focused on user onboarding. Today, Iām sharing my framework with you so that youāre armed with all the best practices, how-tos, and steps to ensure your customer onboardingāa key part of your GTMāis successful.
User acquisition and onboarding 101
To make sure weāre all on the same page, onboarding is the journey a new customer takes from learning about your product to registering an account and receiving that first bit of value. Itās a tricky handoff between the āmarketing customer experienceā and the āproduct user experience.ā
Companies of all sizes can mess this up because they exclusively obsess over two things without thinking about how they connect:Ā
The product, features, and functionality, andĀ
The front page of their website.Ā
They think their front page is so compelling that people will just sign up and find the magic on their own. Then, when the rubber hits the road and the conversion numbers are low, theyāll resort to tooltips, training pop-ups, and videos. Maybe theyāll struggle through a/b tests, all without really stopping to research or really think about their audienceās āwhy.ā
Let me say this: training is a poor excuse for bad design.
The good news is that the solution is rarely more features. Instead, it usually involves refining the flows and copy that accompany every single step of the onboarding process.Ā
āOnboarding is like a first date. Youāve discovered each other, and now youāre out for the first time, getting to know the other person. It is the point at which people learn the value of what you have to offer, and decide whether it works for them.ā - User Interface Engineering on Medium.
Take a step back and imagine a first date. Do you spill all the beans, telling your date all the good (and bad) about you? Or, do you keep it light and fun to gauge if you have enough interest to go on a second date?
Hopefully, your dating rule-of-thumb is the latter: give away enough information and personality to get the next date š.
During onboarding, new customers learn just enough about the value your product offers to decide whether it works for them (and, therefore, if they want to go on a second date).
Practically speaking, the onboarding process spans from marketing landing pages through sign-up forms, new user account creation, and getting started.
User acquisition and onboarding are a universal challenge that both marketing and product must solve, but it can fall through the cracks without the right people or support. In comes you, PMM š¦ø.
On the marketing side, you must:
Find or create demand
Affordably attract visitors to the website
Persuade them to sign up
On the product side, you must:
Streamline sign-up forms to collect only the information needed
Add clear copy that moves the new user through each step
Ensure the initial product UX looks and functions as intended
If you ask me, itās the start of a full and beautiful romance š. Now, letās dive into my step-by-step guide for user onboarding.
Onboarding: A step-by-step guide
FYI: Iām using a project management software example in my framework below, where Sam is the primary customer/champion for the software and now has to ensure their team gets the most out of it. On Samās team are Jordan and Jessie. Sam is a Consulting Partner at a Boutique Consulting Company of about 100 people.
Bonus: Use this free bundle of assets to implement this step-by-step framework.
Step 1: Your target customer
In this example, we need to design two onboarding experiences: one for Sam, and another for their team (Jordan and Jessie).Ā
This is where your persona work comes in. Focusing on Sam, you need answers to the following:Ā
What problem are they currently experiencing?Ā
How are they feeling?Ā
Where do they first look for help?Ā
How do they find you?
What is the one thing they need right now that you can help them with?
Step 2: Evaluate the current state of your onboardingĀ
Rarely do we have the luxury of crafting user onboarding from scratch, so start with a deep review of the existing user flows on your current product (and a competitorās product, too, for good measure).Ā
Establish which user flows you will evaluate. At a minimum, focus on sign-up and activation (the first bit of value). This includes your customerās starting point, such as an ad, the homepage, or an app store.
For our working example, we would start at the homepage on a phone since thatās Samās starting point. We would also evaluate sign-up and the first-time user experience.
With the customerās hat on from the initial starting point, very slowly step through the flow. At each step/click, answer these questions:
What are my first impressions?
What stands out to me?
What questions are coming to mind?
What do I want to do first?
What do I think this product is?
Repeat this twice, documenting your notes and reviewing the problems youāve outlined.
Does the problem appear in a single location or multiple places?
Are there problems with the overall structure of the user experience?
Is it too much information that youāre overwhelmed? Or, is it not enough information that youāre lost?
What seems to be missing?
Step 3: Craft a new storyline
The best onboarding follows the structure of a good storyline: set up the story, develop the plot, and reach a resolution. Before we lay out the design and screens, letās write a story outline.
Act 1: Set up the storyĀ Ā
Who makes up your general target market?Ā
Ex: Small to mid-sized consulting companies
What are their big goals irrespective of a specific technology, tool, or product?Ā
Ex: To build and maintain high levels of client satisfaction and maintain a reputation for delivering high-quality consulting services
What are their biggest problems?Ā
Ex: Lack of structure, chaos in managing a variety of clients and needs, repeated non-billable work
Who are they working with?Ā
Ex: Coworkers, employees, consulting clients.
What is your product?Ā
Ex: Collaboration software, project management software
What are the big benefits (the big market-level differentiators)?Ā
Ex: Small team collaboration tool, workflow automation, reusable project templates
Act 2: Develop the plot
Your customersā specific needs (what will help them reach their goals from Act 1? These are similar to āJobs-to-be-Doneā):
Ex: Seamless integrations with communication tools like Slack & MS Teams
The concepts your customers need to know - core but broad activities:
Ex: Manage projects, collaborate with coworkers, etc.
Your specific persona: narrow from your target market:
Ex: Team leads at boutique consulting companies
Ex: Robust task management capabilities, including task dependencies
Your productās specific value props and concepts
Ex: Increase visibility, spot blockers, improve productivity
Act 3: Resolution
Here are the quick notes on what goes here. You will refine these in Step 5 below.
Exact tasks and activities: these are the exact means, methods, steps, and tools they need to take to fulfill the needs outlined in Act 2.Ā Ex:
Connect Your Calendar
Add a new project
Invite your teammates
How does the user get the initial value from your product? Ex:
Set up a first project
Add tasks
Pick a view
Invite teammates
Step 4: Map this info to your marketing funnel
The marketing funnel is a great framework for thinking about your onboarding. We tend to think of the upside-down triangle as a way to represent the number of people we interact with at each stage of the funnel. We can also use this ābig-to-small sizingā to reference the amount of information we give away at each step.
In awareness, the information we share is broad and general. By the time a customer becomes a user at acquisition and activation, the information we share increases in granularity and detail.
Coming back to the idea of being on a first date: at the top, on our first date, we may share our interest in traveling, and closer to the bottom, 1-2 months into the relationship, we reveal our deal-breakers as weāre planning a trip together.
In the image below, visualize your script/storyline from Step 2 to the different stages of the onboarding steps.Ā
Step 5: Define and refine the Acquisition and Activation stages
For onboarding, acquisition covers account creation. The customer has become a user by supplying an email address and confirming that address. Yet, new users are different from active users. In onboarding, activation represents the user flow this new user must step through until your product delivers and demonstrates its initial value.
The activation user flow requires you to work with technical product managers and designers to identify the simplest activities to hook a new user. Often, products either provide too little information leaving a new user confused, or they overwhelm a user with too many possibilities.Ā
For example, with a security-first email provider, I was able to increase their converted paid customers at a 2.8x higher rate by simplifying their suggested 3 steps to get started. One of their prior steps was for a new user to import their email and contacts from their previous provider. What a *huge* ask š !Ā
In the new version, we prompted them to send their old email address a message from this new one so they could verify their display name appeared correctly. Far simpler!
For the acquisition and activation user flows:
List out the step-by-step instructions. (Be literal: see the PB&J Challenge here and here.)
What is the minimum info users need to know to take that first step?
How do you want them to feel?
What can you say to make them feel that way?
How can you set expectations for what will happen in the next step?
Step 6: Test your onboarding
You donāt need to wait for a formal usability test to get feedback on your new/proposed onboarding flow and copy. Easy and cheap paper prototype testing can bring BIG insights. Use one piece of paper for each step, listing the information (from broad to specific) on each page. Your goal is to:
Ensure users interpret each page correctly.
Ensure the order of pages, steps, and information make sense.
Guarantee the āgoldilocksā amount of informationānot too much or too littleāis available for the user to succeed.
Grab a friend, a partner, or a stranger at a coffee shop (note: if your product is super technical, a developer tool, or something like that, this exercise may not work if you just grab āanyoneā). For each page, ask them the same questions you asked yourself in Step 2:
What are your first impressions?
What stands out to you?
What questions are coming to mind?
What do you want to do first/next?
What do you think this product is?
Step 7: Repeat steps 3-6 for the invited teammates
Now that we have an onboarding process for Sam, the direct customer and champion of our project management software, we must design the process for Samās team.Ā
As you construct the onboarding for Samās team, be wary of assuming they will use it because itās their job or Sam ordered them to. They need to be handled just like Sam. Meet them where they are, express that your product is there to help, and guide them with motivational and encouraging value propositions until they receive the initial value that lays the foundation for a great relationship moving forward.Ā Ā
Final Tips: Getting onboarding right
Here are the rules of the road š£ļø:
Begin with the āpitchā at the top of the marketing funnel.
Start at a high level, then slowly introduce the customer to your product.
Treat the journey like a first date: lead with your best foot forward, and donāt give away too much too soon.
Keep it simple and clear, no jargon.
Less is more! Donāt collect more user info than you need.
Small changes in the copy to encourage the user through each step can make a BIG difference.Ā
Favor copy changes over brand-new functionality.
Use this bundle of assets to implement this step-by-step framework
Top LinkedIn Post
When the average software development project goes 3x over scope, your ability to cross the chasm to āspeak technicalā with your teammates is crucial. Thereās a weird energy in tech right now; stay on your toes with this podcast episode:
Fresh finds
Tool I love: UserOnboard.com: Samuel Hulick posted onboarding & acquisition teardowns from 2013-2021. Though some of the teardowns are 10 years old, the principles behind usability and user experience are solid and timeless. Iāve been immersed in user experience since my second year in college back in 2002. As a technologist with high standards for UX, my respect for Hulickās website speaks volumes.Ā
Shallow dive: How do you do low-cost user acquisition for an early-stage startupās two-sided marketplace? Watch this ~5-minute video on my YouTube channel.
Deep dive: I said what I said: āTrainingā is a dirty word in product design. Read more about how software design can become so bad that training is required, including an example of a public utility that wasted 250 million dollars of taxpayer money.
Inside Olivine
Content gems
Knowing Your Audience as a Product Marketer - Taylorās Version
Do you know what your product is hired for? Jobs to be Done can help.
Client happenings
Job openings
I would love to get the conversation going!
š What's your experience with user onboarding? Have you encountered a product that nailed it from the start?
š Do you agree that many teams overlook the crucial connection between marketing and product experiences?
A decade ago, Twitter onboarding was š¤. New users were asked their interests and shown examples of people to follow. I believe they were encouraged to follow at least 10 so a new user's feed was nice and full from the beginning. What I heard through the grapevine was that the team became obsessed solely with a/b testing and onboarding started to go downhill. It's always important to include qualitative insights (that represent a user's "why?") in addition to quantitative metrics (the "what?")