8 Ways to Have a Great SaaS Onboarding Process for New Customers

Intro

Poor onboarding process is the major reason for high churn rates for new SaaS customers. New customers will stop using software features for a business if they are not well onboarded and don’t know how to use the services better to solve their pains.

You don’t want to lose customers after all the hard work reaching out to leads, nurturing them, and getting them to convert. Invesp research shows that it costs five times more to get a new customer than to retain one.

That’s why you need a great strategy to effectively onboard your new customer, get them acquainted with your services, and know how to solve their pains with your software.

To reduce the churn rate, here are ways you can onboard your new customers, give them the best experience with your brand, and keep them for long-term recurrent sales and revenue from them.

What is the customer onboarding process?

This is the process of getting new customers to know more about your business products or services and how they can use them to solve their pain points. It’s the customer's education plan to start using the business services to solve their challenges.

With the onboarding process, the brand aims to give its new customers the best value the business offers to solve their pains and build more trust with the new customers so he/she can keep using the business. When done right, it sets the new customer up for success and showcases the best help to solve their pain points.

Why you need a customer onboarding process

• Reduce churn rate. When new customers start using a service and don’t know how it operates or use it to solve their challenges or maximize the profits from it, they leave. Running effective onboarding campaigns for your new customers helps avoid losing your newly acquired customers.
• Improve customer experience. A new onboarding strategy makes customers know the brand better and improves the customer experience. They feel the business understands them and prioritizes their needs which strengthens their bond with the brand.
• Improve product adoption

Source: Heap

With a great onboarding strategy and product adoption, it will make it easy for new customers to know the different features of the software and use it effectively to solve their pains and accomplish their business goals.

• Get more referrals to your business. Happy customers will most of the time become advocates of your business to their friends and close relationships. They love your business services and the solutions it provides and will help market the business and draw more leads to the company.
• Increase customer lifetime value. New customers will stay with brands whom they understand their offers well and have used them to get great value when solving their pains. With a great onboarding process, new customers will understand all the features of the business well, maximize them to solve their pains, and keep making recurrent purchases from the business.

Ways to onboard new customers well

1. Use welcome videos

Create explainer videos showing the different features of your software and how new customers can use them to solve their pains. Make the videos easy to understand and personalize them to your new customer needs. Here is a screenshot of one of the explainer videos on our website.

Source: Ranktracker

You can also use email campaigns and set up your new customer email giving them more details about your business, how it works, and how they can use the business when solving pains.

2. Have a high-quality website

New customers will want to discover more about your business and not just the services you offer. Make sure your website is easy to navigate and has a quality design. Create landing pages explaining in depth your services and what they need to know to effectively solve the challenges. For example, here is a FAQ page helping new customers and website visitors answer their major questions about your services.

Source: Ranktracker

Embed videos and other visuals in your landing pages to make it easy for new users to understand your brand and increase engagement rates with your website. Your website should be easily accessible on a smartphone as many prospects use mobile devices in their search for brands to solve customer pains, as research shows

Source: Statista

3. Good customer support team

A new customer will not know how to use your business services. They will be in constant touch with the support team to get guidance and clarification when using the new software. Having a great professional customer support team will make it easy for the customer to deepen their trust and even feel comfortable when using the software.

Since all customers don’t prefer the same communication channels, use different channels through which new customers can contact and engage the business in their onboarding stage. Here is an example of a live chat feature on our website.

Source: Ranktracker

You can make the onboarding process self-serve so the new customers can use the software on their own, be able to access it all the time and contact the support team when they face challenges in the process.

4. Offer onboarding webinars

You can record webinars highlighting the different features of your software and how to use them as new customers solve their challenges. When creating the webinars use tools with interactive features so new customers can ask questions and get clarification where they face challenges. Ensure the price of the webinar platform you use is cost-effective has all the needed features and is easy to use.

Ensure your webinar speakers are familiar with the business services and can handle all the concerns your new customers have. The webinars should be more than just for showing the customers how to use the business, but also build trust and confidence with them when they use the software.

5. Show testimonials from customers

To reduce new customer doubts and anxiety and avoid second thoughts on their decision to use your business, share customer testimonials from your past and current customers and the results they have seen using your business.

It will help them see the value of your services even when they have barely used it as the testimonials will help reduce their doubts and get them to trust that your software will solve their pains.

For example, if a potential customer was searching for a rank tracking and keyword tool for their business, they will be more impressed by this testimonial.

Source: Ranktracker

They will likely try out the keyword tool to get the results others got for their business keyword research.

6. Get feedback and act on it

To keep improving your services ask customers their feedback about your brand services and use it to improve the value you deliver them. As your new customers sign up and start using your software features, they will share their feedback and experiences while using your business. Measure metrics like product adoption, customer success rates, and retention rates to get a clear picture of how your new and old customers enjoy and use your services.

7. Get customers to their “aha moments” quickly

Giving your new customers a great and easy time to see their first win using your software should be your first priority. Get them to their “aha moments” with your services. Make them see the value of their investment in your business software and avoid doubts that can cause them to stop and use other businesses.

Another way to get them to experience those moments is to reduce friction when signing up for an account. Many people don’t like filling out forms and if a SaaS brand can make the process easy, it will make the onboarding process easy for many new customers. You can add features so they can sign up with their Facebook, or Google accounts. Here is what our sign-up form looks like.

Source: Ranktracker

8. Spy your competitors

To get more insights on onboarding new customers, you can spy on your competitors to see how they onboard new customers. Use the insights and feedback from your analysis to make your onboarding process more successful.

For example, you can use social listening tools on social media channels to know how other companies are doing. Know what is working for their onboarding process and implement it in your strategy to improve your new customer onboarding process.

Conclusion

New customers can easily stop using business SaaS features if they can’t get the value of it once they start using it to solve their pains. The best onboarding process will make new customers understand the features of your software faster, know how to use it, and use it to get results to their pains.

To avoid losing new customers after a long nurturing process, invest in the right onboarding strategy. The tips in this article will guide you to improve and deliver the best onboarding process, get new customers to understand your business, and get to their aha moments easily to solve their pains and retain your new customers for a long to increase customer lifetime value.