Most SaaS, app, and ecommerce products lose 60 to 80 percent of their signups in the first 24 hours. After helping 50+ founders redesign their onboarding flows over the past decade, the lesson is consistent: the goal of onboarding is not to teach features. It is to get the user to their first moment of real value as fast as possible. Everything else in the product can be discovered later. The brands that win in the USA, UK, and EU markets treat onboarding as a critical product surface, not as a checklist.
Want to redesign onboarding for your own product?
Brand design is the answer.
Suregraphic has redesigned the visual layer of onboarding flows for over 50 SaaS and ecommerce brands since 2013. The patterns that work are simple, but only obvious in hindsight.
The five patterns that consistently lift activation are: (1) one primary action per screen – never two, (2) progress indicators that show only the steps that matter, (3) the user’s own data appearing in the product within 60 seconds of signup, (4) microcopy that reads like a helpful colleague, not a corporate manual, and (5) skip buttons on every non-essential step.
Design can be art. Design can be aesthetics. Design is so simple, that's why it is so complicated.Paul Rand
Great onboarding is not what you teach. It is what you let the user accomplish first.
The five patterns that consistently lift activation are: (1) one primary action per screen – never two, (2) progress indicators that show only the steps that matter, (3) the user’s own data appearing in the product within 60 seconds of signup, (4) microcopy that reads like a helpful colleague, not a corporate manual, and (5) skip buttons on every non-essential step.
Most SaaS, app, and ecommerce products lose 60 to 80 percent of their signups in the first 24 hours. After helping 50+ founders redesign their onboarding flows over the past decade, the lesson is consistent: the goal of onboarding is not to teach features. It is to get the user to their first moment of real value as fast as possible. Everything else in the product can be discovered later. The brands that win in the USA, UK, and EU markets treat onboarding as a critical product surface, not as a checklist. The five patterns that consistently lift activation are: (1) one primary action per screen – never two, (2) progress indicators that show only the steps that matter, (3) the user’s own data appearing in the product within 60 seconds of signup, (4) microcopy that reads like a helpful colleague, not a corporate manual, and (5) skip buttons on every non-essential step.
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Quisque molestie, turpis ac interdum gravida Vivamus interdum suscipit lacus. Nunc ultrices accumsan mattis. Aliquam vel sem vel velit efficitur malesuada. Donec arcu lacus, ornare eget ligula vel, commodo luctus felis. Ut dignissim sapien sit amet molestie rutrum. Orci varius natoque penatibus et magnis dis parturient montes, nascetur ridiculus mus. Pellentesque in porta dolor, a suscipit risus. Great onboarding is not what you teach. It is what you let the user accomplish first.