If you’re in the SaaS business, then you know that product adoption is more than just getting users to sign up.
It’s about transforming new users into power users — engaged, loyal customers who find real value in your product.
Achieving high product adoption can accelerate growth, reduce churn, and ultimately, create an enduring relationship with users. But, as with most things in SaaS, mastering user adoption involves understanding a few key strategies and metrics that drive success.
In this guide, we’ll walk through the essential goals, metrics, and strategies for improving SaaS product adoption — from optimizing onboarding to using data-driven insights that connect the dots between conversion rates, user experience, and product success.
Let’s dive in.
Understanding SaaS product adoption: Goals and concerns
When we talk about SaaS product adoption, we’re really talking about a journey. It begins with initial activation (dare we say, “a single step”) and continues as users discover the product’s value, engage with it regularly, and adopt it as an integral part of their workflow.
Key goals of improving product adoption
Before tackling how to improve product adoption, you’ve got to set clear goals. Here’s what you should aim for:
- Increase Product-Led Growth: Product-Led Growth (PLG) strategies allow the product to be the primary driver of new customer acquisition, retention, and expansion. When you focus on adoption, you’re fueling a cycle that continually attracts new users.
- Reduce churn rate: A high churn rate means customers are leaving faster than they’re coming in, driving up acquisition costs. By improving adoption, especially in the critical early stages, you can reduce churn and retain more customers.
- Enhance Customer Lifetime Value (CLV): When users stick around longer, they bring in more revenue. Improving adoption leads to higher engagement, which tends to lengthen (and broaden) their use of your product(s), while also giving you the option to upsell them on future product developments — ultimately driving up the customer lifetime value.
- Optimize the onboarding process: The first impression matters. A seamless onboarding experience sets the stage for successful product adoption, helping users understand how the product fits into their workflow.
- Drive engagement and track Key Performance Indicators (KPIs): Metrics like the Net Promoter Score (NPS) and customer satisfaction scores provide insight into how users feel about the product. By tracking these KPIs, you and your customer success team can gauge adoption and engagement trends over time.
The key challenges you’ll face in driving SaaS product adoption
This process isn’t easy — and product adoption isn’t always smooth sailing. Every SaaS company will encounter some version of these common challenges, whether they’re trying to onboard individual users or entire enterprise clients.
But, addressing these pain points early on can make a huge difference in creating a product adoption strategy that not only attracts users but keeps them engaged over time.
Low user engagement after onboarding
Imagine this: A new user signs up, they get through the onboarding process, maybe they even complete a product tour. But after that initial burst of activity, their engagement drops off.
This is a classic problem in SaaS adoption — that initial excitement fades if users don’t quickly see the value of your product. Users need to understand how the product can solve their specific problems, but if onboarding isn’t crystal-clear and aligned with their needs, they may get lost or lose interest.
This challenge emphasizes the importance of continuous engagement beyond onboarding.
Without sustained engagement tactics like in-app prompts, reminders, or relevant content, users can easily become inactive or even customer churn.
High churn rate among trial users
Trial users are often the most difficult segment to convert to paying customers. They’re in the “try before you buy” phase, and if they’re not getting immediate value, they may not make it past the trial period. One of the main issues is that trial users can be overwhelmed by too many features or too much information too soon, which might hinder activation.
The key here is to streamline and personalize the onboarding experience for trial users to guide them to that “aha” moment quickly — ideally, within their first few interactions. Analytics on trial user behavior, like those provided by Sprig, can reveal patterns that point to specific friction points in the trial experience, allowing product teams to tailor onboarding flows to convert these users more effectively.
Difficulty scaling adoption for enterprise clients
Enterprise clients often have more complex needs than individual users, especially when it comes to adoption at scale. Large teams need customized training, a dedicated support team, and tools to facilitate internal adoption.
What works for a single user might not translate well to a 500-person enterprise team. Without a strategic approach, scaling adoption to large clients can quickly turn into a resource-heavy challenge.
Ineffective user education
Educating users on product features and updates is crucial, but it can often be overlooked in fast-paced SaaS environments. Poor user education leads to under-utilization of key features, which can significantly impact user satisfaction and product stickiness (you’ll see this if your feature adoption metrics look bleak). If users don’t fully understand your product’s capabilities, they’re less likely to use it consistently or to its fullest potential.
Addressing this requires a multi-faceted approach: interactive tutorials, product walkthroughs, and ongoing educational content.
Fragmented user feedback
In an ideal world, feedback from users would be straightforward and comprehensive. But in reality, customer feedback often comes from various sources, including in-app surveys, support tickets, social media, and user interviews.
When data is fragmented across multiple channels, it becomes challenging to get a cohesive understanding of user needs, pain points, and engagement trends. To drive product adoption, product managers need large amounts of consolidated data to make informed decisions and enhance your overall customer experience — not bits and pieces from disconnected sources.
Key metrics for measuring SaaS product adoption
Product adoption metrics provide insight into how well your onboarding and engagement efforts are working, where in the lifecycle users might be getting stuck, and how satisfied they are with the experience.
So which metrics should you keep an eye on?
Here are the metrics that we think give you the best, most complete view of the adoption process, including some powerful satisfaction scores to track user sentiment and experience.
Adoption rate
The product adoption rate is the primary indicator of how quickly new users are engaging with your product or a specific feature. It reflects the percentage of users who have completed a defined action within the product, such as using core functionality or reaching a milestone in the onboarding process.
- High adoption rates suggest that your onboarding flows, user education, and in-app communication are resonating well with users, driving them to take action.
- Low adoption rates, on the other hand, may indicate a need to revisit your onboarding experience or even reconsider how key features are presented.
Active user engagement
Engagement metrics, such as Monthly Active Users (MAUs) or Daily Active Users (DAUs), help gauge whether users find your product valuable and are coming back regularly. Active engagement is especially critical in SaaS because it suggests that users are deriving consistent value.
- To boost engagement, consider using personalized in-app messaging or timely reminders to draw users back into the product. For example, if a user hasn’t engaged with a specific feature that’s important to their use case, a subtle nudge could make the difference in increasing engagement.
Customer retention rate
Retention rate measures the percentage of users who continue using the product over a given period, providing insight into long-term product adoption. High retention indicates that users are finding value over time, while low retention often signals dissatisfaction or unmet needs.
- Monitoring retention rates is essential in any adoption strategy because retaining existing customers is far more cost-effective than acquiring new ones. Retention rate can also serve as an indicator of whether your onboarding and ongoing engagement strategies are effective.
Time to first key action
The time it takes for a user to reach a meaningful milestone within the product, known as “time to first key action,” can significantly impact their likelihood to stick around. This metric measures how quickly users achieve their “aha” moment — when they understand the core value of the product.
- A shorter time to first key action generally suggests a smoother onboarding process, while a longer time may indicate that the onboarding experience could use simplification or further guidance.
This is closely related to another metric, known as “Time to Value” (TTV). Again, with TTV, the goal is to reduce the time it takes for the customer journey to arrive at real value for the user.
Net Promoter Score (NPS)
Net Promoter Score (NPS) measures users' willingness to recommend your product to others, using a simple question: “How likely are you to recommend this product to a friend or colleague?” Users rate this on a scale from 0 to 10, with those giving a score of 9 or 10 considered “promoters.”
NPS is a powerful indicator of user loyalty and satisfaction; high scores suggest that users are not only satisfied but are also likely to advocate for your product, which can help drive organic growth. In the context of product adoption, NPS is crucial because it can indicate how well your product is meeting users’ needs and whether users are truly invested in your solution.
Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT)
CSAT measures user satisfaction with specific aspects of your product, often immediately following an interaction or a product milestone, such as completing the onboarding process or using a new feature. Users typically rate their satisfaction on a scale from 1 to 5, allowing you to gauge their immediate response to various experiences within your product.
CSAT scores are particularly helpful for pinpointing areas that may need improvement — if users are consistently rating low on satisfaction after completing onboarding, it might be a sign that your onboarding process isn’t providing the clarity or value they expect.
Customer Effort Score (CES)
Customer Effort Score (CES) gauges how easy it is for users to perform a particular action within your product, with a focus on reducing friction. This metric is often measured by asking users, “How easy was it to accomplish your goal today?” CES is valuable for tracking the usability of key workflows and processes, such as onboarding or task completion.
When CES is high (indicating low effort), users are more likely to continue using your product. If CES is low, it may be a sign that certain workflows or features need to be simplified. For SaaS products, a low-effort experience is critical, as users are more likely to adopt and continue using products that don’t require extensive time or energy to navigate.
Monitor and act on insights from NPS, CSAT, CES, and other adoption metrics to better tailor their product experiences, and drive higher user satisfaction and long-term loyalty.
How to improve product adoption in SaaS
Improving adoption means not just getting users in the door but ensuring they stay, engage, and find value. Here are some strategies to enhance adoption:
Streamlining user onboarding
An effective onboarding experience makes it easy for users to start seeing value right away. Walkthroughs, in-app messaging, and interactive product tours can highlight key features and guide users through initial steps. Personalizing onboarding flows based on user segments can further improve activation and engagement.
Personalizing the user journey
Today’s users expect a tailored experience. Use data from user behavior to create personalized onboarding checklists and experiences, suggest relevant new products or features, and recommend workflows that align with user needs.
The playback page of a Replay study in Sprig, where you can watch all of the targeted session recording clips you’ve captured.With tools like Sprig’s heatmap and session replay features, product managers can see how different user segments interact with the product, enabling them to customize messaging, training resources, and support that cater to enterprise-level needs. Additionally, these tools can provide a window into how features are being adopted across teams, enabling better prioritization of feature enhancements.
The results page of a Heatmap study in Sprig — including the AI Summary and heatmap, scrollmap, and clickmap data.Leveraging in-product communication
In-app messaging, tutorials, and tooltips can provide real-time guidance, nudging users toward value-driving features. Triggered messages, such as reminders for incomplete tasks, can help users progress without feeling overwhelmed.
Results page of a drop-off analysis Survey in Sprig — Sprig AI analyzes all responses to generate a study summary and key takeaways.Using behavioral data to improve adoption
Behavioral data sheds light on how users interact with the product, revealing pain points and areas for improvement. For example, tracking drop-offs in workflows or specific features can highlight where users encounter friction, allowing your team to address issues before they lead to churn.
- Again, here’s where Sprig’s surveys and feedback tools help identify areas across your user base where people are struggling, enabling teams to create more targeted educational materials that address specific user pain points and foster better understanding of key product features — improving your product adoption curve.
Qualitative and quantitative data in SaaS product adoption at scale
Adoption data comes in many forms, and both qualitative and quantitative insights are crucial. Quantitative data (e.g., adoption rate, retention rate) shows what’s happening, while qualitative data (e.g., user feedback) reveals why it’s happening.
Triggered surveys
Triggered surveys gather feedback at crucial moments in the user journey. For instance, you can prompt a survey right after onboarding to measure the user’s satisfaction with the experience.
Sprig’s triggered surveys offer easy setup options and allow you to collect structured insights at scale.
Session replays and heatmaps
Session replays and heatmaps allow you to see actual user interactions, from where they click to areas they avoid.
By using tools like Sprig’s Heatmap and Replay features, you can automate data collection and analysis based on specific events, creating a comprehensive view of user engagement.
AI analytics and product recommendations
AI-driven tools like Sprig’s AI Explorer and AI Recommendations take product adoption analytics to the next level.
Capture experience data at scale via Replays, Heatmaps, Surveys, and Feedback — Sprig AI instantly analyzes all data to uncover trends in your product experience.When you leverage machine learning, you can scale your analysis of user behavior and provide actionable recommendations for feature improvements, onboarding adjustments, and engagement strategies across every part of your product.
Become a product adoption expert
Mastering product adoption is an ongoing journey, not a one-time fix. It requires constant observation, feedback, and adaptation. For SaaS companies, combining quantitative metrics with qualitative insights offers the clearest path to understanding how users experience the product and where improvements are needed.
Whether you’re streamlining onboarding, personalizing the user journey, or leveraging in-app messaging, the right mix of strategies and metrics can make all the difference in driving product adoption.
With Sprig, you’re ensuring your product not only meets but exceeds users’ expectations, fostering long-term loyalty and growth.
Book a demo today to make sure your team is equipped to not only understand but improve user engagement at every stage.