Your acquisition methods have paid off, and also you’ve gained a brand new buyer! Now what? Your subsequent touchpoint units the stage on your whole relationship shifting ahead: your onboarding collection. From onboarding emails to cellular onboarding messages, the content material and timing of those communications can remodel a buyer from an unsure beginner to an enthusiastic energy person.
Cautious consideration to the onboarding e mail sequence usually will get misplaced within the shuffle between entrepreneurs centered on lead era and buyer success groups on problem-solving. However this stage is an important alternative to activate new clients, so benefit from it!
Right here’s what that you must create participating onboarding emails:
What’s the distinction between a welcome e mail and an onboarding e mail?
A welcome e mail is the primary message after somebody indicators up for a product or subscribes to a e-newsletter, and it’s usually the primary touchpoint in an onboarding e mail sequence. Onboarding emails supply a set of subsequent steps for patrons to get acquainted with your product and begin seeing worth.
A welcome e mail is used to make an excellent first impression. It’s your first alternative to open a dialogue and begin constructing relationships. After that, your onboarding e mail sequence is designed to have interaction folks extra deeply together with your product. It’d embody how-tos for establishing their profile, studying the core performance, and every other actions that lead the client to activation.
The way to write an onboarding e mail: 6 greatest practices
A profitable onboarding course of drives clients to take the actions that make them stick. So, your onboarding emails shall be distinctive to your model, viewers, product, and trade. For instance, the best onboarding collection for a fintech enterprise will look totally different than the perfect SaaS onboarding emails.
We analyzed emails from a few of our favourite manufacturers and recognized six traits that create an interesting expertise.
1. Personalize your message
A robust onboarding e mail sequence is customized utilizing demographic and behavioral knowledge. When you theoretically can welcome and onboard all of your clients with the identical messaging, talking to every particular person’s distinctive expertise is far more efficient.
With Liquid, you should utilize your buyer knowledge to create tailor-made content material for every buyer. When crafting your e mail content material, take into account attributes like time zone, location, particular occasions, standing, subscription sort, and firm identify.
For instance, Bitly’s onboarding e mail personalizes a to-do record based mostly on the actions recipients have taken and have but to take. We don’t know for positive, however think about Bitly leveraging dynamic content material to alter what the to-do record says based mostly on buyer actions.
>>> Wish to see personalization in motion? Learn the way Notion’s customized onboarding resulted in a 49-51% open charge
2. Proactively deal with frequent issues and blockers
Put your self in your buyer’s footwear. The place are they within the onboarding course of? What are they acquainted with? What don’t they know? Look by means of help tickets, often requested questions, and your mostly accessed documentation for perception into the place clients sometimes hit friction early of their journey.
Every message in your onboarding e mail sequence ought to push folks additional into your product expertise—and that is the best time to assist them overcome hurdles they may encounter. One of the best onboarding emails clarify why somebody ought to transfer ahead and supply precisely what they should do.
Perplexity overcomes new clients’ issues about AI on this onboarding e mail pattern by offering up-front, sourced info and sources. The aim is to push those that’ve signed up however are nonetheless skeptical into motion.
>>> Seeing lots of clients drop off in the course of onboarding? Try our on-demand webinar on easy methods to diagnose and repair drop-off
3. Educate folks in regards to the worth of your product
Individuals usually consider a number of instruments without delay. They might join free trials, demo totally different choices, and even pay for a month to see how they prefer it. They’ll transfer on in the event that they don’t have a very good expertise in that preliminary get-to-know-you interval. Your onboarding e mail sequence ought to educate folks about how your product solves their issues. Present sources that display your worth to clients.
Riverside makes it look straightforward on this onboarding e mail. They provide three various kinds of instructional content material: their data base, YouTube channel, and weblog. Nonetheless, their most important aim is to drive their viewers to make use of the product, which stays the first CTA.
4. Deal with the advantages for patrons, not your product’s options
A function is only a function till your clients perceive why they need to care. You assume your product is superior, however your onboarding emails want to attach the dots for folks by specializing in their wants, ache factors, and needs.
Typeform emphasizes its worth proposition with benefits-first headlines and duplicate paired with case research on this instance. The corporate exhibits clients what they will obtain with the product and builds belief with proof factors from well-known model names.
5. Provide a transparent name to motion
Often, onboarding emails ought to have only one main name to motion. You might have considered trying your buyer to do all of the issues, however too many selections could make it extra probably they gained’t do something in any respect. That’s as a result of selection paralysis is kryptonite for buying selections.
How does this apply to your onboarding e mail sequence? The reply is within the thought of a sequence: craft a journey by which every message results in an important motion to take subsequent. Then, proceed to observe up with well timed, related further steps.
For instance, the expansion advertising and marketing staff right here at Buyer.io makes use of this trial expiration e mail to strengthen the urgency and key advantages of upgrading. With solely 4 days left in a buyer’s trial, we make sure the CTA is obvious: improve now, or threat letting the magic slip away.
6. Present, don’t inform with video content material
91% of individuals have watched an explainer video, and when requested how they’d prefer to find out about a services or products, 44% say they’d most like to observe a brief video (supply). This system is very helpful when you’ve one thing complicated to elucidate or should present folks easy methods to full a particular collection of actions.
Wistia successfully makes use of video in its onboarding sequence—notably applicable for a video device! They make it private by responding to what a buyer has already executed and displaying folks what to do subsequent. Bonus? Video is good for showcasing your model’s persona and constructing an emotional connection together with your clients.
8 of the perfect onboarding emails
It’s useful to see these greatest practices in motion as you place collectively your onboarding e mail templates.. That’s why we’ve chosen eight of our favourite onboarding e mail examples to encourage you.
Onboarding e mail instance #1: Coda
Why we find it irresistible: This tailor-made onboarding e mail pattern guides folks by means of certainly one of Coda’s hottest use instances—taking notes throughout conferences—and gives a template to get clients began. Clear language and informative graphics stroll the recipient by means of the how and why of every function, culminating in a single, sturdy CTA.
Onboarding e mail instance #2: Poshmark
Why we find it irresistible: Poshmark is a clothes resale app. This e mail continues to coach folks as they transfer by means of their journey. A Poshmark buyer may be each a purchaser and a vendor, and this e mail educates consumers on how they will promote (or re-posh) gadgets they’ve bought earlier than. As a substitute of pigeonholing their viewers into both purchaser or vendor segments, Poshmark intertwines these journeys with a customized message based mostly on the client’s earlier exercise, main consumers to turn into sellers as effectively.
Onboarding e mail instance #3: Bubble
Why we find it irresistible: One of the best SaaS onboarding emails break issues down into manageable chunks and assist folks take motion over time with a logical onboarding e mail sequence. Bubble does simply that with their onboarding welcome e mail. Easy, clear, and centered, it doesn’t embody something that distracts from the core message.
Onboarding e mail instance #4: Canva
Why we find it irresistible: Canva is a picture modifying and design device. On this onboarding e mail, they take a choose-your-own-adventure method. As a result of Canva has many various use instances, the e-mail highlights 4 potential beginning factors for a buyer’s journey with the platform. Clients get simply sufficient option to customise their expertise with out being overwhelmed with choices—and Canva will get priceless intel about every particular person’s pursuits for future campaigns.
Onboarding e mail instance #5: Shopify
Why we find it irresistible: Shopify is a web based storefront, and its clients have all kinds of experience in establishing an e-commerce enterprise. This onboarding e mail arrives early within the journey whereas persons are nonetheless of their free trial interval. Clients can leap proper into including merchandise to their on-line retailer, but when they haven’t but created an internet site or snagged a customized area, the e-mail helps them take these essential steps.
Onboarding e mail instance #6: Sonos
Why we find it irresistible: This onboarding welcome e mail from Sonos is customized based mostly on the particular speaker mannequin the recipient has bought. Sonos isn’t attempting to get folks to take motion on an internet site or in an app. As a substitute, they concentrate on pure schooling: successfully utilizing your Roam speaker. Every part addresses a standard hurdle folks might run into and gives focused sources.
Onboarding e mail instance #7: Jasper
Why we find it irresistible: Jasper is a B2B AI device, and clients have only a week to discover the app with a free trial. So, the platform’s onboarding e mail sequence wants to assist folks get began rapidly. This e mail is laser-focused on inspiring clients to take a single motion: establishing the Jasper Model Voice function. With a transparent how-to and a single CTA, the aim is to make sure the recipient sees worth instantly from this function (and continues utilizing their device).
Onboarding e mail instance #8: Asana
Why we find it irresistible: This is among the greatest examples of video utilized in onboarding to information folks towards a vital subsequent step. Asana, a widely known mission administration software program product, goals to encourage new customers to collaborate with others of their workspace. Whereas the message gives a few instructional hyperlinks for a deeper dive, it strategically focuses on the video—probably as a result of it does the perfect job explaining easy methods to use their device for collaboration. Plus, noting the size of the video is a pleasant contact: it units expectations so folks know precisely how a lot time participating with the content material will take.
Begin constructing simpler onboarding emails
Your onboarding emails are a chance to attach, educate, drive product use, and begin constructing relationships. On the finish of the day, the perfect onboarding emails really feel like an extension of the product expertise, serving to folks truly get worth from a device they’ve simply begun attending to know. The examples right here ought to provide you with plenty of inspiration to start crafting your personal onboarding campaigns.
Able to get began? See how one can create subtle, customized onboarding flows with Buyer.io Journeys.
Don’t overlook, your e mail campaigns are by no means really completed. When you’ve constructed your onboarding e mail sequence, the following step is experimentation, iteration, and ongoing enchancment! We’ve bought inspiration for you on that entrance too: obtain our eBook, 10 data-driven development advertising and marketing experiments.
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