The SaaS customer journey is the path customers take from discovering your software to becoming a loyal advocate. Understanding and optimizing this journey is key to customer satisfaction and retention. Here’s a quick guide.

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Takeaways

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• The SaaS customer journey has 6 stages: Awareness, Consideration, Decision, Onboarding, Adoption, Retention, and Advocacy.
• Mapping the customer journey allows SaaS companies to find pain points and improve the overall customer experience and retention.
• Onboarding, engagement, and customer feedback are key to reducing churn and building long-term relationships with users.

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As a B2B performance marketing agency, we use the SaaS customer journey as a framework to map the steps customers take from awareness to advocacy. Understanding and optimizing this journey helps SaaS businesses find pain points, improve touchpoints, and create a seamless customer experience that drives growth.

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What is the SaaS customer journey?

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The SaaS customer journey is a framework that outlines the steps customers take from awareness to advocacy. It includes all the interactions a customer goes through when buying a product or subscription, from initial problem discovery to becoming a loyal advocate. The journey is relatively predictable and linear, so SaaS companies can easily map and optimize it.

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A key part of the SaaS customer journey is the customer journey map. These maps show how users interact with the software across different touchpoints so businesses can find conversion points and optimize user adoption. Understanding the journey allows SaaS companies to maximize customer satisfaction and foster B2B customer loyalty over time.

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B2B decision-makers have specific technical needs. Finding these decision makers, their needs, research methods, expectations, and loyalty factors is key to providing the best experience for existing customers.

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SaaS customer journey stages

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The typical stages of a SaaS customer journey are Awareness, Consideration, Decision, Onboarding, Adoption, Retention, and Advocacy.

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Awareness stage

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The awareness stage is where customers discover and become interested in the product and learn about different options. This is where customers recognize a specific problem and start searching for solutions. Potential users will learn about a product through multiple channels, such as ads, referrals, and search engine results.

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Capturing customer attention during the awareness stage requires showing the product as a solution and crafting messaging around customer pain points. Showing the product benefits allows SaaS companies to attract potential customers and move them to the next stage of the journey.

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Consideration stage

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In the consideration stage, customers evaluate different solutions and educate themselves through content like case studies and testimonials. This is where customers are assessing the value propositions of different products to see which one fits their needs. Creating content that makes comparison easy for customers during the consideration stage.

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Decision stage

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The decision stage is to convert prospects into customers through a frictionless buying process. This is the final evaluation stage where customers buy the product so SaaS companies must provide a smooth and efficient buying process that leads to a conversion.

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Onboarding stage

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Onboarding is the initial experience with a product and therefore is key to customer satisfaction. Good onboarding increases customer retention by providing initial product setup and education, guiding users on product usage, and highlighting the value to encourage continued engagement. Reducing friction in the sign-up process and using a welcome screen for user goals can make onboarding much better.

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Good onboarding has an onboarding checklist with a progress indicator to encourage timely completion and a frictionless experience that improves user perception of the product. This stage is key to converting new users into long-term customers and reducing churn.

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Adoption stage

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Continuing engagement during the adoption stage helps users get the most out of the product. In this stage, you offer guidance and support to new users to help them use the product effectively and get the most value.

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24/7 customer support, advanced features, use case education and community engagement are key during the adoption phase. Tracking metrics like email open rate, support tickets, content engagement, and user churn will help measure the effectiveness of adoption strategies.

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Retention stage

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The retention stage is about keeping customers happy and loyal through regular interaction and personalization. Good retention strategies can increase customer loyalty, upsell opportunities, and keep customers engaged over time.

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Having good retention strategies allows SaaS companies to reduce churn and build long-term customer relationships.

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Advocacy stage

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In the advocacy stage, customers promote the product and become advocates who refer services to others. Metrics like NPS, customer referral rate, and CSAT help SaaS companies measure the effectiveness of their advocacy strategies.

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Some examples of advocacy strategies are product-led strategy, which focuses on first-hand product experience and satisfaction, and referral programs, which encourage customer advocacy and organic growth.

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Why map customer journeys

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Customer journey mapping in SaaS allows you to address key pain points and increase customer satisfaction.

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Moreover, a strong SaaS customer journey mapping means a more personal approach to marketing and customer engagement. This means businesses can increase customer satisfaction through targeted marketing and better product offerings and ultimately increase customer lifetime value and reduce the cost of marketing and customer acquisition.

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How to create SaaS customer journey maps

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Creating a good SaaS customer journey map involves understanding customer pain points and optimizing key touchpoints to improve the overall customer experience. Following this process allows SaaS companies to create a journey map that includes every point of contact between the user, the company, and the product. This section will walk you through the steps to create a customer journey map, from setting goals to visualizing the journey.

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Set your goals

Having clear goals for customer journey mapping helps you understand user needs and address pain points. The first step in creating a SaaS customer journey map is to pick a goal for your journey. Factors like product type, industry trends, and customer insights will help you determine if the goals you set for journey mapping are realistic.

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Be specific when setting the initial goal for creating a customer journey map. Having a clear target will help focus the map and give you actionable insights and the journey mapping process will align with the desired outcome.

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Create customer personas

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Creating SaaS buyer personas is key to identifying your ideal customer and targeting specific segments for better engagement. Knowing the audience type is important when creating personas because you need to know who to design for, the end user or decision maker.

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You can gather information through in-app micro surveys, customer surveys, feedback forms, and sentiment analysis.

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Segmentation strategies for personas can also include demographics and user behavior, which are important for tailoring experiences and increasing customer engagement.

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Identify touchpoints

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Touchpoints are user interactions with the company and product so are key to improving the overall customer experience. Identifying patterns in touchpoints allows SaaS companies to start mapping the important interactions and understand how and when these touchpoints happen. Examples of direct touchpoints are contacting the support team and referral programs, which are important for improving the customer journey.

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For each touchpoint, identify the roadblocks and friction points that might be getting in the way of customer interactions. Persona-specific maps allow you to tailor the messaging to different customer segments and have a more personal experience. Creating stage maps for customers who are struggling at a particular stage helps companies improve the experience and address the pain points better.

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Collect and analyze data

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Customer data analysis is key to identifying the gap between current performance and customer expectations. SaaS companies should be utilizing conversion and engagement data and accessing touchpoint data directly in the CRM to analyze.

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Collecting and analyzing data will give you deeper insights into the customer journey and identify areas to improve and optimize the overall experience. This will help you address pain points and make sure the customer journey is aligned with user needs and business goals.

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Visualize the journey

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Visualizing the customer journey is a key step in understanding customer needs and addressing pain points at each touchpoint. Tracking customer activity will help you identify the weak spots in the customer journey map so you can review and update the map continuously to keep it dynamic and relevant. Update the customer journey map as goals, roadblocks, and friction points change, so it remains a useful tool to optimize the customer experience.

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Updating a customer journey map takes time and effort but the benefits of a well-maintained and accurate map are huge. Tracking customer activity through a customer timeline in customer profiles will give you valuable insights into how users are interacting with the product and help improve the overall experience.

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How to improve your SaaS customer journey through customer feedback

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Using customer feedback helps you find pain points in the customer journey and get valuable insights to improve. Feedback analysis gives you actionable insights to inform your decisions so SaaS companies can improve the overall customer experience. Changing based on customer feedback can improve satisfaction and retention and give a positive and engaging customer journey.

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Step 1: Collect user feedback

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Surveys, customer interviews, and support tickets give you insights into the moments that matter in the customer experience. Qualitative data from customer interviews and surveys adds to the quantitative data and gives you insights into emotions and motivations.

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Using these feedback collection methods will improve the customer experience by aligning services to user needs and preferences. Feedback surveys and user interviews give you flexibility and the opportunity to get deep into customer experiences to identify areas to improve and optimize the customer journey.

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Step 2: Analyze

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Interpreting the data from customer profiles will give you trends and specific areas to improve and guide your decisions and improve the customer journey.

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By understanding customer needs and expectations through feedback analysis, SaaS companies can make informed decisions that improve the overall customer experience and satisfaction.

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Step 3: Implement changes

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Make an action plan to improve the overall experience and keep customers happy and loyal.

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Calculate your customer lifetime value (CLV) to estimate the total revenue your business receives from a single customer throughout their lifetime and create strategies to improve it.

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Bonus: Key metrics to enhance your customer journey mapping

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Key performance indicators (KPIs) are important to measure the effectiveness of customer journey strategies and should be compared to previous performance data. Churn, adoption, and renewal should be monitored to see the impact of the improvement plans in the SaaS customer journey.

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Customer satisfaction metrics

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Customer satisfaction can be measured with metrics like Customer Satisfaction Score (CSAT) and Net Promoter Score (NPS), which focus on the customer experience with the service. CSAT measures customer reaction to a specific interaction, and NPS measures the likelihood of customers recommending the service to others.

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Using CSAT and NPS effectively will allow SaaS companies to make informed decisions that improve customer experience and satisfaction and ensure long-term success.

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Engagement metrics

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Engagement metrics are important to understand how users interact with your SaaS product, as they will give you insights into overall usage and satisfaction. Average session duration will tell you how well users are interacting with the product and overall engagement. Session duration will give you insights into how long users are using the software and how much value they get from it.

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Tracking active users will tell you how many customers are actively using the product and how relevant and satisfied they are. Feature adoption rates will tell you how well users are using different parts of the product and how engaged and satisfied they are.

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Retention and churn metrics

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The churn rate is calculating the percentage of customers who stop using a service within a certain period. Churn rate is an important metric that will tell you the percentage of customers who stop using the service, it’s a red flag to the customer experience. Tracking retention rate will tell you how well a service keeps customers over time, it will give you insights into overall customer satisfaction.

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Retention rate and customer satisfaction are key to understanding long-term customer behavior and improving services.

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Map your SaaS customer journey with an experienced partner

In short, mastering the SaaS customer journey means understanding and optimizing each stage from awareness to advocacy. A strong journey mapping will solve pain points, improve satisfaction, and increase retention.

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Even though this guide is comprehensive, the path is easier with an experienced partner. Schedule a free strategy call with our ABM agency CEO, Alex Hollander. Or visit our homepage for more information regarding B2B SaaS & Tech Growth Operation