Do you know whether your customers hate your onboarding process?

Are you sure?

If you offer a product or service that requires data from your customers, you probably see those customers getting stuck trying over and over to get their data in shape so that it can be used. Migrating data from legacy systems and external sources to your product or service (a.k.a. data onboarding) is a critical first step in the overall experience a new customer will have working with your offering, and customer success leaders are very aware that any glitches and delays from poor data onboarding and migration can derail a new relationship before it’s even begun. Improving your onboarding process will directly impact your overall customer success metrics.

It’s those metrics that will give you real insights into the critical first steps of your customers’ experience.

By improving your data onboarding and migration process and keeping an eye on these specific metrics, companies can reduce costs, accelerate revenue and significantly increase customer satisfaction. If you want to improve your onboarding process, pay attention to these customer success metrics:

1. Retention rates

2. Product adoption

3. Time to value

4. Net promoter score

Here’s how understanding these metrics can help you figure out what’s happening during your onboarding process and how to improve your customer experience:

Retention rates

This metric provides the most direct insight into whether your customers are happy with your product and service. A poor data onboarding experience will hurt your customer relationship and general customer satisfaction and can impact your retention rates. Conversely, a streamlined data onboarding or migration process can positively impact your retention rates because those who can get started and derive value quicker will be more satisfied customers as a result.

Product adoption

Consider the speed and volume of usage of your product. How long did it take customers to use it for the very first time? Are they using it daily? Is usage growing or shrinking? These could be indicators of a solid or weak customer experience during onboarding.

Time to value

Time to value (TTV) measures the time from signup to the time users activate. If your data onboarding or migration process relies on time-consuming spreadsheet uploads and follow-up emails to handle the inevitable data errors that arise, you can expect a delay in activations.

The more steps in your activation process, the longer it will take individuals to begin successfully using your product. You may have a clear checklist that takes users through an activation process, but if one of the items is “import data” and the data onboarding process isn’t up to par, customers will experience delayed time to value.

Net promoter score

CS leaders often track the Net Promoter Score (NPS) throughout the customer journey to better understand how customers feel about their product. A painful data onboarding process will not only negatively impact the early engagement period but also leave lingering bad impressions that can affect scores going forward.

The easy way to improve customer success metrics

Onboarding and migrating data are difficult processes that require careful planning, execution and follow-up. However, when you’re laser-focused on these metrics, tying the value of data onboarding back to them can make a significant difference in the quest for customer satisfaction and successful product adoption.

Once you analyze your onboarding process, you might find that it’s challenging to implement the improvements you need, especially at scale. Fortunately, a dedicated data onboarding and migration solution can help quickly resolve common issues and help teams safely and efficiently onboard data files of all sizes and numerous types, improving customer success metrics across the board. By leveraging a data onboarding and migration solution, you can avoid the costs of missed opportunities, delayed revenue and the time and resources involved in creating and maintaining complicated workarounds.

Want to learn more about how Flatfile can improve your customer success metrics? Book a demo with Flatfile today.