\u201cCustomer churn is the percentage of customers that stopped using your company’s product or service during a certain time frame.<\/p>\n
You can calculate churn rate by dividing the number of customers you lost during that time period\u2014say a quarter\u2014by the number of customers you had at the beginning of that time period.<\/p>\n
For example, if you start your quarter with 400 customers and end with 380, your churn rate is 5% because you lost 5% of your customers.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
Many companies focus on acquisition<\/strong> when trying to achieve growth. Retention<\/strong> is often left aside.<\/p>\n However, no matter how hard you work at acquiring new customers, it\u2019s completely useless if you have a \u201cleaky bucket\u201d\u2014a high churn rate.<\/p>\n What\u2019s the point of getting new customers if they just leave you shortly after? Growth can\u2019t happen this way.<\/p>\n Churn can have several reasons:<\/p>\n But, most of all, churn happens when customers don\u2019t get enough or adequate support throughout their journey with the company.<\/p>\n So, you need to work on making your success and support experiences outstanding, yes?<\/p>\n Sure. You should always strive to make all of your support experiences a delight.<\/p>\n However, there are times in a customer\u2019s journey with you when they need it a lot more than usual.<\/p>\n When you\u2019re just starting out with reducing customer churn, these are the first areas to focus on.<\/p>\n There are three stages where keeping an extra eye on how your customers are doing is especially important:<\/p>\n There are things you can do in all of those stages that will help your customers to:<\/p>\n All of these help reduce disappointment and fight future churn.<\/p>\n Let\u2019s talk about what you can do to make sure the customers\u2019 experience is flawless throughout these important milestones.<\/p>\n This is an interesting stage in the buyer\u2019s journey. If you\u2019re not familiar with what that is, here\u2019s a handy explanation by What you need to pay extra special attention to is the last one\u2014the decision stage.<\/p>\n In this stage, your potential customer has identified their issue, and decided that they need a solution like yours. They\u2019re researching all the options out there, and you\u2019re one of them. This is where you already need to step in.<\/p>\n One of the biggest causes of churn is the actual product not being in sync with what the customer expects it to be. What they expect it to be is based on what you tell them it is.<\/p>\n Making a sale is tempting, but if support and marketing are not truthful about the fit between the customer and the company, they will most likely churn anyway. It\u2019s not worth it.<\/p>\n This is why you need to make sure that your messaging is in sync with what your product or service actually is and does.<\/p>\n Here are some ways to do that:<\/p>\n Don\u2019t embellish or stretch the imagination about what your product can do. Be realistic about your capabilities, and straight up about what it\u2019s not good for.<\/p>\n This way, you\u2019ll attract the customers who are actually a perfect fit for what you\u2019re offering. They won\u2019t be disappointed when they start using your product or service, and are way less likely to churn.<\/p>\n You\u2019re familiar with your product because you built it. Your customers did not build it.<\/p>\n Regardless of how simple of a solution it is, starting to use it can be a learning curve. If customers can\u2019t figure out how to use the product, they\u2019ll be frustrated. Frustration leads to churn.<\/p>\n A well thought-through onboarding will also help your customers reach their first success with your product faster.<\/p>\n Onboarding is the time where your users possibly need the most proactive support in their whole life cycle.<\/p>\n Some people prefer to talk to real people when onboarding to resolve any issues or questions they have. Some prefer to help themselves through available help documentation.<\/p>\n You should accommodate for both of these types of users. Some ways to do that (that take into account both cases above) are:<\/p>\n You\u2019ve probably seen a product tour before when using one for the first time. Basically, it gives the user a virtual tour of how the product works when they first sign in.<\/p>\n Product tours are extremely useful in getting your customers to learn the basics right from the get go. You can build one from scratch, or use a service to make it a little easier. We\u2019re a fan of Appcues<\/a> for product walkthroughs.<\/p>\n For the users who aren\u2019t a fan of having to reach out to support, having online help materials is extremely important. The most well-known form of help documentation is a knowledge base<\/a>.<\/p>\n There are other types of help materials you can create later on. You can create live tutorials, a FAQ page, product videos, and even blog posts on product tips.<\/p>\n Whichever help documentation you go with, make sure it\u2019s easily accessible from both in- and outside your product. Nobody wants to go rummaging around for help materials in a rush. Include a visible link on your website, as well as a link inside your product.<\/p>\n Support is most needed in the early stages of becoming acquainted with a product. Give that option for the people who would rather talk to a real person or reach out.<\/p>\n Include a live chat box or contact form in easy reach in their first few sessions.<\/p>\n Automated emails get a bad rap. However, when done tastefully, they can be invaluable for lightly informing and supporting a customer during onboarding.<\/p>\n You can send support messages based on user activity or milestones:<\/p>\n\n
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The three essential stages of fighting SaaS churn<\/h2>\n
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Right before signing up (managing expectations)<\/h2>\n
![\"The](\"https:\/\/canny.io\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/5c0ee8ca8bb278.58975283-1024x576.png\")
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Onboarding (learning to use the product)<\/h2>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/canny.io\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/CustOnboardingProcess-1024x640.jpg\")
Including product tours<\/h4>\n
Having help documentation readily available<\/h4>\n
Including an easy-to-reach support channel<\/h4>\n
Sending automated support emails or messages<\/h4>\n
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/canny.io\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/05\/Screen-Shot-2019-05-28-at-12.36.10-PM-1024x303.png\")
\n![\"Canny](\"https:\/\/no-cache.hubspot.com\/cta\/default\/5705808\/e1d55d08-a2cf-44a3-a9a0-f3ca5ff21dfa.png\")
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