---
name: activation
description: Gets new users from signup to first real value — signup flow, onboarding, time-to-value, and the early experience that determines whether someone becomes a user or a lapsed account. Use this to design or fix signup and onboarding, diagnose why signups do not convert to active use, reduce time-to-value, or decide what a new user must accomplish first.
---

# Activation

Acquisition spend is wasted downstream of a weak activation. This is usually the cheapest place to
improve revenue and the least worked on.

## Define the activation moment

Name the specific thing a new user does that predicts they will stay — not "logged in twice," but
the action that delivers the value they came for. Find it in the data: compare what retained users
did in week one against what churned users did.

Everything in onboarding exists to get people to that moment faster. Without it defined, onboarding
becomes a feature tour.

## Signup

Every field costs conversion, and each one must earn its place. Ask for what is needed to deliver
value now; collect the rest later, in context, when the reason is obvious.

- Defer email verification past first value where the product allows it.
- Never ask for payment details before value is delivered unless the model requires it.
- Show progress on multi-step flows, and let people finish later without losing work.
- Errors inline and specific. A form that rejects on submit without saying which field is where
  people leave.

## Onboarding

The goal is the first real outcome, not a completed tour.

- **Use their data, not sample data.** The moment someone sees their own information in the product
  is the moment it becomes real.
- **One action at a time**, each visibly advancing toward the outcome.
- **Skippable, resumable, and repeatable.** Forced linear onboarding fails everyone whose situation
  differs from the assumed one.
- **Empty states do the teaching.** They are the most-seen screens in a new account and usually the
  least designed.

Checklists work when the items lead to real value and the list can be dismissed. They fail when they
are busywork.

## Diagnosing

Instrument each step and find the largest drop. Then watch session recordings of people who dropped
there — the quantitative data says where, and only observation says why.

Common causes, in rough order: asked for too much too early, value not visible before effort
required, an empty product with no path out of it, and a required integration nobody has permissions
for.

## Measuring

Percentage reaching the activation moment, and time to reach it. Signup conversion alone will
happily improve while activation falls.

## Sources

`references/sources.md` in this skill lists the outside authorities that settle the questions
here — what each one is authoritative for, and what you may do with it. Check them before
answering on anything they cover, and cite what you used. Most are free to read and not free
to reproduce; the use note on each is binding.

## Never

- Pick an activation moment because it is easy to measure. It has to be the point where the user gets the value they came for.
- Add a step to onboarding without removing one. Every screen between signup and value costs you users.
- Ask at signup for anything you do not need to deliver the first result. Collect the rest later, in context.
- Count signups as activation. A user who never reached the value moment did not activate.