How to Identify the "Aha" Moments in your product and Improve your onboarding campaigns

Content Team

Nov 16, 2022 • 6 min read

For most product users, value isn't always obvious and it takes a key pivotal moment for a customer to perceive the true value that your product gives. This is where the aha moment comes in. It is the ideal moment that describes the feelings a customer gets when they use your product.

The faster you get your customers to experience an aha moment when using your product, the faster you get them to perceive your product’s value proposition.

In this article, we’ll explain what an aha moment means. We'll also cover how you can identify your product’s aha moment and improve your onboarding campaigns.

Here's what we'll consider:

1. What is an aha moment?

2. How to identify your product’s aha moment

Talk to your active users
Learn from churn users
Analyze patterns in your user analytics data
Understand user intent

3. How to tailor user onboarding to an aha moment

4. Bottom line

What is an aha moment?

An aha moment is a moment of sudden realization or discovery. When it comes to software, it is an emotional moment when a user derives the key value of your product. During this moment, everything clicks for the customer and they understand why they need your product.

Aha moments are emotional and create a strong impression that keeps users coming back for more. However, just because they are positive emotions behind user behavior doesn't mean that they can't be tracked or measured.

So, how can you identify an aha moment?

In the next section, we'll highlight the various ways that you can identify your product’s aha moment.

How to identify your product's aha moment

It can be challenging to find your product’s aha moment. There are many factors involved and different sets of users use your product to solve various problems.

If you don’t know how to identify the moment when your users get to say “aha”, we have prepared this section to help you.

We’ll highlight why you should dig into your analytics data, and user feedback, and how you can identify the user behavioral patterns that correlate to the product value.

1. Talk to your active customers

One way you can pinpoint the exact aha moment of your product is by talking to your active customers. This is because they are the ones that use your product the most.

To begin, you can talk to your best customers. These are the individuals that achieve the best results from your product and will have positive feedback to share with you. Your goal is to identify what your customer’s success story looks like and use the information to spot patterns that correlate to your product’s aha moment.

You might uncover what a customer found memorable the first time they used your product or what they found lacking. So, how do you get in contact with your best customers? You can communicate with them via email. You can ask them some basic questions like;

What do you love most about [your product]?
What are the features you use most of the time?
What are the features you never use at all?
What’s one thing you wish that [your product] could help you achieve?
What’s the biggest problem that [your product] has helped you solve?

Alternatively, you can obtain customer feedback by sending an NPS survey. Group your best customers into specific segments and ask them for feedback so you can learn what works and doesn't.

As you analyze the answers to these questions, think deeply about each of them. This will help you figure out what an ideal user experience looks like and will bring you a step closer to identifying your product’s aha moment.

2. Learn from churned users

Your best customers aren’t the ones that you should talk to when identifying your product’s aha moment. You also need to learn why some users churn and implement the needed changes to your product. While the most common reason for churned users is a value gap in the product, there are many other reasons that your former users can share with you.

For instance, a former customer may have churned because of friction or because they didn’t derive adequate value from your product. But rather than guessing, you can contact them to learn why they churned.

You can send an email asking some questions like;

What goal were you trying to achieve when you signed up for [your product]?
What could have been done differently to make you keep using [your product]?
Why was [your product] not ideal for you?

As you go through the answers to these questions, prepare for some negative feedback. But they are necessary so that you pinpoint what went wrong and use the information to improve the user experience.

3. Analyze patterns in your user analytics data

After you obtain both positive and negative feedback from your customers, you need to dig into user analytics data. The goal is to spot trends and identify what separates converted users from those that are yet to use your product.

Here are some questions to help you out:

Did converted users finish an onboarding process?
Did they interact with a specific product feature?
Did your converted users connect with other users?
Did they interact with a specific feature during and after an onboarding process?

As you answer these questions, compile a list of user behavior or patterns that indicate product value and those that don't.

For instance, you can spot patterns in customers that use specific features on a regular basis and behaviors by customers that don't always use your product.

Here are other patterns and behaviors that you can spot:

Using your value metrics
Watching an onboarding video before engaging with your product features
Achieving a specific outcome within your product

It may be challenging to analyze analytics data if you run a startup that's in its early stages of growth. In this case, you can supplement your analytics efforts with customer feedback to gain more insight.

4. Understand user intent

When discovering your product’s aha moment, it's important to consider what an aha moment means for each user segment. Think about it—your customers are individuals with different behavioral patterns and goals, so it's inevitable that they'll experience different aha moments.

In another instance, think about the reasons why people sign up for Dropbox—one user may need to store multiple files while another may want to share files with others. It's clear that both users will experience different aha moments.

Nonetheless, whatever aha moment your users experience, they can serve as useful pointers for patterns. This way, you can predict when users are most likely to experience them and direct other users to them during onboarding campaigns.

How to tailor user onboarding to an aha moment

When you know the particular events that trigger aha moments in your product, you can use the information to create better onboarding campaigns. You can create a personalized journey for each customer regardless of their type or niche. Whether they are CEOs, marketers, or managers. So how do you get started?

Here are some ways:

1. Segment your new users

When people sign up to use your product, create two or three buyer personas for each user type. You can group them according to demographic, job titles, and industry.

With each user segment, you can create a personalized journey to an aha moment based on their information.

With Engage, you can create unique customer segments and send personalized messages during your onboarding campaigns.

2. Consider user preferences

In this case, you can personalize the customer experience by providing recommendations so that customers can set up preferences with ease.

Here are some points to consider:

Ensure that your recommendations are in line with the core value of your product
Remove friction as much as you can. Asking customers to fill out long forms may increase friction and spoil the product experience in the long run.

Bottom Line

It's without a doubt that you want your customers to say "aha!" when using your product. There's a probability that some of your customers may have experienced it or maybe on their way to doing so.

All you need to do is ask them and analyze your user analytics data. Use the points mentioned above to guide you as you identify your product’s aha moment.

Remember to reflect on your customer feedback so you can identify what a customer success story looks like. Learning about the different experiences that lead to aha moments can help you improve the customer experience and boost your product value.

At Engage, we have made this process less challenging for you. With our messaging platform, you can communicate with your customers to obtain feedback that you can use to drive better outcomes.