Why I Made App Signups Harder (And 10x'd User Activation)

Last year I was brought in as a user onboarding coach for mobile apps for a B2B SaaS that was drowning in signups but starving for paying customers. Their metrics told a frustrating story: lots of new users daily, most using the product for exactly one day, then vanishing. Almost no conversions after the free trial.

The marketing team was celebrating their "success" — popups, aggressive CTAs, and paid ads were driving signup numbers up. But I knew we were optimizing for the wrong thing.

Like most product consultants, I started with the obvious solution: improve the onboarding experience. We built an interactive product tour, simplified the UX, reduced friction points. The engagement improved a bit — nothing crazy. The core problem remained untouched.

That's when I realized we were treating symptoms, not the disease. Here's what you'll learn from my counterintuitive approach:

• Why making signups harder actually improved activation rates
• The fundamental problem with most SaaS onboarding strategies
• How to build qualification into your user journey
• The metrics that actually matter for sustainable growth
• When to break conventional UX wisdom

This approach completely changed how I think about product onboarding optimization and user activation.

Most user onboarding coaches for mobile apps will tell you the same thing: reduce friction at all costs. The conventional wisdom sounds logical enough:

• Simplify the signup process — ask for minimal information upfront
• Remove barriers — no credit card requirements, no lengthy forms
• Get users to "aha moment" fast — show value immediately
• Progressive disclosure — reveal features gradually
• Gamify the experience — use progress bars and achievements

This advice exists because it works in specific contexts. E-commerce checkout optimization, consumer apps with network effects, and viral products all benefit from reduced friction. The logic is simple: more signups = more potential customers = more revenue.

But here's where this conventional wisdom falls apart for B2B products: it optimizes for quantity over quality. When marketing teams are incentivized to maximize signups at any cost, you get exactly that — signups at any cost. Including the cost of bringing in unqualified users who will never convert.

The hidden problem? Most onboarding coaches focus on post-signup optimization while ignoring pre-signup qualification. They're trying to activate users who should never have signed up in the first place.

This creates a fundamental mismatch between user expectations and product value, leading to high churn rates and poor activation metrics that no amount of onboarding optimization can fix.

When I joined this B2B SaaS client, the numbers painted a clear picture of dysfunction. They had thousands of trial signups monthly, but their activation rate was abysmal. Most users would sign up, complete the basic setup, then never return.

The product itself wasn't the problem — paying customers loved it and had strong retention rates. The issue was that the wrong people were signing up. Cold traffic from paid ads and SEO was bringing in anyone with a pulse and an email address.

My first instinct was textbook onboarding optimization. We implemented all the standard best practices:

• Interactive product tours to guide new users
• Simplified UX with fewer decision points
• Reduced friction in the setup process
• Better in-app messaging and tooltips

The engagement metrics improved slightly, but the core problem persisted. Users were still abandoning the product after their first session. That's when I dug deeper into the user data and discovered something crucial: there was zero correlation between signup ease and long-term engagement.

The users who converted to paid plans had one thing in common — they had a clear use case and genuine need for the product before they even signed up. Meanwhile, the vast majority of signups were curiosity-driven browsers who had no immediate need and no clear problem to solve.

This insight forced me to question everything about traditional onboarding optimization. Instead of making it easier for anyone to sign up, what if we made it harder for the wrong people to sign up?

Instead of optimizing for maximum signups, I proposed something that made my client uncomfortable: make signup harder to filter for serious users. We completely restructured the onboarding approach around qualification rather than conversion.

Here's exactly what we implemented:

Step 1: Pre-Signup Qualification

We added qualifying questions before the signup form:

• Company size and type
• Current solution they're using
• Specific use case for our product
• Timeline for implementation

Step 2: Credit Card Requirement

We added credit card requirements upfront, even for the free trial. This single change eliminated 70% of low-intent signups immediately. Yes, overall signup volume dropped significantly, but engagement skyrocketed.

Step 3: Lengthened Onboarding Flow

Instead of getting users to value quickly, we made them invest time in setup. We required:

• Detailed company profile completion
• Integration with their existing tools
• Goal setting and success metrics definition

Step 4: Educational Gating

Before accessing premium features, users had to complete educational modules about best practices. This ensured they understood the product's value proposition and how to use it effectively.

The psychology behind this approach is simple: people value what they work for. By requiring investment upfront, we filtered for users who were genuinely motivated to succeed with the product.

My client initially panicked when signup numbers dropped, but the transformation in user quality was immediate. We went from having thousands of inactive trial users to hundreds of highly engaged, qualified prospects.

The results completely validated our counterintuitive approach. While signup volume decreased by 65%, the quality metrics told a different story:

• Trial-to-paid conversion increased from 2.8% to 12.3%
• Day-7 activation rate improved from 15% to 43%
• Support ticket volume decreased by 40% (more engaged users asked better questions)
• Average time to first value decreased from 8 days to 3 days

The most surprising outcome was that our Cost Per Acquisition actually decreased despite higher upfront friction. We were paying the same amount for ads but getting far more qualified leads, which meant our marketing spend became significantly more efficient.

Sales conversations also improved dramatically. Instead of explaining basic product concepts to unqualified prospects, the sales team was talking to users who already understood the value proposition and had specific implementation questions.

Within three months, monthly recurring revenue increased by 34% despite having fewer total users in the system. The business shifted from optimizing for vanity metrics to optimizing for revenue metrics.

This experience completely changed how I approach user onboarding optimization. Here are the key lessons I learned:

1. Optimize for the right metrics — Signup volume is a vanity metric. Focus on activation, engagement, and conversion rates instead.
2. Qualification beats optimization — It's easier to bring in the right users than to activate the wrong ones.
3. Friction can be strategic — The right friction filters for intent and creates psychological investment.
4. Marketing and product alignment matters — When marketing optimizes for maximum signups, product suffers from poor user quality.
5. User investment drives engagement — People value what they work for. Easy signups often lead to easy abandonment.
6. Quality compounds over time — Engaged users provide better feedback, create more referrals, and reduce support burden.
7. Context matters — This approach works best for B2B products with clear value propositions and longer sales cycles.

The biggest shift in my thinking was moving from "how do we activate more users?" to "how do we attract users who will naturally activate?" Sometimes the best onboarding strategy is preventing the wrong people from boarding in the first place.