Build a retention-focused onboarding optimization plan

Description

Your signup-to-activation rate is low and users drop off before experiencing your product's core value. This dissects your onboarding funnel step by step, identifies the exact drop-off points, and generates a prioritized optimization plan tied to retention outcomes.

Create an onboarding optimization plan for {{product_name}} that maximizes the percentage of new users who reach the activation milestone.

## Context
- Product: {{product_name}}
- Activation milestone: {{activation_milestone}} (e.g., "user completes first project," "user invites a teammate," "user generates first report")
- Current signup-to-activation rate: {{activation_rate}}
- Current onboarding steps: {{onboarding_steps}}
- Time to activation (median): {{time_to_activation}}
- 30-day retention rate: {{retention_rate}}
- Primary user persona: {{user_persona}}

## Step 1: Funnel Mapping
1. List every step from signup to activation milestone
2. For each step, estimate or provide the completion rate
3. Identify the biggest drop-off point (where are you losing the most users?)
4. Calculate the "time to value" — how long until the user has their first "aha moment"?

## Step 2: Drop-off Diagnosis
For each major drop-off point:
1. What is the user trying to accomplish at this step?
2. What friction exists? (too many fields, unclear CTA, requires external data, loading time)
3. What do users who complete this step have in common vs. those who don't?
4. Is this a motivation problem (they don't see why) or an ability problem (they don't know how)?

## Step 3: Optimization Ideas
Generate 3-5 optimization ideas for each drop-off point:
- Reduce friction: can you remove or defer this step?
- Add motivation: can you show the value of completing this step?
- Improve guidance: can you add contextual help, tooltips, or a wizard?
- Social proof: can you show what other users achieved after this step?
- Personalization: can you tailor the experience based on the user's role or goal?

## Step 4: Prioritize and Plan
1. Score each optimization by: expected impact on activation rate, implementation effort, and confidence level
2. Select the top 5 optimizations for the next sprint cycle
3. For each, define:
   - Success metric and target
   - A/B test or staged rollout plan
   - Rollback criteria
4. Set a review date to measure aggregate impact on activation and 30-day retention

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