Increasing user engagement to drive revenue (early-stage SaaS strategies)

Focus on the actions that matter

Not every click or login translates to revenue.

Early-stage founders need to identify the specific user actions that correlate with revenue — whether that's increased usage leading to upgrades, inviting teammates (adding paid seats), or reaching a usage threshold that triggers conversion. These are your product's north star actions.

For example, Slack famously found that teams exchanging around 2 000 messages essentially become long-term users (a strong predictor they'll upgrade to a paid plan). This shows how a high volume of a key action (messages sent) drives revenue through retention and expansion.

Similarly, Notion's growth suggests that teams who create lots of content and invite colleagues tend to adopt paid plans, because they've woven the product into their daily workflow.

Even consumer apps have their engagement tipping points — Facebook's "10 friends in 7 days" rule is a classic example.

Start by digging into your usage data (even if limited): what do your best customers do more of?

Maybe it's uploading files, completing projects, or integrating with other tools. Those behaviors are likely tied to value (and revenue). Once you know these, you can focus your efforts on multiplying those actions across your user base.

Quick wins to boost engagement and revenue

Streamline onboarding to the "aha" moment

Make sure new users hit the core value-driving action as soon as possible. Guide them through a simple onboarding that showcases that action.

For instance, if your SaaS is about project management and creating a project is the key action, walk new signups straight through making their first project.

Remove any friction or extraneous steps that delay that first win.

Quick tweaks like adding an in-app tutorial or pre-filling a sample project can lead users right to the "aha!" moment where they say "I see why this is useful" after performing that key action.

Nudge users with timely prompts

Sometimes users need a gentle push. Implement nudges and reminders that encourage the next valuable action.

This could be an email that triggers when a user hasn't engaged in a while "We noticed you haven't created a project this week — need help?" or an in-app tooltip that appears if they haven't tried a high-value feature yet.

Many successful SaaS apps do this — for example, if you haven't invited teammates yet, the app might highlight the Invite button with a note like Collaborate with your team to get more done.

These prompts gently drive users toward actions that increase their investment in the product (and eventually, your revenue).

Remove friction from key actions

Do an honest audit of how easy it is for users to perform the revenue-driving actions. Any speed bump can reduce the volume of those actions.

Simplify workflows around those actions: use fewer clicks, clearer UI, and eliminate unnecessary steps or confirmations. If usage is tied to revenue, consider even lifting certain limits in early stages to encourage habit formation.

For instance, if a file storage app's free tier limits uploads, you might temporarily raise the cap (or make the upload process extremely simple) so new users get accustomed to heavy usage.

You can always introduce monetization once they're hooked — but they won't get hooked if there's too much friction upfront.

Encourage collaborative usage

Many B2B SaaS products get more valuable (and stickier) when used in a team. Leverage this by encouraging actions like inviting colleagues or sharing content.

Each invite isn't just a potential new user; it also increases the original user's engagement because the product becomes part of their team's workflow.

Make the invite flow obvious and rewarding — for example, highlight an Invite team call-to-action with a small incentive (like extending the trial or unlocking a feature for both the inviter and invitee).

Real-world example: Slack's early growth was fueled by internal virality; a single team member invites coworkers, and soon the whole team is on Slack, busily exchanging those all-important messages.

Similarly, Notion makes it easy to share pages or workspaces with teammates, which naturally leads to more active use across a company (and eventually, the need to upgrade to paid plans).

By building collaboration into your product, you not only drive engagement but also bring in new users who can turn into paying customers.

Celebrate and reward high-value actions

Positive reinforcement can go a long way. When a user hits a milestone that's meaningful — say they ran their 100th report or added their 10th team member — acknowledge it.

This could be a simple celebratory message in-app "You just completed your 100th task — nice work!" or an email highlighting the achievement and the value they've gotten.

Some products even gamify usage with badges or progress bars to motivate continued action.

The point is to make users feel good about using the product frequently. That emotional win boosts the chance they'll keep doing it (and keep paying for it).

Just ensure any gamification stays tied to genuine value — don't reward pointless clicking, but do celebrate actions that reflect real, valuable usage of your product.

Long-term engagement strategies

Quick wins can jump-start engagement, but sustainable growth comes from baking engagement into your product and overall strategy.

Design engagement loops into the product

Think beyond one-off features and look at the overall loop of how users interact.

Great SaaS products create a virtuous cycle: using the product creates value, which encourages more use, which unlocks more value.

Over time, this daily or weekly reliance means users are likely to expand their usage — adopting more features or bringing more of their work into the product — which in turn often leads to upgrades when they outgrow the free offering.

Consider Linear's approach: by making issue tracking so fast and satisfying, it encourages teams to capture every bug or task in the tool. The more work they manage in Linear, the more integral it becomes to their daily workflow — driving constant engagement and eventually necessitating a paid upgrade when the team scales.

In your product, identify these loops.

It might be content creation → insight gained → more content creation, or data input → valuable output → more data input.

Build features and workflows that reinforce repeating the key actions and increasing the value each time. Over the long run, an engagement loop keeps users coming back on their own, driving up those action counts naturally without constant prodding.

Align your pricing model with engagement

Early-stage startups often wrestle with pricing. One useful principle is to align your pricing with the value users get, which usually correlates with how much they engage.

If you charge in a way that the more a customer uses the product (and gets value), the more they're willing to pay, you create a win-win scenario.

For example, Slack's free plan limits the message history and certain features, but by the time a team hits those limits, they've already exchanged thousands of messages and derived huge value — at that point, paying to keep the conversation going is a no-brainer.

Consider a freemium or tiered model where the basic usage is free, allowing users to ramp up engagement with little friction.

Then ensure that heavy engagement naturally leads to an upgrade (because they reach a cap or need advanced capabilities).

The goal is to encourage users to use the product as much as possible — not to hold back out of fear of cost — until using it less or losing access hurts more than the price of upgrading.

Keep an eye on metrics like free-to-paid conversion and expansion revenue; often, improving those numbers comes down to users finding so much value through frequent use that they want more.

Invest in user education and support

In the long run, engaged users are informed users. Allocate time for customer success efforts even if you don't have a formal team.

This could mean creating a helpful knowledge base, in-app tooltips, how-to webinars, or even one-on-one onboarding sessions for early customers.

Users sometimes stagnate or leave simply because they aren't fully aware of everything your product can do for them. By proactively teaching customers how to get more value (especially from the features tied to your key metrics), you'll increase their engagement.

For example, Notion frequently shares templates, tutorials, and use-case guides; these resources inspire users to explore new ways to use the product, leading them to create even more docs, databases, and workflows — i.e. more engagement.

For your SaaS, even a simple monthly newsletter with a "Did you know?" tip or a highlighted power feature can spur an inactive user to try something new.

Over time, consider building a community or forum where your users can share success stories and tips with each other. Peer examples can motivate users to deepen their usage as well.

Continuously refine based on data

Long-term engagement growth requires continuous improvement. Instrument your product with analytics to track how often those key actions are happening and to see where users drop off.

For example, you might test a redesigned dashboard that prominently suggests the next useful action for a user. If the change leads to a measurable uptick in that action's frequency, roll it out to everyone.

Talk to your most active users and those who signed up but never really got going.

Their insights can highlight new opportunities — perhaps a highly-requested feature could drive even more usage, or maybe a certain workflow is confusing users and holding them back from engaging fully.

By iterating regularly based on data and feedback, you'll keep improving the product-market fit over time.

Read more about product-market fit in our guide.

Even mature products continuously tweak onboarding flows, feature placements, and messaging to encourage more usage. Your early-stage product should do the same, embracing small adjustments that compound into big engagement lifts.

Conclusion & key takeaways

Increasing engagement in a B2B SaaS isn't about adding random features or bombarding users — it's about systematically guiding users to do more of the things that matter for them and for your business.

You can implement some quick fixes to see an immediate uptick, but also plan for engagement to be woven into the product's DNA through long-term thinking.

Key takeaways and action steps

• Identify your North Star action: Pinpoint the core user action(s) that most closely link to revenue (e.g. a certain usage volume, key feature use, or invites sent) and make it your primary success metric.
• Onboard users to value fast: Design your first-run experience so that new users perform that key action early on and experience its value within minutes.
• Use prompts and reminders wisely: Reach out at the right moments (via in-app messages or email) to pull users back to valuable actions, but keep the focus on helping them, not nagging.
• Remove barriers to engagement: Continuously polish your UX around key actions. Every unnecessary field, click, or confusion point you remove can increase usage.
• Encourage team/network effects: Prompt users to invite others or share content when it fits. More teammates or collaborators often lead to exponential growth in activity (and more potential revenue).
• Build long-term habits: Aim to become part of your users' routine. Think through engagement loops and continually deliver value that keeps them coming back.
• Align value with monetization: Let users get hooked on your product's core value (often via a free tier), then ensure that when they use it a lot, upgrading is the natural, easy choice.
• Iterate with data: Regularly analyze engagement metrics and user feedback to find improvement opportunities. Small, steady tweaks based on data will compound to major gains over time.

By focusing on meaningful engagement — getting users to take actions that genuinely help them and drive your revenue — you create a virtuous cycle. Users gain more value and achieve their goals, they stick around longer and use the product more, and that increased use translates into a healthier, growing business. Make it easy and rewarding for people to use your product more, and the revenue will follow.