\u200bImplementing an intentional customer lifecycle marketing program is how you fix that. By aligning your marketing efforts with each stage of the customer journey and sending hyper-personalized messages that meet users where they are, you can move beyond one-off transactions and build lasting, profitable relationships.<\/p>\n
In this guide, I\u2019ll show you how to build a customer lifecycle strategy<\/a> that reduces CAC, maximizes revenue, and turns your existing customers into your biggest growth channel.<\/p>\n \u200bIn PLG-led companies, the product does its own marketing. This means that the ways of personalizing your lifecycle campaigns must be rooted in your users\u2019 in-app behaviors and go in line with communication within the product.<\/p>\n Product marketers should set up personalized, JTBD-based sequences of conversational and product bumpers that guide users toward user journey milestones. The bumpers can appear inside the app (e.g., as interactive workflows with modals, tooltips<\/a>, checklists) or outside of it (emails, push notifications). And, all subsequent steps should trigger based on how the user interacts with both the product and the communication elements.<\/p>\n That\u2019s why I highly recommend using an all-in-one product platform. It will let you:<\/p>\n <\/p>\n There are four key lifecycle stages in the SaaS customer journey.<\/p>\n The evaluation stage, also known as the consideration stage, begins the moment a user signs up for a free or freemium account. They’re assessing whether your product actually solves their problems before making their first purchase.<\/p>\n Your goal at this stage is to get users to their first “Aha!” moment<\/a> and activation as fast as possible.<\/p>\n Most new customers won’t initiate action immediately after signing up. A well-timed welcome email sequence<\/a> keeps your product top of mind and nudges them toward activation.<\/p>\n I like to include a quick video in my welcome email, as that\u2019s the fastest way to show users what they can do next.<\/p>\n Zapier\u2019s onboarding campaign does this too. They welcome you with a 14-day learning path, a video, and links directly to helpful features:<\/p>\n After the initial welcome, if someone clicks into a specific feature<\/a>, you can send a targeted email that shows how to get more out of that specific feature.<\/p>\n For instance, if you click the \u201cTables\u201d feature on the Zapier web app, they follow up with an email explaining Tables, offering templates, and showing real workflows in action to support first-time customers:<\/p>\n This kind of behavior-driven messaging helps first-time customers see how your product fits into their real day-to-day work and keeps them moving forward.<\/p>\n \ud83d\udca1 Pro Tip: <\/strong>I strongly recommend using an integrated product adoption platform <\/a>that enables you to trigger omnichannel engagement flows across email, web and mobile to predefined user segments or tracked user behavior.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n I\u2019ve often used personalized interactive onboarding tours<\/a> to reduce time-to-value for users.<\/p>\n The keyword here is “personalized.”<\/strong><\/p>\n That means walking each user through the exact steps they need to reach their first meaningful outcome. You can also predict future behavior if you base these steps on the goals they shared during signup or in the welcome survey<\/a>. For instance, if users indicate they want to “automate repetitive tasks” versus “integrate multiple tools,” the tours should follow entirely different paths.<\/p>\n We worked with Impala<\/a> to build a tailored onboarding experience for<\/a> different customer lifecycle stages using Userpilot<\/a>. After implementation, there was a clear pattern where users who completed the walkthrough were twice as likely to activate. Impala\u2019s activation rate<\/a> had jumped from 23% to 46%.<\/p>\n \ud83d\udca1Action tip: <\/strong>Use our no-code editor to create interactive tours<\/a> quickly and real-time customer data to<\/a> improve user activation<\/a>. You can create multi-step flows, embed videos or images, and target users by segment<\/a> or behavior without writing a line of code.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n At the conversion stage, users are nearing the end of their trial or actively exploring your pricing page, so your marketing strategy must switch from education to persuasion.<\/p>\n Everything we send to users in the conversion stage as part of our lifecycle marketing efforts needs to be focused on two things: reinforcing value and creating urgency.<\/p>\n I’d suggest running a targeted lifecycle email marketing<\/a> sequence 3 days before the trial ends. You don\u2019t want to send \u201cjust reminders.\u201d Instead, I like to create emails that tell users what they\u2019d lose out on if they don\u2019t upgrade.<\/p>\n That could mean including personalized usage stats. Instead of saying \u201cyour trial is ending,\u201d I\u2019d send an email saying, \u201cYou\u2019ve automated 12 workflows this week. Don\u2019t lose them.\u201d Then add a clear, focused CTA to upgrade.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s an example from Zoho nudging potential buyers with their end-of-trial email<\/a>: Zoho lays out what features you\u2019ll lose, ties it directly to the plan change, and ends with a dead-simple upgrade button.<\/p>\n When users hesitate near the end of a trial, I send a short-term discount, something like 15% off if they upgrade within 48 hours. It gives them a reason to act.<\/p>\n I’ve tested email marketing, in-app messages, and banners. Push notifications work best. They\u2019re quick, noticeable, and easy to tie to in-product behavior.<\/p>\n I always personalize the message using customer data like name, plan, language, and what they\u2019ve done in the product.<\/p>\n \u200bUserpilot also offers templates to trigger upgrade offers based on real-time customer data, such as usage, plan, or trial status<\/p>\n \ud83d\udca1Pro Tip:<\/strong> I recommend setting frequency caps to respect quiet hours and prevent notification fatigue. For example, you might limit each user to no more than three push messages per day and configure your system to automatically hold all notifications between 10 PM and 7 AM in the user’s local time.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Once a user converts, I shift focus to retaining customers and maintaining strong customer engagement while giving them value throughout the customer lifecycle.<\/p>\n I work to find methods that reinforce their decision to upgrade, help them build habits inside the product<\/a>, and guide them toward deeper product adoption<\/a> over time.<\/p>\n One quick way, baked into our broader marketing strategy, is to send monthly usage summaries. These emails remind users what they\u2019ve accomplished and show the ROI they\u2019re getting from the product.<\/p>\n I\u2019ve also found that these emails add a bit of gamification, as users start wanting to beat their numbers from last month.<\/p>\n Grammarly\u2019s usage reports are a solid example of this in action:<\/p>\n The email highlights completed actions, improvement streaks, and comparisons to other users, making progress feel rewarding and driving increased customer engagement.<\/p>\n And these emails don\u2019t need to be long or fancy. What matters is that they surface real results and build momentum for further usage.<\/p>\n Just because someone hasn\u2019t logged in recently doesn\u2019t mean they\u2019re gone for good. With the right message, you can still pull them back in. And re-engagement emails are a great way to start.<\/p>\n These emails work best when they do three things to engage customers:<\/p>\n Here\u2019s what that looks like in practice:<\/p>\n What I like about this format is how it offers multiple re-entry points: a help center for users who got stuck, an article for skeptics, and a direct upgrade CTA for potential customers who might already be sold.<\/p>\n No matter why they stopped using the product, each option provides a clear path back, showing users why they should return rather than just asking them to.<\/p>\n The more features customers adopt, the more embedded your product becomes in their workflows. That\u2019s what makes your product sticky<\/a> and builds lasting customer loyalty.<\/p>\n But the challenge is that most users experience feature blindness<\/em> across the customer life cycle, a phenomenon where people use the same 2\u20133 features and ignore the rest.<\/p>\n Cleeng<\/a> experienced this pain when a UI tweak buried its \u201cCustomer History\u201d tab, and usage collapsed by 92%. With Userpilot tooltips<\/a> and advanced analytics tools, the team highlighted the tab and regained 75% of the lost traffic within days.<\/p>\n \u201cWe decided to draw more attention to the feature tab with a tooltip\u2026 Even with many users dismissing the tooltip, the page visits still increased.\u201d – <\/em>Anna Sobiak, Product Designer at<\/a> Cleeng<\/p><\/blockquote>\n To make sure your users don\u2019t miss features, I\u2019d recommend turning every new release into a chance to re-engage people and guide them into a new habit.<\/p>\n Here\u2019s how we do feature announcement emails<\/a>:<\/p>\n Instead of just a \u201cHey, there\u2019s a new feature\u201d email, we spell out exactly what the user can accomplish with the feature. In this case, the session replay feature<\/a> helps users watch real user sessions and spot friction points and bugs. Such messaging helps users connect the feature to their day-to-day problems.<\/p>\n But email alone isn\u2019t enough.<\/p>\n Once users return to the product, reinforce the feature with in-app messages. You can trigger the tooltips or announcements when the user lands in a relevant section of the product.<\/p>\n Advocacy is the final stage where your most valuable customers become brand champions. Users in this stage already love<\/em> your product and make repeat purchases.<\/p>\n Your goal is to give these users an easy way to share. There are two reliable ways to do that: incentivized referrals and well-timed review requests.<\/p>\n Referral programs work because they tap into natural behavior. If a repeat customer is getting value, they\u2019re likely already talking about it. Your job is to make sharing easier and more rewarding.<\/p>\n A good referral program<\/a> does three things:<\/p>\n Dropbox\u2019s referral system is a textbook example. It rewards users with free storage and immediately celebrates their contribution with a thank-you email:<\/p>\n If you\u2019re building something similar, make sure users can share in just one or two clicks. The easier it is, the more likely they are to do it again.<\/p>\n User reviews influence buying decisions more than most carefully-crafted promotional marketing campaigns ever will. But great reviews don\u2019t appear automatically. You have to ask for it, and do it right.<\/p>\n One reliable trigger is NPS data<\/a>. If a user gives you a 9 or 10, they\u2019ve already told you they\u2019re happy. That\u2019s the moment to ask for a review<\/a>.<\/p>\n The best customer lifecycle marketing campaigns share a few common elements. In this guide, I share the elements that turn signups into paying customers.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":64,"featured_media":297108,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"content-type":"","inline_featured_image":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7194],"tags":[1682,205,5041,7238,7239,7237,203],"class_list":["post-297107","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lifecycle-marketing","tag-customer-lifecycle","tag-customer-lifecycle-marketing","tag-customer-lifecycles","tag-how-to-build-a-customer-lifecycle-strategy","tag-lifecycle-marketing","tag-lifecycle-marketing-strategies","tag-saas-lifecycle-marketing"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n\u200bHow lifecycle marketing works in PLG companies<\/h2>\n
\n
![\"Run](\"https:\/\/blog-static.userpilot.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/omnichannel-lifecycle-marketing-campaigns-userpilot_2fec8bad13bbdaa15d00e5b89dc3001c_800.png)
<\/picture><\/figure>\nLifecycle marketing tactics for every stage of the SaaS journey<\/h2>\n
\n
Evaluation stage campaigns<\/h3>\n
Trigger a welcome email sequence to help users get started<\/h4>\n
![\"Zapier\u2019s](\"https:\/\/blog-static.userpilot.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/zapier-welcome-email_5aa60d5be584a2e8a0901512a0d495ea_800.png)
<\/picture>![\"Zapier\u2019s](\"https:\/\/blog-static.userpilot.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/zapier-follow-up-email_372cc2b1960b64d6f508a7e1787a0880_800.png)
<\/picture>![\"Trigger](\"https:\/\/blog-static.userpilot.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/trigger-omnichannel-engagement-flows_11fd7a8ff9bc788f4a36e37e8d47b372_800.png)
<\/picture><\/figure>\nLaunch a personalized interactive tour to activate first-time users<\/h4>\n
![\"Impala\u2019s](\"https:\/\/blog-static.userpilot.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/impala-onboarding-flow_37ed0dbc0880fcb4e39b1abd174a4c47_800.png)
<\/picture>![\"Userpilot\u2019s](\"https:\/\/blog-static.userpilot.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/userpilot-builder-personalized-onboarding_cc3fdfc7d3d9cc35dbec15915e62539b_800.png)
<\/picture><\/figure>\nConversion stage campaigns<\/h3>\n
Send end-of-trial emails to invoke loss aversion<\/h4>\n
![\"Zoho](\"https:\/\/blog-static.userpilot.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/zoho-email-campaigns_a54cecb652e90be165fe3e88c66cf7b9_800.png)
<\/picture>Offer time-sensitive offers to encourage upgrades<\/h4>\n
![\"Mobile](\"https:\/\/blog-static.userpilot.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/userpilot-mobile-push-notifications_3f018cabad0f6a0b68a56d0875ed23b6_800.png)
<\/picture>Retention stage campaigns<\/h3>\n
Send monthly product usage reports to reinforce value<\/h4>\n
![\"Grammarly](\"https:\/\/blog-static.userpilot.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/grammarly-weekly-insights-email_704344b5a245222af2f331abc4dd64c9_800.png)
<\/picture>Re-engagement campaigns prevent churn<\/h4>\n
\n
![\"Eversign](\"https:\/\/blog-static.userpilot.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/eversign-support-team-email_8defdff653833f31cee3adbf942a4868_800.png)
<\/picture>Announce new features to deepen product adoption<\/h4>\n
![](\"https:\/\/blog-static.userpilot.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/userpilot-feature-announcement-email_e0f8a25a86aad0a3afac8ff5ef28913b_800.png)
<\/picture><\/figure>\nAdvocacy stage campaigns<\/h3>\n
Implement loyalty and referral programs<\/h4>\n
\n
![\"](\"https:\/\/blog-static.userpilot.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/dropbox-referral-system-email_424107375073e2cc99e91a62d4bd4200_800.png)
<\/picture>Prompt power users to leave reviews and testimonials<\/h4>\n
![\"Create](\"https:\/\/blog-static.userpilot.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/userpilot-in-app-messages_4a79201c01948ed82810f02242ec0a96_800.png)
<\/picture><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"