Substack Why Most SaaS Churn Is Caused by 2 Predictable Events
80% of SaaS churn comes from poor onboarding & champion loss. Here’s why it happens and how to fix it before it’s too late.
In a 2024 SaaS Capital study, 80% of preventable churn traced back to just two causes: poor onboarding and loss of the customer champion.
They know it in theory — but most teams still overinvest in last-minute renewal saves and underinvest in proactive onboarding.
Here’s why this matters, and what recent real-world examples show.
1. Failure to Successfully Onboard
When new customers sign up, excitement is at its peak. That’s when they’re most willing to put in the time to learn your product. Miss that window, and you’ll rarely get their full attention again.
In 2024, Asana overhauled its onboarding to focus on outcome-driven templates, in-app guidance, and clear “first success” milestones. This reduced the time for new teams to start collaborating and led to a significant increase in free-to-paid conversion rates. The improvement came from focusing less on showing features and more on getting customers to business value quickly.
What works:
- Move retention focus to the first 30 days, not the last 30 before renewal.
- Measure business benefits delivered, not just logins. Usage without value is a false signal.
- Intervene immediately when onboarding satisfaction or activation scores are low.
2. Loss of the Champion
Your champion — the person who fought to get your product adopted — is your strongest internal ally. If they leave or change roles, your renewal odds drop sharply.
Dropbox studied enterprise accounts and found churn risk spiked when the original buying champion left. In accounts where the Dropbox team proactively built relationships with multiple stakeholders early, retention rates were meaningfully higher. The takeaway: relying on a single point of contact leaves you exposed.
What works:
- Include “champion in role?” as part of your Customer Health Check.
- Treat champion loss like a fresh sales cycle — identify and re-sell to the new decision-maker quickly.
- Incentivize customer success or account managers for these “re-sell” saves, even if no new revenue is booked.
The Takeaway
These two churn drivers are predictable and measurable — yet many SaaS teams wait until renewal to act.
Get onboarding right from day one, and plan for inevitable champion turnover, and you’ll protect far more revenue than any last-minute discount ever could.