7-Step Client Onboarding Process: Workflow & Template

When you’re scaling up from the “scrappy startup” phase and growing your CS team beyond one or two people, there’s an obvious next step: build a client onboarding process.

What’s not so obvious is what happens after that.

You can consolidate the entirety of your CSM’s activities into a comprehensive client onboarding checklist and still find yourself with:

• Onboarding that drags on without clear accountability or progress tracking
• No way to tell if customers are engaging vs. just going through the motions
• Overwhelming trainings that dump everything on customers at once
• Tasks that get lost in the shuffle between slide decks and spreadsheets

If you're nodding along, it's time to replace that checklist with a systematic process.

We’ve put together a seven-step onboarding workflow with insights from senior CS leaders that most teams miss. 

If you’re ready to upgrade to an onboarding process that speeds up onboarding, gets customers to value faster, and delivers a more consistent experience—read on.

The ideal client onboarding process workflow

This onboarding workflow breaks the process into seven manageable phases, each designed to build on the previous one while keeping everyone aligned on goals and next steps.

Here’s a quick rundown:

1. Pre-onboarding
2. Kickoff & alignment
3. Success planning
4. Technical implementation and setup
5. Customer training and enablement
6. Validation and launch
7. Ongoing customer success

Read on for a detailed description of each step. But first, here’s a client onboarding process flow chart that puts everything into visual context.

1. Pre-onboarding

Is pre-onboarding full of administrative prep work? Yes. Is it largely invisible to the customer? Also yes. But since it’s where most user onboarding problems begin, it merits close attention and a careful process.

Here are the basics:

• ☐ Create and share internal handoff documents
• ☐ Assign Customer Success Manager to new client
• ☐ Conduct your internal sales-to-customer success handoff meeting
• ☐ Assign pre-kickoff homework (like your client intake form)

Here’s what you might be missing:

• ☐ Get your CSMs involved before closing deals
• ☐ Consider offering a proof of concept

Get your CSMs involved before closing deals

Why wait until the kickoff call to start building rapport with your customer success team? Pulling your CSMs into sales calls gives you multiple benefits:

• A smoother sales-to-success handoff since everyone’s already acquainted
• Faster onboarding since your CSM can offer technical expertise and a presales preview of the client onboarding experience
• More closed deals since you’re building confidence in the quality of your support team

Joseph Schmitt, VP of Customer Success at UpKeep, elaborates on why pulling CS in early is so powerful during presales:

“When we go into these new sales calls and we're pitching, we're essentially going in with the conversation that UpKeep is not just a software. The value that you get is the people in the process behind it.”

Consider offering a proof of concept

Without a free trial, customers have to take a tremendous leap of faith before signing up. That can deter sales. As Alexa Grabell of Pocus says on Dock’s Grow & Tell podcast:

“People don't want to just be guessing about what they're purchasing.”

Proof of concepts (POCs) lower perceived risk by demonstrating exactly how your product solves your customer’s specific problems.

POCs make sense when you need to:

• Build trust with risk-averse buyers
• Show technical buyers exactly how your tool integrates into their environment
• Demonstrate the value of data-heavy, visual solutions like dashboards

While POCs are primarily driven by the sales team, they often require CS involvement.

2. Kickoff & alignment

You already know kickoff calls are your best chance to get off on the right foot with new customers. Still, most CS teams fall into the trap of treating the kickoff as a step-by-step process walkthrough instead of using it to understand customer priorities, context, and constraints.

Here are the basics:

• ☐ Send welcome email and schedule kickoff call
• ☐ Create your kickoff call agenda (check out Dock’s customer success kickoff call template)
• ☐ Record and share kickoff meeting summary

Here’s what you might be missing:

• ☐ Create and share onboarding workspace before the call
• ☐ Use your kickoff call for alignment, not logistics
• ☐ Ask customers whether they prefer async or live communication

Create and share an onboarding workspace before the call

Most CS teams send a welcome email, schedule a kickoff call, and share a kickoff agenda ahead of time. It’s a solid start, but there’s no “wow” factor that makes an unforgettable first impression—and there’s nothing for customers to explore or get started on while they’re at the peak of their curiosity.

Brittany Soinski, Loom’s Manager of Onboarding, shows another way of doing things:

“The first thing we do is record a pre-watch Loom where we introduce them to the Dock workspace. We show them everything we're going to be going through during onboarding, and then we link the Dock template in our Loom call-to-action button.”

By using Dock to create a personalized onboarding workspace and sharing it before the call, customers have clear expectations upfront, your kickoff call is more focused, and the entire experience is more polished and professional.

Use your kickoff call for alignment, not logistics

Your kickoff call is not the place for a point-by-point review of the onboarding journey. Rather than boring customers with slide decks, center the conversation on understanding their world.

For example:

• Focus on understanding their day-to-day workflows and pain points
• Present directly from your onboarding hub instead of using PowerPoint
• Validate success criteria and stakeholders. This is the time to ask: "Are we still on the same page about what success looks like?" and "Do we have the right people in the room?"

Ask customers whether they prefer async or live communication

Async tools can help you speed up and scale your onboarding.

It’s not always the right fit. Enterprise customers often default to calls, and highly technical implementations sometimes need more real-time hand-holding. But plenty of users—like IT admins and startups—tend to prefer going through onboarding materials at their own pace.

To know what needs to be live and what can be async, you need to ask. The kickoff call is the perfect time.

3. Success planning

Use the success planning phase to paint a detailed picture of what success actually looks like for this specific customer's situation and timeline. It’s much harder to do this once the project has already gotten started, so make sure you don’t skip it.

Here are the basics:

• ☐ Create a timeline with key milestones
• ☐ Write an executive summary
• ☐ Identify stakeholders and assign deliverables
• ☐ Document the customer's tech stack and map out which systems need to connect

Here’s what you might be missing:

• ☐ Create a compelling vision for what success looks like
• ☐ Move beyond vague KPIs and set goals your customers care about
• ☐ Collaborate with customers on a shared success plan

Create a compelling vision for what success looks like

Brittany Soinski at Loom calls this her “secret weapon in customer success.” In addition to documenting your customer’s pain points and current challenges, you also want to create a vision for a future improved state that you will help them achieve.

Here’s how Brittany’s “team impact discovery” method works:

• It starts with asking, "What's a day in the life look like for somebody on your team?"
• Then ask, "Wave a magic wand. What would look different?"
• What are the blockers to change? Why haven’t they waved that metaphorical magic wand?
• Finally, ask "If we were to fast forward six months a year from now, what would allow you to say, 'Wow, using your tool made us super successful and got us to convert more of our prospects into customers'?"

With the answers to these questions in hand, you’ve got a compelling before/after vision, a meaningful foundation for your KPIs, and a powerful way to position your product during training sessions.

Move beyond vague KPIs and set goals your customers care about

The vision you set with your customer is your “North Star,” but you also need measurable sub-goals that prove you’re on the right path. Make sure they aren’t vague, and connect them to KPIs your customer actually cares about like product adoption rates, efficiency gains, cost reductions, or revenue impact tied to their business objectives.

Customers are busy. They won’t always have a list of KPIs in their back pocket. Be ready with a set of go-to KPIs that generally help companies improve, then hone in on the three that matter most to your customer.

Collaborate with customers on a shared success plan

On a well-designed kickoff call, you’ll talk about everything that goes into a success plan—big picture goals, key milestones, and mutual responsibilities.

Once you’ve agreed verbally, codify everything you’ve discussed into a shared success plan. Then, make it client-facing so both teams can contribute, track progress, and stay accountable on deadlines.

4. Technical implementation and setup

Getting your product technically implemented is only half the battle. The other half is making sure it actually gets adopted, which means integrating it into existing workflows and keeping momentum going with real-time tracking.

Here are the basics:

• ☐ Build a step-by-step implementation action plan
• ☐ Provide technical checklists for admin champions

Here’s what you might be missing:

• ☐ Help admins integrate your product into everyday workflows
• ☐ Use real-time progress tracking to stay on schedule

Help admins integrate your product into everyday workflows

Once the technical basics are complete—data migration, security setup, API integrations—it's tempting to declare victory and move on.

But even a perfectly implemented product can be completely ignored. While your change management efforts will do the heavy lifting to drive adoption, you can help during technical implementation by working with admins to embed your product into commonly used workflows.

Use real-time progress tracking to stay on schedule

To prevent your technical implementation timeline from going off the rails, use real-time progress tracking. When both teams can see tasks, dates, and bottlenecks, implementation naturally moves faster.

Accountability is a big part of what makes this work, says Noah Massucci of Robin:

“The fact you could tie [the project list] to the different stages and see, ‘Hey, you're halfway there’ or ‘You're three-quarters of the way there’ was so awesome because it helped our team track it, but more than anything, it helped the customer be on the same page with us and understand if we’re going to hit those goals and deadlines we had talked about in the kickoff.”

5. Training and enablement

Your onboarding flow needs to teach customers how to use your product and encourage product adoption. Usually, admins are the key to making sure both things happen.

Here are the basics:

• ☐ Create an onboarding hub
• ☐ Schedule training sessions for different user groups
• ☐ Share end-user resources like videos and tutorials

Here’s what you might be missing:

• ☐ Create “train the trainer” assets
• ☐ Break training into phases to avoid overwhelm
• ☐ Measure how users engage with your onboarding content

Create "train the trainer" assets

Your internal champions are your secret weapon for driving adoption, but they need the right tools to succeed. Give them ready-made resources to enable their teams.

As Brittany Soinski at Loom explains, “Our job in customer success is to package everything up really easily to help our admins, champions, and stakeholders to communicate this change effectively. It's much more effective coming from them than it is from us.”

Your train-the-trainer toolkit should include assets like:

• Email templates announcing the new tool to end users
• Slide decks explaining key features and benefits
• Quick reference guides and cheat sheets
• Internal presentation talking points

Break training into phases to avoid overwhelm

Everyone likes quick wins. No one wants to feel overwhelmed by a massive to-do list.

To give users the momentum they need to actually make it through your training, break your onboarding into manageable phases.

“We found that people were more likely to actually use the training if it was delivered in small chunks," says Will Yang, Head of Growth & Customer Success at Intrumentl. “This way, they could do one piece at a time and feel like they were making progress on their new skillset.”

Track how users engage with your onboarding content

If you send over a bunch of onboarding PDFs attached to an email, they’ll probably get forwarded around a few times and forgotten. Instead, use an onboarding hub (like Dock) to track engagement with your training resources and make sure real adoption is happening.

For Ingrid Murra, CEO of Two Front, tracking engagement is a core part of guiding her clients through the onboarding process:

“Now we can see if a [client] hasn't gone in there. We've connected Dock to our Slack channel, and we just get notified all day, every day, who's looking.
‘Oh, of course, you're not getting any results. You haven't even looked at this. You’ve gotta go into your portal and get rolling. Take a look at what we've provided there for you to get onboarded.’”

6. Validation and launch

Launch validation is your last chance to catch problems before they become support tickets. Verify functionality, monitor early usage, and stay close during those critical first days.

Here are the basics:

• ☐ Verify user access and permissions
• ☐ Run internal go-live review with onboarding, CS, and support teams
• ☐ Send launch announcement to the appropriate communication channels
• ☐ Monitor early usage closely

Here’s what you might be missing:

• ☐ Conduct user acceptance testing with end users (not just admins)
• ☐ Be respectively assertive so nothing falls through the cracks

Do user acceptance testing with end users (not just admins)

Your technical implementation might be perfect in your test environment, but real-world usage is different. Run comprehensive testing with your customer using their actual data, workflows, and edge cases to verify everything works as promised.

Focus your user acceptance testing (UAT) on the workflows that matter most to your customers' success metrics. Test and optimize with end users who will be using the system daily—not just the admins who configured it.

Be respectively assertive so nothing falls through the cracks

Launch validation is not the time to be overly accommodating about incomplete tasks. Respectfully hold the line on completing all critical onboarding steps.

Common things that slip through the cracks include incomplete user provisioning, missing integrations, and skipped training sessions. Don't assume these will get handled post-launch—they usually don't.

Madison Kochenderfer, Dock’s Customer Success Lead, uses personalized videos to send follow-ups and keep accountability high:

“I might give somebody a to-do item before we chat next. And I'll record a little Loom for a minute, just recapping why this is important and how to go about doing it so they don't even have to read an article. It's specific to them. I'm saying their name in it. It takes me one minute to record. I can do it between calls.”

7. Ongoing customer success

Will your customers become churn risks or happy, referral-generating success stories? The answer depends on whether you can deliver on your co-created success metrics, communicate the value of your product, and deepen your customer’s use of your product over time.

Here are the basics:

• ☐ Monitor product usage analytics
• ☐ Set up automated health score tracking
• ☐ Compare KPIs against your original success criteria
• ☐ Plan quarterly business reviews or regular check-ins
• ☐ Start renewal and expansion conversations early

Here’s what you might be missing:

• ☐ Collect customer feedback via reverse demos
• ☐ Transform your onboarding workspace into a dedicated client portal
• ☐ Get stickier by adding verticalized use cases over time

Collect client feedback via reverse demos

Skip the generic "how are things going?" check-ins and ask customers to show you exactly how they're using your product.

Reverse demos reveal the gap between what you trained them to do and what they're actually doing. These sessions help you identify possible case studies, spot workflow inefficiencies, and discover upsell opportunities.

Transform your onboarding workspace into a dedicated client portal

You might already have a dedicated client portal for ongoing customer success, but if it’s on a different platform than your onboarding hub, you’re adding unnecessary friction.

Using Dock’s connected workspace functionality, you can seamlessly turn your onboarding hub into a client management portal where you can embed dashboards, track ongoing progress toward your client’s goals, and manage renewals.

Get stickier by adding verticalized use cases over time

If your product has lots of potential use cases, you probably can’t—and shouldn’t—cover every application for every department during onboarding. Instead, start with general use cases and roll out persona-by-persona use cases in post-onboarding.

Monica Perez, Head of Customer Success at Notion, starts with a horizontal approach before going vertical:

“We focus quite a bit on our core bread and butter which is documentation, note taking and wiki... If we can nail that really well, then we do see the opportunity to go persona by persona and then get into more verticalized use cases per persona… What we try to do throughout the year is to showcase all the potential things you could be using for using Notion for today that you're not currently. Like, how can we create a roadmap to get you there?”

Considerations for your onboarding process

Every company's onboarding needs are different. To adapt this customer onboarding process for your specific situation, consider the following questions.

• How do you get the customer to value?
• Does onboarding start in sales?
• How easy is it to start using your product?
• Who are you onboarding?
• What resources do you have (or need)?
• What's the right balance between live and async work?
• How will you measure success?

Your answers should guide your entire onboarding approach, from the resources you offer to your timeline and success metrics.

For example:

If you don't offer free trials, buyer’s remorse is a bigger risk.

Free trial customers start self-onboarding before they buy, so your job is to build on existing momentum and create a seamless transition between sales and onboarding. Without trials, customers see your product for the first time after they purchase. 

That means your onboarding needs to demonstrate value quickly and validate what was promised during the sales process.

If your product is hard to use, plan for a high-touch approach.

Simple products can rely on knowledge bases and in-app notifications, but complex products need human guidance, product tours, and hands-on technical implementation. 

Plan for human-led onboarding along with a series of kickoff calls and working sessions.

If you're onboarding admins, focus on relationship-building and technical setup.

Provide “train the trainer” materials so your point of contact can get the rest of the organization on board fast. 

For end users, keep it simple with quick wins and role-specific training materials. Always onboard admins before end users and create separate onboarding tracks for each.

If you offer limited self-serve resources, expect more calls and longer timelines.

As you grow your resource library, you’ll streamline onboarding since customers can handle technical setup and training through self-service. Fewer resources mean more hands-on guidance, which naturally extends implementation timelines.

If you use an async-heavy approach, get obsessive about tracking onboarding engagement.

Async onboardings are a powerful way to shorten your onboarding timeline and can still be “white glove”—but only if you still provide an impeccable level of service. You need to anticipate client needs and understand where they hit roadblocks. 

With Dock, you can track workspace engagement, gauge how users are progressing, and see where they might need help.

Build an onboarding process that actually sticks with Dock

Every closed deal brings built-in excitement and urgency. Your customers just committed budget and time because they believe your solution will transform their business. A subpar customer onboarding strategy wastes that energy and makes it nearly impossible to provide the kind of customer experience that turns clients into enthusiastic advocates.

With Dock, you get a single collaborative workspace that eliminates the confusion of managing onboardings across spreadsheets, project management tools, and slide decks. 

Customers see exactly where they stand and what comes next, from pre-onboarding handoffs to ongoing success, while your CS team members get real-time visibility into engagement and can intervene before customers get stuck.

Ready to build a better customer onboarding experience? Get our free customer onboarding template or try Dock for free today.