How to Increase Monthly Active Users (MAU) for Your SaaS
To understand how to increase Monthly Active Users, a SaaS company needs to define what activity should be considered as user engagement with the software. This is achieved by the monitoring of unique people who engage with the main components of the system in a 30-day period, which is referred to as MAU. This makes the evaluation of whether the sign-ups are due to a buzz around the product, or whether there is actual interest in the product.
This guide outlines a strategy that seeks to influence static sign-ups to become a more dynamic user base by means of routine engagement.
Self-Assessment: Choosing Your Approach
Before giving effect to these technical changes, these questions can help in making decision on the approach to take so far as the product is deployed is concerned.
- Is the product in use ever so often or just a few times? If the tool is used constantly, then the ‘stickiness’ ratio should be calculated (Calculated as $DAU / MAU$). You can use a DAU/MAU ratio calculator.
- Where is the depletion occurring? A customer churn analysis helps to understand if users leave after one day (onboarding issue) or after 20 days (value depth issue).
- Is the use of the product mandatory or optional? If mandatory, then the focus is on completing the task, whereas if it is optional, then the focus is on creating a habit.
Establish Value-Based Activity Benchmarks
Using a simple user log-in as the sole measure of ‘monthly active user’ may lead to metrics that don’t entirely represent business conditions. Consider focusing on “the Core Action“, defined as an event where a user receives the intended value for their payment. In the case of an invoicing tool, the core action is ‘invoice sent’; in the case of a CRM, it is ‘lead added’.
This way of setting goals helps in understanding how many users find what is sometimes referred to as the ‘Aha!’ moment within the platform.
|
SaaS Category |
Example Core Action for MAU |
Healthy MAU/Seat Ratio |
Product Adoption Rate |
|
Microlearning |
Completed one 2-minute lesson |
40% – 60% |
High |
|
CRM / Sales |
Added a new lead or updated a deal |
30% – 50% |
Moderate |
|
Invoicing |
Sent at least one invoice |
15% – 25% |
Moderate |
|
Compliance |
Finished a mandatory module |
60% – 80% |
High (Seasonal) |
According to OpenView’s 2022 SaaS Benchmarks, companies aligning their MAU definition with user success, rather than solely session counts, observe a correlation with faster perceived value.
Free MAU Optimization Checklist
Grow your SaaS monthly active user base and improve retention with this actionable MAU framework and engagement checklist.
-
A list of dunning and recovery strategies
-
Types of interactive onboarding flows
-
Examples of DAU/MAU "stickiness" targets
-
Step-by-step payment friction audit
-
And more!
Eliminate Payment Friction and "Silent Churn"
Silent churn indicates when users want to continue using the service but are not able to due to some technical issues in the background. One of the reasons for this might be that the user’s credit card does not work in the country where the service is provided, or the payment processing system sets too strict fraud restrictions on cross-border payments, or the global compliance issues are not satisfied with the payment process. This leads to immediate drops in MAU, and the user becomes “inactive” despite having the intent to pay.
Banks may sometimes block international transactions if local routing is not considered. Different regions require specific tax handling, such as VAT in the EU or Sales Tax in the US. For example, non-compliance with PSD2 regulations in Europe can be associated with increased decline rates. This can lead to involuntary churn due to failed payments, accounting for an estimated 20% to 40% of subscriber departures.
By providing more than 100 local payment methods and using them to aggregate payments across borders, we increase the number of users who do not leave the app due to billing issues.
Free MAU Optimization Checklist
Grow your SaaS monthly active user base and improve retention with this actionable MAU framework and engagement checklist.
-
A list of dunning and recovery strategies
-
Types of interactive onboarding flows
-
Examples of DAU/MAU "stickiness" targets
-
Step-by-step payment friction audit
-
And more!
Implement Functional Multi-Stage Onboarding
Onboarding should be seen as a multi-phased process that grows together with the user’s level of expertise. The goal is to shorten the Time-to-Value (TTV) to enable product utility at an earlier stage.
- In primary onboarding, the aim is to provide the user with an initial beneficial outcome relatively quickly.
- In secondary onboarding, advanced features are introduced only after the user has mastered the basics.
Use a ‘Checklist’ or ‘Progress Bar’. The user experience team at Userpilot has confirmed an increase in the activation rate of new users of Kontentino by more than 10% through the introduction of guided steps and checklists that walk users through the process of creating their first post schedule. Check the case study here.
Free MAU Optimization Checklist
Grow your SaaS monthly active user base and improve retention with this actionable MAU framework and engagement checklist.
-
A list of dunning and recovery strategies
-
Types of interactive onboarding flows
-
Examples of DAU/MAU "stickiness" targets
-
Step-by-step payment friction audit
-
And more!
Deploy Interactive In-App Guidance and Nudges
It is a common observation that documentation during a live session may not contribute significant value. Interactive tutorials employ a different strategy in which relevant tooltips are displayed only when the user engages with the relevant object, acquiring understanding in the process of performing the task.
This approach may correlate with a decrease in perceived cognitive effort and feelings of being overwhelmed.
The following strategies can influence user onboarding and early value realization:
- Contextual Nudges: If a user has not used a particular feature (such as ‘Reporting’) in the last 14 days, showcase its benefits using a short video box.
- Learning by Doing: Interactive step-through takes the user through the process, which research suggest may influence new feature adoption rate compared to simply watching a static video.
- TTV Metric: It should be 24 hours or less. There appears to be a correlation between not achieving a ‘win’ within the first 24 hours and a reduced probability of a user becoming a monthly active user.
Free MAU Optimization Checklist
Grow your SaaS monthly active user base and improve retention with this actionable MAU framework and engagement checklist.
-
A list of dunning and recovery strategies
-
Types of interactive onboarding flows
-
Examples of DAU/MAU "stickiness" targets
-
Step-by-step payment friction audit
-
And more!
Automate Subscription Recovery and Exit Surveys
To keep your product alive and well represented among active users, you should have a policy for handling retried payments and learning from those who leave. One approach is to use an automated dunning management system, which involves sending reminders wisely and trying the card again at the right time, to maintain the number of MAU.
- Smart Retry Strategy: Increase by 15% the profitability of transactions that are declined by retrying the card during different ‘payday’ periods.
- Exit Surveys: When a user leaves, ask the reason. The presence of subscription fatigue or the absence of a feature are potential explanations.
Leadpages uses exit polls to remind users about the information that will be lost, and in most cases, win back the business by offering a ‘Pause’ or ‘grandfathered’ option.
- Retention Offers: Rather than letting them go, offer to pause the subscription or move them to a different tiered pricing plan.
Conclusion
Increasing Monthly Active Users is a process in which the user’s value is defined, the user is shown the way in which the value can be provided, and all the frictions that lead to churn, be it technical or financial, are removed. Through the optimization of global payments, you can avoid ‘silent churn’ before it starts.
It is necessary to monitor the main activities and be ready to make adjustments if the product becomes less relevant or takes a background position in the customer’s activities.
FAQ
-
A unique login counts all the people who have visited your app as one single person, while active users are the people who have performed some form of action that is relevant and valuable. To obtain the correct MUA, it is necessary to define activity a meaningful interaction, such as creating a report or sending a message, instead of just being a passive session.
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In B2B SaaS, a reasonable account turnover rate is between 10% and 20%, which implies that only a fifth of users actively use the tool. If the ratio is more than 20%, it usually means that the software is ‘mission critical’ and is fully integrated into the user’s professional processes.
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The term involuntary churn is used to describe when active users lose access to a product, potentially due to reasons like credit card expiration or location restrictions, impacting total churn by an average of 20-40%. These users are “silently” removed from your MAU, even though they have no intention to leave the platform, and this is one of the reasons why automated dunning and global payment optimization are important.
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While as acquisition adds to the total number, sustainable MAU depends on retention and re-engagement of existing users. If the churn is not fixed through better onboarding and features, your MAU will reach a ceiling point, no matter how many new users you bring in.
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TTM tracks the time it takes for a new user to reach the first “Aha! moment” or complete a significant action. Adopting such a strategy can help enhance the chances of keeping the trial user as a monthly active user in the long run. However, it is better to aim at reducing the time to less than 24 hours, or even better, 15 minutes, as the fastest way to get this kind of conversion.
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You should monthly check the raw MAU, but weekly monitor DAU/MAU or feature adoption rates. Such practices help you to quickly detect any sudden drop in the positioning trend in terms of conversion or activity, which may be due to technical issues or other factors, before they become a declining trend.
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A Merchant of Record helps in preventing users from leaving the platform in cases “cross-border” payment failures or lack of local tax compliance. A smooth global billing experience for users could influence their engagement in various regions by potentially mitigating administrative or financial friction.
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