Month 16 starts today. My trial activation rate is 35% and I've been ignoring it for 3 months.
Kicking off June with a Monday update that I've been putting off writing, because writing it means admitting I've been avoiding a number.
My Genie 007 trial activation rate is 35%.
That means 65% of people who sign up for a free trial never actually use the product. They sign up, maybe look at the download page, and disappear.
I've known this for 3 months. I've blamed it on various things: wrong positioning, wrong traffic source, landing page isn't clear enough. Some of that's probably true. But I've also just been avoiding it.
This week I'm dealing with it.
Here's what I'm building:
A 48-hour activation sequence. Two emails. First one at 24 hours: "Did you get stuck? Here's the one thing that trips people up." Second at 48 hours: "Still haven't had a chance? Here's the 2-minute setup." Not clever copy. Just addressing the real reasons people don't activate: they got confused, they got distracted, or they forgot.
My hypothesis: the product is fine. The onboarding gap is where I'm losing people. Voice AI has a higher adoption barrier than a SaaS dashboard because it requires a behaviour change, not just a login.
Last week in numbers:
- 47 cold emails out, 3 replies, 1 converted to trial
- 3 user calls, 2 feature requests logged, 1 bug fixed same day
- Revenue: +1 annual subscription, -1 churn. Net positive by £5
Nothing viral. Nothing broke. Just the grind.
This week's focus: the activation emails, and one partnership call on Wednesday with a SaaS productivity tool about a possible integration. If I move that 35% to even 45%, it's the highest-leverage thing I can do right now.
Genie 007 (genie007.co.uk) is the voice AI tool I'm building. Free trial if you want to kick it.
Anyone tracking activation rates willing to share their numbers? Curious what's considered normal for a tool requiring an app download vs a pure web SaaS.
