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Growth idea action plan

Superhuman onboarding notes as product backlog

Turn each live onboarding into a structured product-research session with feature requests, bugs, friction points, and follow-up promises captured immediately.

uncommon tacticlow budget

Why this can grow a startup

Analytics can show where a user stops, but it rarely shows the sentence they say right before losing trust. In Superhuman’s early days, onboardings ran up to 90 minutes: discovery first, then guided setup while the team captured every request, bug, and friction point. It was common to leave with ten pages of notes plus several bugs and feature requests. That turns onboarding from labor into a learning engine. It also lets the team close loops later, which makes early customers feel heard instead of processed.

Company example

Superhuman used early onboarding sessions to collect workflow notes, product requests, bugs, and unnoticed friction, often producing ten pages of notes from a single customer conversation.

Source and metric

Source: First Round Review: Superhuman Onboarding Playbook · Browse First Round Review: Superhuman Onboarding Playbook tactics

Early sessions commonly generated 10 pages of notes, 5-10 feature requests, and 5-10 bugs to fix before the next onboarding.

Customer ResearchActivationProductcustomer researchonboardingproduct feedbackretention
GrowthDex operator note

When to use it

Use this when Customer Research, Activation, Product is relevant to customer research, onboarding, product feedback and you can run a bounded test with a low budget.

When not to use it

Do not use it as a substitute for customer evidence, a clear owner, or a measurable stop condition. Local platform rules and market behavior still need checking.

Founder checklist

  1. Read First Round Review: Superhuman Onboarding Playbook and identify what is directly supported.
  2. Choose one channel context: Customer Research, Activation, Product.
  3. Define the test around Early sessions commonly generated 10 pages of notes, 5-10 feature requests, and 5-10 bugs to fix before the next onboarding..
  4. Set an owner, evidence window, and stop condition before launch.

Explore the context

Advisory bridge

Apply this with an operator

Choose product surfaces that compound distribution without hiding weak activation or retention.

Work with Ian