Struggling to figure out why users bail during onboarding? You’re not alone. Most onboarding flows look good on paper, but real users end up lost, frustrated, or just… gone. If you’re using FullStory, you’ve got a goldmine of session recordings that show exactly what’s going wrong—but only if you know how to dig in and make sense of them.
This guide is for product folks, UX designers, and anyone tired of guessing what’s breaking in their onboarding. No fluff—just practical steps to actually use session recordings to fix things.
1. Get Your Bearings: Set Up FullStory for Onboarding Analysis
Before you dive in, make sure FullStory is tracking what you need:
- Verify recording is enabled: This sounds obvious, but double-check that FullStory is capturing sessions for your onboarding pages.
- Tag key events: Set up custom events for important onboarding steps—like “Started onboarding,” “Completed profile,” or “Skipped tutorial.” This makes filtering recordings way easier.
- Identify users: If possible, pass user IDs or emails to FullStory. Otherwise, you’ll be watching a sea of anonymous sessions, which gets old fast.
Pro tip: Don’t tag every possible click. Focus on the moments that matter in onboarding. Too much noise just makes analysis harder.
2. Find the Right Sessions: Filtering Without Losing Your Mind
You don’t want to watch hundreds of random recordings. Here’s how to zero in:
- Use event filters: Search for sessions where users started onboarding but didn’t finish. Or, find those who dropped off at a specific step.
- Look at rage clicks and dead clicks: FullStory flags when users click repeatedly out of frustration or click on unresponsive areas. Both are gold for spotting UX landmines.
- Segment by new users: Filter sessions to only show new signups or people in their first session. These are your onboarding guinea pigs.
What to ignore: Don’t waste time watching sessions from power users or customer support reps. You want real new user struggles, not edge cases.
3. Watch Sessions Like a Detective—Not a Tourist
It’s tempting to just sit back and “see what happens,” but you’ll get more out of recordings if you watch with purpose:
- Focus on patterns, not one-offs: One confused user doesn’t mean your UI is broken. If you see the same stumble five times, that’s a real issue.
- Watch for hesitation and backtracking: Does a user hover, scroll up and down, or leave a form half-filled? These are clues that something’s unclear or scary.
- Listen for the “aha” (or the “uh…”): Pay attention to when users finally get it—or when they give up and leave.
Pro tip: Take notes as you watch. Jot down time stamps and what you’re seeing. Otherwise, it all blurs together after a while.
4. Identify the Real Problems (Not Just Annoyances)
Session recordings are great for empathy, but don’t get sidetracked by every small hiccup:
- Prioritize blockers over annoyances: If a confusing button makes users pause but they still finish onboarding, that’s less urgent than a bug that sends them packing.
- Watch for drop-offs: Where do users bail entirely? These spots deserve serious attention.
- Ignore “user error” excuses: If five people miss your call-to-action, it’s not “bad users”—it’s a bad design.
What doesn’t work: Trying to fix everything at once. Focus on the biggest friction points first.
5. Turn Observations into Actionable Fixes
All the recordings in the world won’t help if they just sit in a doc somewhere. Here’s how to drive real change:
- Clip and share: FullStory lets you make short clips of key moments. Use these in Slack, Notion, or Jira to show your team exactly what’s happening.
- Pair with quantitative data: Back up what you see with numbers. If you notice confusion on step 3, pull funnel data to see how many are dropping there.
- Brainstorm simple fixes: Don’t overthink it. Sometimes adding a “Skip” link or clarifying a label does the trick.
- Iterate and re-watch: After you launch a fix, watch new sessions to see if things actually improve. Don’t assume—it’s easy to miss if a tweak backfires.
Pro tip: Keep a running list of “onboarding fails” with links to actual recordings. This comes in handy for product meetings (and for reminding folks that “users just don’t read” isn’t a strategy).
6. What’s Worth Your Time—and What Isn’t
FullStory’s recordings are useful, but they’re not magic:
- What works: Spotting real user confusion, dead ends, and points where people give up. Great for empathy and prioritizing fixes.
- What doesn’t: Overanalyzing every single click or expecting recordings to tell you why someone is confused. Sometimes people just get distracted.
- Don’t bother with: Watching hours of “successful” sessions. Focus on failures and friction.
If you’re short on time, start with rage clicks and drop-offs. These are usually the quickest wins.
7. Common Pitfalls and How to Avoid Them
A few traps to dodge:
- Analysis paralysis: Don’t get bogged down watching endless sessions. Set a timebox—analyze 10-15, then act.
- Fixating on outliers: Not every weird behavior is your fault. Look for trends.
- Assuming intent: You see the what, not always the why. Pair recordings with user interviews if you really want to understand.
8. Keep It Simple: Build a Habit, Not a Project
The best teams bake session review into their weekly routine. It’s not a one-and-done thing. Just a few regular check-ins can catch new issues before they become big problems.
- Set a recurring calendar slot to review the latest onboarding recordings with your team.
- Share the worst offenders (clips, not just words) so everyone feels the pain.
- Don’t wait for a “big release” to check in—onboarding is often where small changes break stuff.
Wrap-Up: Don’t Overthink It—Just Start Watching
Session recordings in FullStory aren’t a silver bullet, but they’re the best way to see what’s actually happening in your onboarding. Filter for the right sessions, watch with purpose, and focus on the biggest pain points. Don’t try to fix everything at once—chip away, test your changes, and keep it simple. Over time, you’ll build an onboarding experience that actually works for real users—not just the ones in your test scripts.