It’s not just about getting new customers. It’s about keeping the ones you already have.
Onboarding Matters walks through the Orchestrated Onboarding® framework to transform this critical phase from a missed opportunity into your competitive advantage.
In Onboarding Matters, Donna Weber provides a step-by-step blueprint for orchestrating customer success from day one. Packed with practical guidance, detailed templates, and real examples from leading B2B companies—everything you need to immediately apply these strategies to your organization.
This is the systematic approach Donna uses with clients to move from reactive firefighting to proactive value delivery, creating competitive advantages that compound over time.
As someone with over 20 years of experience in customer-facing roles at B2B tech companies, I greatly enjoyed Onboarding Matters and learned a lot from it. Donna Weber provides a practical, insightful guide to creating structured onboarding processes that drive customer success and loyalty.
The book’s centerpiece is the Orchestrated Onboarding® framework, which consists of six clear and actionable phases: Embark, Handoff, Kickoff, Adopt, Review, and Expand. Each phase is designed to guide customers seamlessly from initial engagement to long-term growth. As Weber explains, when onboarding is done right, it not only reduces churn but also builds trust, drives product adoption, and creates loyal advocates for your brand.
What resonated with me most was Weber’s emphasis on the importance of aligning teams and setting clear expectations early in the customer journey. She also highlights the risks of neglecting onboarding, noting that it often leads to disengagement and lost opportunities.
As somone who has a team that oversees the onboarding process for our clients, this book has and continues to deliver value for us. While we had many elements of the ‘Orchestrated Onboarding’ process, it was neither orchestrated as it should have been or had all key elements. In my opinion, this is a must have book if you are in SaaS, deal with customers / clients, and /or play any role in onboarding customers.
The book provides tactical approaches to onboarding that can be implemented into your own organization. This is my favorite type of “work” book as it is an easy read, provides actionable insights, and can continue to be referenced for new ideas. Donna’s website also offers a ton of resources which are referenced in the book so check those out as well.
If you are a CS professional, your customer onboarding will always be in need of improvement. Knowing how to onboard quickly, in a way that delivers great experience and value for customers is an on-going challenge.
Donna’s book equips you with 3 key elements you need to make onboarding a priority:
Unlike other CS books, Donna shares tried and tested templates and playbooks that are ready to implement without the need for new tools or team specializations. In particular, her chapters on “Design Thinking Principles” and “How to Scale Customer Onboarding and Enablement” will inspire those who already have a good handle of onboarding and want to separate themselves from the pack. I would recommend this book to anyone in Customer Success, it has something for all levels and roles.
Let me start with the fact that I have been a follower of Donna Weber’s for a long time and have watched her mold a strategy into reality that she has kindly put together in an easy-to-follow framework that allows so many more of us to benefit from her guidance. The steps in the book are really designed to give the reader a path forward to customer success. The graphics are useful, and not just eye fluff. Each chapter guides you through the process of creating your own structure, and gives you ways to measure your own success. The more I read, the more notes I make about my own procedures and where I need to start asking some tougher questions of me, my team, and my leadership.
As Customer Success moves to the forefront in many organizations, it’s important to have a guide to help you through. This book is exactly that.
Thanks, Donna.
I love this book so much, it’s as applicable for a service based business as it is to a SAAS company. Donna explains why onboarding matters and how to incorporate it into everything you do, even when you are selling to ensure that your customers have a great experience. If your team struggles with onboarding, or if you’re in growth mode and need a better process, this book is the how to guide you need. I should also add that I did an Author Q&A with Donna after reading this book in a business book club and the value she provided and specific examples and visuals she shared were outstanding.
Schedule a confidential call with Donna today to determine your next best strategy to:
