--- title: "How to Reduce Time to Value in SaaS | Utkarsh Panwar" description: "What time to value (TTV) is, how to measure it, and how to reduce time to value in SaaS by timing the waits in onboarding and cutting them first." url: https://www.utkarshdesign.com/guides/reduce-time-to-value author: Utkarsh Dhairya Panwar updated: 2026-10-08 --- # How to reduce time to value in SaaS Guide · 7 min read · By [Utkarsh Dhairya Panwar](https://www.utkarshdesign.com/about) · Updated 8 Oct 2026 **Time to value (TTV) is how long a user takes to reach the first result they signed up for. To reduce it, I time a fresh signup to that result, split it into doing and waiting, and cut waits first: in B2B, usually permissions, environment setup and an unclear finish.** ## What time to value is, and how to measure it TTV = timestamp of the value event minus timestamp of signup. The value event is the same one you use for activation, such as a first review on a real pull request in a code review tool. What TTV adds is the clock. Two products can activate the same share of signups, and the one that gets there in ten minutes will keep more people than the one that takes three days. - Use the median across a cohort. A few accounts that come back three weeks later will drag an average out of shape. - Track the share who never arrive. They don't appear in the median at all, so a falling TTV can hide a rising number of people who gave up. - Stop the clock at value. A short onboarding checklist can end before anything useful has happened. Time to first value (TTFV) pins the clock to the very first result. Plain TTV is sometimes used for the longer wait until a customer gets the full value they bought. For onboarding work, the first one is the clock that matters. ## Time it yourself before you trust a dashboard Analytics can tell you the gap between signup and the value event. It can't tell you what filled that gap. For that I do it by hand: a new account, a stopwatch and a notes file, once for each kind of person who signs up. 1. **Pick the finish line**: The first result the user came for. For a code review tool that's a review on a real pull request. A connected repo is only a step on the way. 2. **Pick the personas**: At least an admin signing up alone, a non-admin from a company org, and someone on a self-hosted or enterprise setup if you support one. 3. **Log every pause**: Each time you stop, write down why: reading docs, waiting for an email, needing a permission, waiting for a sync, unsure what to do next. 4. **Split doing from waiting**: Add up the minutes you spent clicking and typing, and separately the minutes you were blocked. The second number is the one to attack. The non-admin run is the one that surprises teams. The founder or PM who built the flow is an admin everywhere, so they've never seen the version most of their trial users see. ## A waits log, filled in for a typical devtool | Wait | Who it hits | What it looks like | Typical fix | | --- | --- | --- | --- | | Another person's permission | Non-admins in company orgs | An install or authorise screen they can't complete | A hand-off: request the admin from inside the product | | Environment-specific setup | Self-hosted and enterprise users | One long doc that covers every platform at once | One guided path per platform, with a short video | | Waiting for real activity | Everyone on a quiet day | Nothing to show until the next pull request or event | Run on something that already exists, or show sample output clearly labelled | | Not knowing it worked | Everyone | Setup finishes and the screen looks the same | A visible success state, with what to expect next | | Coming back tomorrow | People who signed up mid-task | They leave and never return | An email triggered by the exact step they stopped at | Almost nothing in this table is a slow screen. When I map TTV, the delay sits in waits: for a teammate, an approval, a sync, or the user coming back. So a long TTV is often an organisational problem (approvals, procurement) before it's a UI one. ## Three cuts, in the order I'd try them 1. **Move the wait to someone who can end it**: You can't remove an admin from the process, and you shouldn't try. You can shorten the gap between "I'm blocked" and "the admin knows": let the blocked user email the admin or share an invite link from inside the product. At CodeAnt AI this one change cut drop-off at the repo-connection step by 40%. 2. **Give each environment its own path**: If setup differs by platform, don't make every reader filter one long doc. Ask which platform they're on, then show only those steps, numbered, with the exact field names they'll be asked for. 3. **Fewer steps, and a visible finish line**: Ask of each step whether the user needs it before the first result, or whether the backend does. Team name, role, plan choice and notification settings can usually wait. Then make the end of setup look different from the middle, so people know they've arrived. ![Before: CodeAnt docs page for self-hosted Azure DevOps pull request review, with sidebar navigation, numbered steps and an embedded Azure screenshot](https://www.utkarshdesign.com/images/vSEIhJhnwDQQxTA3aEd7PUqnTio.webp) _Cut two, before: a reference page doing a setup wizard's job._ ![After: guided self-hosted setup with a Configure Application Details video on the left and step 4 of 4 asking for GitLab URL, Client ID and Client Secret](https://www.utkarshdesign.com/images/codeant-self-hosted-after.webp) _Cut two, after: one platform, one step at a time, with a video beside the form._ All three came from the same project. The trial-to-paid guide has the full sequence and the results of each change. [Doubling trial-to-paid at CodeAnt](https://www.utkarshdesign.com/guides/how-we-doubled-trial-to-paid): The admin wall, the guided self-hosted setup, the shorter flow and the trial emails. ## What not to cut - Permission screens. Explain them better, but don't hide what the product will access. Developers and security reviewers notice. - The choice between environments. A SaaS or self-hosted toggle at the door costs one click and keeps people off the wrong path. - Real data, when sample data would mislead. A fake security report can make the real one look like a regression, and the clock should stop on the user's own result anyway. If you'd like someone else to run the stopwatch method on your product, with the non-admin path included, that's the first week of the onboarding audit. ## Questions people ask ### What's the difference between time to value and time to first value? Time to first value is how long until the first real result. Time to value is often used for the same thing, and sometimes for the longer wait until the customer gets the full benefit they bought. ### What is a good time to value? Shorter than the attention span of the person trying the product. For a self-serve tool that usually means the same session; for enterprise software with procurement, it can be weeks. Compare each release against your own last one. ### Does a product tour reduce time to value? Rarely on its own. Tours add reading time, and most of the delay I find is waiting on permissions, setup or data, which a tour can't touch. ### Who owns time to value, product or customer success? Both. Product owns the self-serve path to first value. Customer success owns the longer path for accounts that need setup help, and the two should agree on the same value event. ## Sources 1. [Requesting a GitHub App from your organization owner](https://docs.github.com/en/apps/using-github-apps/requesting-a-github-app-from-your-organization-owner), GitHub Docs 2. [Roles in an organization](https://docs.github.com/en/organizations/managing-peoples-access-to-your-organization-with-roles/roles-in-an-organization), GitHub Docs ## Working on this? Tell me what you're building and where it's stuck: [book a 30-minute call](https://cal.com/utkarsh-design/30min), email [work@utkarshdesign.com](mailto:work@utkarshdesign.com) or [send a brief](https://www.utkarshdesign.com/contact). ## Related - [How to define an activation metric](https://www.utkarshdesign.com/guides/activation-metric) - [Team invite and admin approval flows for B2B products](https://www.utkarshdesign.com/guides/team-invite-flow) - [How we doubled trial-to-paid at CodeAnt](https://www.utkarshdesign.com/guides/how-we-doubled-trial-to-paid) - [SaaS onboarding and activation UX audit](https://www.utkarshdesign.com/services/saas-onboarding-audit) --- Utkarsh Dhairya Panwar, Founding Product Designer and Design Engineer (IIT Roorkee; Founding Designer at CodeAnt AI, YC W24). Email: work@utkarshdesign.com · Book a call: https://cal.com/utkarsh-design/30min · Hire: https://www.utkarshdesign.com/hire · About: https://www.utkarshdesign.com/llms.txt