# Adoption Lifecycle Concepts

## The Five Stages

```
ACQUISITION → ACTIVATION → ADOPTION → RETENTION → EXPANSION
```

### 1. Acquisition — "User has arrived"
**Owner:** go-to-market. **Boundary:** Everything before arrival is acquisition; after is activation.

### 2. Activation — "User completed first meaningful outcome"
**Owner:** product-adoption. The "aha moment." Metrics: activation rate, time-to-value.

### 3. Adoption — "User has formed a habit"
**Owner:** product-adoption. Product becomes regular workflow. Metrics: frequency, depth, feature discovery.

### 4. Retention — "User stays and returns"
**Shared:** product-adoption (adoption signals) + product-lifecycle-learning (churn analysis).

### 5. Expansion — "User deepens engagement"
**Owner:** product-adoption (feature discovery) + conditional-customer-success (account upsell).

## Why Distinguishing Matters

**Example 1:** Low retention → re-engagement campaign, but real problem is activation. Wrong fix.
**Example 2:** Low feature adoption → add more features, but real problem is discovery. Makes it worse.
**Example 3:** Low adoption → blame marketing, but activation experience is broken. Misdiagnosis.

## Relationship Definitions

| Relationship | Definition |
|---|---|
| Acquisition enables activation | Arrival alone is NOT activation |
| Activation enables adoption | Aha moment alone is NOT habit |
| Adoption drives retention | Weak adoption almost always precedes churn |
| Retention enables expansion | Expansion pushed too early accelerates churn |
| Expansion feeds back into adoption | Broader use deepens habit |