We A/B tested showing users their generated posts before asking them to subscribe

One thing I've been thinking about a lot lately: at what point in an onboarding flow does it make sense to ask for a credit card?

The instinct is "as early as possible" — get commitment before people drop off. But we kept seeing users churn right at the subscribe step, and when we looked at the sessions, most of them hadn't actually seen what the product produces yet.

So we ran a test. Instead of voice setup → connect → subscribe → generate, we flipped it: pick your topics → generate 5 posts in your voice → review them → THEN subscribe.

The bet: if someone has already seen 5 posts that sound like them and are queued for next week, "start your trial" feels like a natural next step instead of a blind commitment.

Still early, but the drop-off on the subscribe step is noticeably lower in the value-first variant.

Wrote up the full onboarding flow — both sequences, the design decisions behind each step, and why we built it

as a full-tab experience instead of a popup

How do you all think about where to place the paywall in a trial flow? Curious what's worked (or backfired).