I've seen freshworks do this really well with a frictionless user onboarding. They give you direct access to their product without email verification but they display a "hello bar" in the account that reminds people to verify email to continue using product. This way people get access to get in, look around and trial/experience the product. They capture email at step 1, then give you access to a new instance, but you must verify email to use features ie/ send email Very nice flow