B2B tech companies often prioritize sales and product features over understanding customer needs. This leads to failed product launches, copycat marketing, and missed opportunities. To succeed with product-led growth, companies need to be customer-obsessed and deliver frictionless value at every touchpoint instead of betting on the “PLG Field of Dreams.”
I remember listening to two sales calls recently: one from a vendor and one from a client, both SaaS solutions. Each rep started with pleasantries, then asked about the prospect’s biggest challenge. As soon as they got an answer, they jumped into a product demo. Feature after feature, they bored everyone.
Ironically, the vendor pitched their product to this same client, who then proceeded to slam the vendor’s approach, only to do the same thing themselves a few days later.
Why do we think demos solve everything?
When we love our products more than our customers, we fail.
Product-led growth isn’t about pushing features, it’s about understanding and solving real problems with a seamless customer experience. We can’t solve problems we don’t understand.
We must put our customers first at every touchpoint, or product-led and sales-led strategies won’t work.
And while both strategies have their place—depending on the solution, pricing, client size, and sales cycle—neither will succeed without first starting with customer insights and maintaining a customer-centric focus.
Product-led growth (PLG) is a go-to-market strategy where the product itself drives customer acquisition and growth.
Lured by the success of Slack and Dropbox, many B2B tech companies chase PLG in the hopes of getting bought out for Bazillions. The idea seems simple: build an amazing product, let users experience its value, and watch them become paying customers.
But many companies misinterpret PLG as a cure-all. They focus only on building a great product and ignore the need for a smooth customer experience.
Sales-led approaches often work better in enterprise organizations with longer sales cycles and complex solutions. Yet, both sales-led and product-led approaches fail if they don’t prioritize customer insights and keep sales and marketing customer-centric.
Haste Makes Waste
We often get caught up in our own innovation and forget to ask, “Who is this actually helping?” And when marketing is only responsible for part of the revenue, they face immense pressure from Sales and Leadership teams to generate leads, which can further distract from understanding and addressing customer needs.
PLG companies must understand their customers deeply. Customers are at the center of everything: product, marketing, sales, and CX. Without customers, we’re just making products, not building a business.
Throughout his excellent book, Product-Led Growth, Wes Bush constantly advocates doing customer research.
Many B2B tech companies gloss over this point.
Instead of communicating their differentiated value, they create free trials or freemium models without investing in the infrastructure needed to deliver a frictionless customer experience. They assume a great product will automatically lead to happy customers.
Slack Gets PLG Right
Slack is a SaaS product that focuses on solving real problems for teams by focusing on their unique value: better communication and collaboration tools. They conducted extensive research to understand their best-fit customers and designed a simple onboarding process for their intuitive app. They constantly get feedback to maintain continuous improvement. This customer-centric approach helped Slack grow organically and exponentially, with users becoming brand advocates and driving widespread adoption. Salesforce acquired Slack in 2021 for $28B. Did I mention Bazillions?
The constant pressure to deliver leads in B2B tech often hurts companies. Marketing and sales teams get tunnel vision, focusing only on hitting their numbers. It isn’t scalable or sustainable.
Pressure to Meet Quotas
Overemphasis on Features and Demos
Insular Thinking and Lack of Differentiation
The Bottom Line
Sales pressure often causes B2B tech companies to cut corners and neglect essential steps. This can lead to product failures, copycat marketing, and missed opportunities.
To get PLG right, we need to do more than just build a great product. We need to obsess over our customers and deliver value at every touchpoint.
“Value is always determined by prospects and customers. No matter how cool you think your technology is.”
Alan Hale, Consight Marketing Group
It’s harder than it sounds, but here’s how to get started:
PLG is an effective strategy, particularly for SaaS products, but it’s not a magic bullet. To succeed, we need a balanced approach that combines customer obsession, exceptional product design, and a frictionless customer experience.
In B2B tech, it’s easy to get caught up in our own hype. Tunnel vision only leads to missed opportunities, frustrated customers, and stunted growth.
Whether you follow a sales-led or product-led approach, stay focused on your customers. Keep developing great products, but create marketing that speaks your customer’s language and sales pitches that tell your unique story and differentiated value.
Obsessing over our customers forces us to understand their needs, learn, and improve. That’s a good thing.
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PS: This article is also published and discussed on LinkedIn. Join the conversation!
