Product-Led Growth is so misunderstood

I’ve spent years building product teams, launching features, and crafting growth strategies. I’ve seen beautiful roadmaps : polished, aligned, and celebrated. That ended up delivering nothing. I’ve watched teams execute flawlessly, following every best practice in the book, yet still fail to move the business forward.

It made me realize something brutal.

Execution is NOT enough if you’re building the wrong things.

But I've also seen the opposite: scrappy teams with sharp instincts, no budget, and a strong product-led mindset grow like wildfire, because they knew what really mattered. They didn't just ship. They landed. They didn't just talk product. They talked profit. They didn’t wait for permission from Sales or Marketing. They built products that were the go-to-market.

That’s when it clicked for me. Product-Led Growth (PLG) isn’t a buzzword.

Not a tactic. Not a pricing model. It’s not even just for B2B SaaS or startups.

It’s a mindset shift — and when done right, it changes how you build, how you launch, and how your company grows.

And it's not about removing humans (specifically Sales). It's about removing friction.

It's not about being free. It's about being undeniable.

PLG has been overused, misunderstood, and sugarcoated.

It has been reduced to signup buttons, freemium plans, and SaaS vanity metrics.

I am done watching product teams fall into the same traps: obsessing over features instead of outcomes, applying frameworks like checklists with no link to business impact, thinking PLG means “just make it free and self-serve.”

Let’s shift. And let’s cut the nonsense.

Quick disclaimer, stop reading this if:

You are proud to be a feature factory.
You want to keep product and business in separate silos.
You are here for frameworks and acronyms without outcomes.

But if you are ready to stop building features that don’t land. If you are done being user-centric with no business impact. And if you believe product should drive revenue, retention, and real results... then you are exactly where you need to be.

Product-Led Growth is not a tactic

The term PLG has been stretched and misused so many times that it now risks meaning nothing. Ask ten people what it means and you will get ten answers. Most are incomplete. Some are completely wrong.

For some, it’s about self-serve onboarding. For others, it’s about freemium models. For many, it’s just a trendy label slapped onto whatever growth playbook they were already using.

Let’s set the record straight: PLG is not a tactic. It’s a business model.

Not in the abstract sense, but in the very practical, operational, and strategic way your company decides to grow. It’s a commitment to let your product do the heavy lifting, not just in retention or support, but in acquisition, activation, monetization, and expansion. That’s a fundamental shift. One that redefines how you build, how you market, how you sell, and ultimately, how you grow.

A solid Product-Led strategy isn’t guesswork. It’s built on continuous user feedback, data-driven iterations, and seamless onboarding. The best teams bake analytics into every touchpoint, so every feature doesn’t just work : it drives engagement and growth.

Experts point out that when a company embeds analytics into every product touchpoint, it empowers teams to act on granular behavioral data, ensuring that every feature enhances user engagement while naturally driving growth.

This integration of data and product innovation is at the core of what distinguishes a mature PLG approach from a superficial tactic.

So what Product-led really means?

Your product isn’t just what you sell. It’s how you grow.

If PLG is a strategy, not a tactic, then let’s be honest: most companies don’t know what it really means to be "Product-led".

It doesn’t mean “just build a great product.” That’s the bare minimum today.

It doesn’t mean removing Sales or relying on a magical self-serve funnel to do all the work.

Being truly product-led means something far more radical : It’s a reallocation of trust and responsibility from humans to software. From promises to proof. From friction to flow.

Your product becomes the primary driver of your customer journey and your company’s growth. It’s not just the end of the journey; it’s the front door, the salesperson, the onboarding guide, and the expansion engine.

But users don’t want a funnel. They want to feel empowered with a product they will love.

Your homepage isn’t your website. It’s your first in-app experience.
Your product isn’t what happens after the sale. It’s how the sale happens.
Your UI isn’t just decoration. It’s the narrative, here to persuade.
Your onboarding isn’t an intro with too many carousels to skip. It’s your conversion engine.
Your “aha moment” isn’t a happy accident. It’s the dealmaker.

Every screen is a conversion opportunity. Every click, a sales moment.

That’s the reason why PLG companies don’t design screens. They design journeys. This is where traditional companies fall short. They try to bolt PLG on top of a sales-led machine when what they really need is a new engine.

WHY WORK WITH ME?

Lead with purpose.
Decide with clarity.
Deliver with impact.

You’ve got ambitious goals, Product teams costing millions, and a market that won’t wait. I'm not here to make you feel good about frameworks or buzzwords. I'm here to question your assumptions, refine your strategy, and make sure every decision turns into measurable value—for your business, team, and users.

This approach is based on three pillars: