Pump the PQL breaks, how to grow MRR , and the ideal layering of PLG, PLS, & ABM

You will be mist.

Welcome to the PLG Recap 📈 

I spend all week deep diving into the best PLG LinkedIn posts so you don't have to.

Here are my top 5 favorites from last week! 🔥

1️⃣ Elena Verna

Strategy or Tactic? Strategy

Growth lever = All levers

Recap

• Elena shows us an awesome strategic way to know when to layer on PLS with PLG.

• Motivation, ability, and permission are the three most important factors your product must solve for, or else you will need to layer in sales-assist motions.

• If there is weak motivation, the sales comes in to help convince.

• If there is low ability, sales comes in with white glove treatment.

• If there is low permission or agency, sales comes in to unlock permissions so an org can scale.

• Elena is the queen and arguably the coiner of Product-led sales. I would say give her a follow but you already are 😉 

2️⃣ Kyle Poyar

Strategy or Tactic? Strategy

Growth lever = All levers

Recap

• Kyle released a New Era for PLG 35-page report. Click on the image to see the full post.

• It’s no surprise that we are seeing economic slowness in the tech industry, however, there are best-in-class PLG companies that are rising through the ranks with strong efficiency.

• My favorite principle of the 5 he mentioned is: Build to be discovered by users in their moment of need.

  • I love this because it’s aligned with the values and themes of Product-led marketing (PLM) and if you know, I’ve been writing a ton about this topic!

• Standout PLG companies are acquiring users organically and through product virality. Kyle suggests we start here and scale these motions vs sales-led motions.

• Community = virality outside of the product

  • Another key tactic in Product-led marketing. As communities serve as distribution ambassadors and extensions of your product, it’s key to nurture these into PLM engines.

3️⃣ John Kotowski

Strategy or Tactic? Tactics

Growth lever = Monetization

Recap

• John shares 3 levers to grow MRR:

  • Optimize conv. rate of free trials = more customers

  • Add or remove plans = more ARPU or more customers

  • Raise prices = more ARPU, fewer customers (more churn)

• I think most of us neglect the plan addition and removal variable in SaaS pricing experimentation.

• If we make plans simpler by removing complexity, we can increase the acquisition of lower-tiered segments. By adding plans and features, we can charge more for premium pricing and thereby increase the ARPU

4️⃣ Dave Boyce

Strategy or Tactic? Strategy

Growth lever = All levers

Recap

• Dave beautifully summarizes the complicated layering and intersection of the 3 GTM motions: PLG, PLS, and ABM (account-based marketing).

• In an ideal world, you want to scale PLG first, feed your top-of-funnel into your PLS motion second, and then expand your audience by moving into performance marketing plays via ABM.

• But this usually fails because of impatience, failures, aggressive ARR targets, emotions, and biases of the different siloed teams and founders.

• Don’t abandon these tactics. Tune them, fix them, and design a GTM strategy that is messy with all of them together!

5️⃣ Danny Archer

Strategy or Tactic? Tactics

Growth lever = Product-led sales

Recap

• Danny shows us some real PQA and PQL talk with examples!

• While most of the PLG community is hyping PLS, Danny also says to pump the breaks. Let’s fix this motion a little bit.

• He highlights:

  • Differentiate PQA and PQLs!

  • PQAs are high-usage accounts across non-decision makers while PQLs include a high-usage individual

  • Once you have many high-usage individuals + ICP fit, then surface the PQA to sales.

• It’s good to see PLS posts from more PLG sales leaders who are helping us move forward through constructive feedback.

6️⃣ My post of the week - I am working on a lot of PLM content. There is so much more to come! I highlighted one of the 5 tactics last week: Product Demo Experiences.

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-Drew