plg-sales-integration

Add sales when you see signals like 1-2 inbound commercial requests per week, high-value logos signing up but not activating, or duplicate product instances in one organization. Waiting too long risks competitors capturing enterprise segments, as happened with Dropbox.

Define PQLs from actual product engagement signals such as hitting usage limits, inviting colleagues, or multi-player activity on one domain. Combine behavioral factors with observable factors like title, company size, and corporate email domain to score and route signups.

Choose expansion if you see multiple activated user pods in the same company needing contract consolidation. Choose conversion assist if high-value signups abandon before activation. Validate one motion first, then add the other.

No. Databricks' zero-touch PLG experiment caused revenue to flatten, and analyses of 30 B2B SaaS companies show every product-led company eventually added sales. Self-serve works as lead generation while sales captures large enterprise contracts.

Avoid hiring a salesperson before founders personally validate the motion, going top-down too early, ignoring PQL signals in favor of marketing leads, and failing to fund enterprise features like SSO and SOC 2 that block larger deals.