Product Led Growth (PLG) allows users to use the product by themselves and determine if the product fits their workflow. When users can do this independently, it’s a reduced friction and lower acquisition cost. The product itself, ungated, drives acquisition, activation, and retention and making the customer journey faster and more scalable.

Sales Led Growth (SLG) relies on hands-on human interaction, with sales reps guiding prospects through each customer journey stage. It is better suited for complex, high-ticket, or enterprise solutions where trust, customization, and negotiation are the priorities. The journey is more personalized but involves higher acquisition cost and longer sales cycles.

The main difference is when the customer converts to a paid customer. In PLG, user would go through product led growth bumpers to get onboarded and activated. Once activated, user would discover advanced use cases and hit paywalls to “encourage” user to pay.

While in SLG, the sales team work with the customer to close the deal before giving them full access to the product.

This table answers the "vs" keyword, but let me unpack the most critical difference: when you monetize.

In PLG, the user experiences value first, then you hit them with a paywall or feature limit. "You've sent 100 emails this month, upgrade to send more."

In SLG, the sales rep qualifies and builds trust first, then gives access. "Here's what the platform does for clients like you, and here's the price."

The timing difference changes everything about your business model.

The hybrid model (also called "product-led sales") takes the best of both worlds:

We did this at ClarityInbox. Here's how it worked:

When a user signed up, we offered a complimentary 30-minute onboarding call. Most SaaS companies use onboarding calls to train customers. We used ours as a sales discovery call.

Here's the structure we followed:

Minute 1-5: Warmup
"Hey, I'm Gary. Thanks for signing up for ClarityInbox. What's the main email problem you're trying to solve?"

Minute 6-15: Diagnosis (this is the sales magic)
"Walk me through your current workflow... how many emails do you get per day?... when do you lose emails?... how much time does this waste?"

We weren't explaining features. We were qualifying the user and uncovering their exact use case.

Minute 16-25: Product Tour + Use Case Mapping
Instead of showing every feature, we showed the specific features that solved their problem.

User problem: "I lose critical emails in my inbox."
Our feature: Clarity's email auto-categorization + flagging system.
Our demo: Three clicks to set up the exact rule they needed.

Minute 26-30: Upgrade Offer
"You're clearly getting 200+ emails per day. Our free plan caps you at 50 categorizations. Unlimited is $29/month. Want me to set that up now?"

By minute 30, we'd converted 40-50% of users we got on the call.

✅ Use hybrid if:

❌ Skip hybrid if:

Here's what hybrid requires operationally:

If you can't do these four things, hybrid becomes expensive sales-led growth in disguise. Don't do that.

There's no one-size-fits-all answer. But there are four factors that should guide your choice:

PLG Works If: Users can experience value in <5 minutes
Examples: Slack (type a message), Dropbox (upload a file), Calendly (schedule a meeting)

SLG Works If: Implementation or setup requires >30 minutes of learning
Examples: Salesforce (customize CRM), Procore (implement construction workflow), ServiceNow (enterprise process mapping)

Quick gut check: Could a business school student figure out your product without any help? If yes, PLG is viable.

PLG Works If: ACV < $2,000/year
Your CAC needs to be <$200. With PLG, you can hit that with organic traffic and content. Scale is your friend.

SLG Works If: ACV > $10,000/year
A single sales rep costing $100k+/year salary can justify itself closing 10 deals at $15k. The math flips.

Hybrid Zone: $2k-$10k ACV
This is where onboarding calls, product-led sales, and account-based marketing thrive.

PLG Works If: Buyer = User
The person trying the product is the person deciding to buy (prosumer, individual contributor). Think Slack adoption inside orgs.

SLG Works If: Buyer ≠ User
A procurement team, CFO, or CIO is making the decision, but engineers/ops will actually use it. You need to sell the decision-maker on ROI.

PLG Works If: You can differentiate via product UX
Dropbox didn't invent file storage. They made it so simple anyone could use it. That simplicity was the moat.

SLG Works If: You're selling a category, not a differentiation
Enterprise software is commoditized. Your edge is customization + relationships.

Scoring:

Q: Can a company switch from PLG to SLG later?
A: Yes, but it's painful. Your product, pricing, and team are all built for self-serve. Hiring sales reps and training them on your product takes 3-6 months. Better to get it right upfront.

Q: What if my product is somewhere between simple and complex?
A: You're likely in the hybrid zone. Test both: offer self-serve and optional onboarding calls. Measure conversion rates for each path. Double down on what works.

Q: How do I know if I have product-market fit for PLG?
A: Simple test: Can users hit their "aha moment" in <5 minutes without talking to your team? If yes, you likely have PMF for PLG. If no, you need hands-on guidance (hybrid or SLG).

P.S. If you have 2 min, please take this three-questions survey about this newsletter for me @ https://tally.so/r/3EaPyl

I write daily*** about my learning on launching and leading PLG. Feel free to subscribe.

Gary Yau Chan is an ex-founder and Product-Led Growth leader with 10+ years scaling B2B SaaS self-serve motions.

Current Focus: Writing weekly about PLG, monetization, and hybrid GTM strategies

Background: 26x hackathon winner. Masters in Systems Engineering (RPI). Reforge-trained in Growth Strategy. Posts on YouTube about PLG experiments.

Please follow me on LinkedIn, or read about what you can hire me for on my Notion page.