♾️ Product-led sales

You’re reading The Content Loop — a 5-minute read on how B2B SaaS marketers can use original research and product-led content as a growth lever.

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Last month, I spoke with a client about shifting their content strategy. They’re a bootstrapped company that targets engineering leaders—and uses a hybrid GTM motion (product + sales-led).

They’ve historically focused on the “perception-changing” content and a few traditional comparison articles.

But that also meant they didn’t have enough content assets that directly spoke to the product's value while they were reaching the right people.

When you’re targeting mid-market and enterprise companies, there are only so many perceptions you can change.

And only so many thought leadership assets you can create. There’s a point where you need to show the product—and get over the sales-y feeling.

To be honest, I was in the same camp two years back. I thought product-led content only made sense for PLG companies like Notion or Figma. But I was wrong.

“Product-led sales” as a concept was picking up.

While companies like Pocus, ProductLed, and McKinsey explained that PLS was about:

• Moving users from free to paid accounts

• Cross-selling or upselling existing customers

• Expanding accounts or creating an internal growth loop

I saw it differently when it comes to content and marketing.

You're not trying to convert people directly through the content.

You're using the product to demonstrate value, build trust, and give prospects enough information to have better conversations with your sales team.

Last I checked, every SaaS company has a product. 😆 

So, why do we default to thinking that PLC only matters to the ones using a pure PLG play?

When your sales cycles stretch 6+ months, you need to balance informing your audience and nudging them toward a solution—while surfacing your product early enough in their research process.

AirOps has been doing an excellent job with this.

Their recent report on "The Impact of Stale Content on AI Visibility" found that 83% of citations for commercial queries come from content updated within the past year.

Instead of just presenting this as industry data, they connect it to their solution:

• They answered some of the most burning questions their audience has with concrete data (original research)

• They show how stale content can derail your content strategy (stakes)

• They subtly mention how AI workflows can identify stale content across your site (product tie-in)

The natural next step? "Book a strategy session to build an automated refresh system for your content."

This approach hands qualified prospects to sales for the reason they booked a demo.

Potential buyers aren’t just interested in content refresh as a concept—they want the specific solution AirOps showed them in the research.

What does this mean for your content strategy as a sales-led company?

• Shorten sales cycles by demonstrating value upfront

• Provide product-led experiences within your content

• Make sales handoffs easier with qualified, informed prospects

• Center content around your product to give tangible value

• Keep everything buyer-centric while showcasing your solution

• Make future upsells and expansions easier

On Thursday, I’ll walk you through examples of product-led experiences you can build with your GTM teams.

P.S. If building a solid product-led library is top of mind for you, I’m launching something next week. Stay tuned 👀

P.S. Liked the issue? Share it with someone who could benefit from it.

That’s all for today!

As always, if you have any questions or feedback, hit “Reply” and let me know. 😄