I give away 100+ PLG and AI best practices for your ENTIRE journey.
The best PLG and AI teams have already solved your biggest growth problems (inside Figma, Notion, Softr, Linear, Intercom, Canva, Intercom and more).
Hello everyone 👋 I’m Kate Syuma, and welcome to Growthmates.news — the newsletter where we explore growth stories to inspire your professional and personal growth. Join the community of 7,600+ Product, Design, and Growth people from companies like Amplitude, Intercom, Miro, Atlassian, Superhuman, Framer, and more.
I’m stepping away for a bit (maternity leave 👶), and wanted to share something I’ve been building behind the scenes. Over the past 6+ years from leading growth at Miro to working with 35+ SaaS teams — I’ve been collecting real product decisions from the best PLG and AI companies.
Not frameworks, but actual patterns: how they design onboarding, reduce friction, drive activation, and build growth loops. This newsletter is built around that collection — 100+ best practices across the entire user journey, all in one place.
The goal is simple: help you skip weeks of competitor research and move straight to better product decisions.
This post is brought to you by Softr — a great example of how quickly product building is changing.
Non-technical teams can now build products that used to require full engineering support. I recently used Softr to create a platform for my self-paced course, and the AI co-builder handled the backend logic, user access, and data structure in minutes.
Instead of thinking “I need a developer” or “this is too complex,” you can just build, test, and iterate directly. It feels like a combination of Airtable, Lovable but focused on actually shipping products fast.
Best way to support Growthmates? Explore more fantastic tools 👇
Framer — the fastest way to design and publish stunning websites (Growthmates.club is built on it).
Mobbin — the largest UX & UI reference library for deep product inspiration.
Obi by Cor — AI-powered onboarding voice assistant, I truly recommend.
Magic Patterns — The fastest way to prototype and test new features with AI.
🎉 Today I launch my new self-paced course!
I turned everything I’ve learned into a self-paced course — User-centric PLG in the AI era.
It’s the same frameworks, templates, and real product breakdowns I used while leading growth at Miro and advising 35+ teams — now structured into a clear system to help you build your own PLG roadmap (from quick wins to big bets).
I made this version simpler and more flexible: 60+ self-paced lessons, 29 videos, 30+ flows teardowns, and 20+ templates you can apply immediately, at your own pace. Early-bird price is currently $399 (70% lower than the original $1,199 live cohort) — valid today.
Now, let’s dive into today’s issue.
10/100 PLG best practices in AI Era
I want to give you a shortcut into some of the best practices so you don’t have to spend days (or weeks) on competitor research and reverse-engineering what works. I’ve already done that part for you, using examples from teams like Figma, Notion, Canva, Linear, Intercom, and more.
In this resource, you’ll find curated examples across the entire product journey — from first visit to activation, habit formation, and monetization — with real screenshots and notes on what makes them effective.
Let’s dive into 10/100 best practices 👇
1/10. Magic Patterns: User‑generated content gallery:
🏃♀️ Flow step: Website
⭐️ Best practice: User‑generated content gallery
✅ Why it works: Showing what others are building (“see what others are building”) adds inspiration and trust.
2/10. Softr: Real use cases as AI prompt suggestions:
🏃♀️ Flow step: Website
⭐️ Best practice: Real use cases on homepage 🧭
✅ Why it works: Showing specific use cases (event planning, CRM, knowledge base) helps users immediately understand what they can build and reduces the “blank page” problem.
This is especially important for AI-first builders, where too much flexibility can actually slow users down without clear starting points.
By the way, I recently checked the entrire process of creating a platfrom on Softr and recorded my process.
3/10. V0: Google One‑tap sign‑up:
🏃♀️ Flow step: Sign Up Flows
⭐️ Best practice: Google One-tap sign-up 🪶
✅ Why it works: One-tap registration removes friction and captures users at the moment of highest intent without forcing a full sign-up flow.
In one of my client cases, adding Google sign-up + contextual motivation (like replying to comments or unlocking content) significantly improved conversion from visitors to registered users — especially for high-intent traffic coming from shared links.
4/10. Dropbox: Progressive disclosure for profiling:
🏃♀️ Flow step: Sign Up Flows
⭐️ Best practice: Step-by-step profiling 🪜
✅ Why it works: Breaking questions into smaller steps reduces cognitive load while maintaining a sense of progress — a pattern that consistently improves completion rates in onboarding flows.
5/10. Intercom: Gather intent during profiling:
🏃♀️ Flow step: Website
⭐️ Best practice: Gather intent early 🎯
✅ Why it works: Capturing user intent upfront allows the product to personalize the experience immediately, especially critical for AI-first tools where relevance defines perceived value.
6/10. Clay: What problem do you want to solve first:
🏃♀️ Flow step: Website
⭐️ Best practice: Problem-first segmentation 🎯
✅ Why it works: Asking what users want to achieve (instead of who they are) creates instant relevance and helps guide them быстрее to their first meaningful outcome.
7/10. Airtable: Segment the right intent:
🏃♀️ Flow step: Path to Aha-moment
⭐️ Best practice: Intent-based segmentation 🎯
✅ Why it works: Understanding what users are trying to do — not just their role or industry — enables more relevant flows, faster activation, and less friction.
Want all 100+ PLG & AI best practices? access the full resource for free here:
8/10. Canva: Simplify AI access with clear guidance:
🏃♀️ Flow step: Habit Forming
⭐️ Best practice: Clear AI entry points ✨
✅ Why it works: Making AI features visible is not enough — users need guidance on how AI improves their workflow to actually drive adoption.
9/10. Figma Make: Cross-platform sharing:
🏃♀️ Flow step: Sharing & Invitation
⭐️ Best practice: Intuitive sharing structure 🔗
✅ Why it works: Clear separation of sharing options reduces confusion and helps users quickly understand how to collaborate across different contexts.
10/10. Replit: Clear credits progress
🏃♀️ Flow step: Upgrade & Trial Activation
⭐️ Best practice: Transparent credit tracking 📊
✅ Why it works: Separating credit usage from product progress helps users understand limits without interrupting their workflow or creating anxiety.
What’s behind these patterns?
The shift isn’t just toward PLG or AI — it’s toward clarity.
The best products reduce time to value by removing unnecessary steps: less guessing, less setup, fewer decisions. They guide users through intent, not features — and make the next step obvious at every stage.
That’s what connects all of these examples.
If you want to go deeper
I’ve structured these patterns into a full system inside my course, User-centric PLG in the AI era.
It goes beyond examples — into how to identify opportunities, prioritize them, and turn them into a clear growth roadmap (from quick wins to bigger bets).
The self-paced version is now live, with a limited early price ($399).
You can explore it here: academy.growthmates.club
🤝 Ways to collaborate with Kate & Growthmates:
Onboarding Design Sprint 🏃♀️
I will work closely with your team to help you fix your product growth challenges and improve the first user experience that can drive x2 uplift on your Activation.
⚡️ Fully booked. Join a watlist →
PLG Advising for your company 🧠
Hands-on, in-depth advising across product, UX, and growth to build a scalable, sustainable PLG system that will last for years.
⚡️ Fully booked. Join a watlist →
User-centric PLG Course 🎓
A self-paced course built on the same frameworks, templates, and product breakdowns I used while leading growth at Miro and advising teams like Grammarly and Amplitude — now structured to help you build your own PLG roadmap.
⚡️ Today’s early-bird price is $399. Join today →
Brand Partnerships 📩
Let’s tell your product story to a trusted audience of 30,000+ product, design, and growth leaders — and co-create meaningful content that inspires the wider product and design community.
👉 Send an inquiry to hello@growthmates.club
Premium Edition 💎
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👉 Upgrade to Premium and get full access.
This is all for today, dear readers. If you found this helpful, please share your reaction and leave some comments 💜 It would give huge support for me to continue creating this!
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With best regards,
Kate Syuma