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The best PLG companies today will also be best positioned for the agentic layer where tools are selected without a human in the loop.

Matt argues PLG still matters in an agentic world—you just extend the same self-serve funnel optimization to how agents research and pick tools. ✦ AI generated

Matt Swulinski · 20VC · 2026-08-15 · original ↗

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What changes in the growth world when we shift from humans to agents with product like growth?

I think in a world of agents uh there's definitely a layer where PLG still matters because PLG assumes you have a perfect self-serve funnel to the human. And in the same way, you're definitely going to want to optimize it for how is an agent doing research? How is it picking the tools and the APIs that it's actually using? And I think it just takes the same framing and diligence to why the product already worked from the human end and just understand how are agents making decision-making. So the the the best companies in PLG focus right now will also be best positioned in my opinion for the agentic layer of essentially decisions being made without that human in the loop when tools are being selected for certain tasks.

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1:38think in a world of agents uh there's definitely a layer where PLG still matters because PLG assumes you have a perfect self-s serve funnel to the human. And in the same way, you're definitely going to want to optimize it for how is an agent doing research? How is it picking the tools and the APIs that it's actually using? And I think it just takes the same framing and

1:58diligence to why the product already worked from the human end and just understand how are agents making decision-making. So the the the best companies in PLG focus right now will also be best positioned in my opinion for the agentic layer of essentially decisions being made without that human in the loop when tools are being selected for certain tasks. When you look back at say superhuman if we go

2:21back in time chronologically it grew very kind of craftsmanlike with founder referrals. What's your reflections or lessons from that experience on Superhumans's growth that you've taken with you? >> The the tastem of what it means to create a strong product. Uh like that for me was born while I was at at Superhum. Uh because at the end of the day, no matter whether you know, if you've used Superhum, you've likely

2:49stayed using Superhum just because every little element of that product is is hyperrefined to make you want to continue using it. Um but I think the the difference of what was the early scale of superhuman where it was super founderled word of mouth referral uh there was essentially a asimtope that you know the the product hit where they had it they had to follow a different playbook and uh there was a like this

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