B2C2B: Horizontal Wedge to Enterprise
Win a billion-user consumer use case first, then let personal users carry the product into their workplace.
- Difficulty
- Advanced
- Time to result
- ~months to results
- Steps
- 4
- Confidence
- 88%
For a horizontal product, find a single simple use case with a billion-plus daily users (like notes or docs) to create a massive top of funnel for individuals. Personal users adopt it for the simplest job, discover its deeper power, and then bring it to work — converting into B2B accounts. The consumer wedge funds and feeds growth into more complex enterprise use cases.
Origin
Ivan Zhao describing Notion's internal 'B2C2B' strategy, where roughly half of B2B customers came from prior personal users who first used Notion for notes and docs.
Core principles
- 01Pick a horizontal use case with a billion-plus daily users as your top of funnel
- 02Let individuals adopt for the simplest possible job first
- 03Personal use discovers deeper power, which pulls the product into the workplace
- 04The consumer wedge funds expansion into verticalized enterprise use cases
How to run it
- 1
Find a billion-user simple use case
Identify a horizontal job that a billion-plus people do every day on their phone or computer — for Notion this was note-taking and document sharing. This becomes an enormous top of funnel.
Pro tip Ask which categories of software have a billion-plus users — notes/docs, calendar, and email are the examples Zhao names.
Watch out You may stumble upon this use case rather than plan it; be ready to recognize and lean into it.
- 2
Onboard individuals for the simplest job
Let personal users start with the most basic possible action (a note, a shared doc), lowering the barrier to first use.
- 3
Reveal deeper power so users expand usage
Once in, users discover adjacent capabilities (relational databases, tasks, tracking), deepening their personal usage before any sale.
- 4
Convert personal users into workplace accounts
Personal users bring the product to their team, seeding B2B adoption bottom-up; roughly half of Notion's B2B customers came from prior personal users.
Pro tip Ship additional billion-user horizontal surfaces (calendar, email) to widen the top of funnel further.
In the wild
Notion won the horizontal note-and-document use case used by a billion-plus people daily, let individuals adopt it personally, and then those users brought it into their workplaces. Zhao says about half of Notion's B2B customers came from prior personal users, most of whom first used it for notes and docs.
→ The consumer wedge gave Notion a large top of funnel that fueled growth into more verticalized enterprise use cases, and motivated new billion-user surfaces like Calendar and an upcoming email product.
Common mistakes
Starting with the complex enterprise use case
Leading with verticalized, complex enterprise features skips the huge individual top of funnel; Notion's growth depended on a simple billion-user consumer job feeding B2B, not the reverse.
Ignoring which categories actually have billion-user reach
Not every horizontal use case has a big enough funnel; Zhao deliberately targets categories with a billion-plus users (notes, calendar, email) because only those create a wedge large enough to carry into work.
Is it for you?
Best for
Founders of horizontal productivity tools who can win an individual consumer use case and expand into teams and enterprises.
Not ideal for
Pure top-down enterprise products with no plausible individual-user entry point or consumer-scale use case.
From the transcript
“B2 c2b all this consumers personal user use notion for the most simple way you can use a computer or your phone which is note…”
“half our B2B customers uh coming from prior personal users”
“which other category of software has 1 billion plus user there's document notes there's calendar there's email”
From the episode
Notion’s lost years, its near collapse during Covid, staying small to move fast, the joy and suffering of building horizontal, more
Ivan Zhao (CEO and co-founder)