Behind the success of Figma hides a particularly fine Go-to-Market strategy: rather than directly targeting decision-makers or purchasing departments, Figma has established itself by adding primarily the most influential end users in the organization: designers. This approach, based on adoption by practitioners themselves, redefines in depth the role of “business influencers” in a B2B product strategy.
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A strategic adoption channel: the operational user
When Figma starts, the design market is still perceived as a niche. Dylan Field himself admits: design appeared as a segment that is too small to build a company with high valuation. However, by targeting designers – these technical, connected, demanding and community users – Figma accesses a lever for massive organic growth.
Designers share their tools, their files, their methods. They are at the origin of good practices circulating on Twitter, YouTube, Discord or Slack. They influence the technological choices of their teams, and sometimes even those of their customers. Addressing them, Figma is not only for users: it affects prescribers.
A logic of evangelization by practice
Figma has never needed to explain its value proposal at length: it manifests itself in use. By providing a full version of its product for free, the company allows designers to adopt it freely, then recommend it. Each file sharing is a demonstration. Each YouTube tutorial is social proof.
- The YouTube channel of Femke Van Schoonhovencentered on the design produced with Figma, brings together more than 150,000 subscribers.
- “Figma Academy”created by Dan Mall, forms thousands of designers through educational content derived from their own use of the product.
- On X (ex-Twitter), technical threads around Figma generate tens of thousands of impressions without action of the brand.
Growth is not viral in the marketing sense of the term, it is professional : It is disseminated through work flows, business recommendations, collaborative projects.
Design as an organizational Trojan horse
Once adopted by designers, Figma enters the organization. Product managers, Devs Front-End, marketing managers, customers themselves begin to interact with models and prototypes. Without friction, without onboarding. This is how the use surface extends.
This phenomenon creates a form of progressive dependence. The teams discover that they collaborate better thanks to the tool. The king becomes tangible, measurable, visible. And when it comes to switching to a paid or business plan, the question no longer arises: the product is already integrated into internal processes.
Figma thus applies a logic of Product-LED Expansionwhere the signal comes from the field adoption, not from the top-down prospecting.
A lesson for B2B marketing: target makers
Rather than wrapping the general departments, Figma has bet on makers, technicians, creators. It is a reversal of perspective for traditional B2B marketing: influence no longer comes from hierarchical power, but from the network of practices.
The product becomes a standard, not because it was sold, but because it was adopted. In a world where the tools are increasing, where users are increasingly competent and connected, this strategy is obvious.
