Two founders turned a $150K loan into a $10B+ startup while coding in their underwear.

Here’s the wild journey of Notion from 0 to 30M active users:

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𝗣𝗮𝗿𝘁 𝟭: 𝗡𝗼𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻’𝘀 𝗦𝘁𝗼𝗿𝘆

Countless productivity tools have been launched in recent years— Miro, Canva, and Coda, to name a few.

Notion managed to cut through the noise and became the go-to platform for seamless productivity and collaboration.

Today, it's valued at over $10 billion, boasting a user base of 30 million and generating an estimated $576M in revenue.

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𝗖𝗵𝗮𝗽𝘁𝗲𝗿 𝟭: 𝗙𝗿𝗼𝗺 𝗮 𝗙𝗮𝗶𝗹𝗲𝗱 𝗦𝘁𝗮𝗿𝘁𝘂𝗽 𝘁𝗼 𝗡𝗼𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻 𝟭.𝟬

Back in 2015, co-founders Ivan Zhao and Simon’s no-code startup flopped. They realized their mistake:

“We focused too much on what we wanted to bring to the world. We needed to pay attention to what the world wanted from us.” – Ivan.

With a $150K loan from Ivan’s mom, they moved to Kyoto and spent an entire year coding with zero distractions. In 2016, they launched Notion 1.0 and it became an instant hit on Product Hunt.

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𝗖𝗵𝗮𝗽𝘁𝗲𝗿 𝟮: 𝗙𝗶𝗻𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗣𝗿𝗼𝗱𝘂𝗰𝘁-𝗠𝗮𝗿𝗸𝗲𝘁 𝗙𝗶𝘁

Notion initially gained traction with a focus on “docs, wikis, and tasks” —but it was wikis that made all the difference. At the time, Confluence was the go-to for wikis, but Notion found success by offering a cleaner, more affordable & accessible design that caters to non-technical users as well.

heir early features, like cross-platform support and integration with other tools, made it easy for users to adopt Notion across their own ecosystem.

In 2018, they launched Notion 2.0, combining notes and Kanban boards to create a one-stop workspace for everyone.

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𝗖𝗵𝗮𝗽𝘁𝗲𝗿 𝟯: 𝗕𝘂𝗶𝗹𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗣𝗿𝗼𝗱𝘂𝗰𝘁-𝗟𝗲𝗱 𝗚𝗿𝗼𝘄𝘁𝗵 𝗠𝗮𝗰𝗵𝗶𝗻𝗲

By 2019, after years of staying lean and scrappy, Notion finally raised external funding—on their own terms. They took $10M at an $800M valuation, keeping a tight grip on ownership while scaling the business.

The key to Notion's success? They didn’t just hire salespeople— they hired product experts who knew how to keep improving the user experience and driving growth without the hard sell.

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𝗖𝗵𝗮𝗽𝘁𝗲𝗿 𝟰: 𝗪𝗵𝗲𝗿𝗲 𝗧𝗵𝗲𝘆 𝗔𝗿𝗲 𝗧𝗼𝗱𝗮𝘆

Today, Notion has grown to 500 employees, yet only 10% work in sales. They’ve stayed true to their Product-Led Growth (PLG) model and the result is over a staggering $567M ARR.

Asana - which is in a similar space- rakes in about $167M in annual revenue.

Notion has clearly made a name for itself; it's not a matter of “if” it will go public, but rather “when” that will happen.

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𝗣𝗮𝗿𝘁 𝟮: 𝗧𝗵𝗲 𝟳 𝗟𝗮𝘆𝗲𝗿𝘀 𝗼𝗳 𝗡𝗼𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻’𝘀 𝗚𝗿𝗼𝘄𝘁𝗵 𝗦𝘁𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗴𝘆

So what’s the secret behind Notion’s explosive growth?

It’s all thanks to a carefully crafted "7-layer PLG strategy" that guides their success.

If you want to dive deeper into their strategy, check out the full breakdown: news.aakashg.com/p/how-…