4e Essentials was a disaster of a product, and 4e itself was a disaster.
Realistically, what PF2 can do to be significantly more successful is probably "nothing." If the market for "a game that doesn't play much like D&D, but thematically takes most of its elements from D&D" was big, 4e would have been a lot more successful, and PF1 wouldn't have existed. 13th Age probably would have done a lot better.
Pathfinder's appeal is some combination of, in approximate ranking of importance
- continuing to support the most popular edition of D&D <=== PF2e lost this
- High-quality adventure paths <=== Not great now, but can be fixed
- Sunk cost (i.e. "I already have all these books, I want to use them!") <=== PF2e lost this
- Far better 3rd-party support than WotC <=== PF2e lost this
- Organized play <=== PFS is fine!
The point here is there are some major aspects of PF1's appeal that PF2 lost and can't get back. Yes, they could publish better adventures. But, in my opinion, there's a pretty limited ceiling on how big a game can grow when it's "The D&D SRD with different math," regardless of how good the published modules are.
This is why I, in my infinite stupidity, think PF2e needs a new face. I think the intrinsic limits to a different numerical spin on D&D's menagerie of monsters and tome of spells makes it worth the risk to try and find something new. Come up with something that isn't "like the Forgotten Realms but..." or "like Greyhawk but..." or "like Eberron but..."
Come up with something where a drow wizard casting cloudkill at a group of gnolls is
not a thing. There are talented people at Paizo. They have connections to some of the best people in the industry. They are some of the only people who could pull this off. They're doing what I predicted they would do in 2016, because it seems to be the least risky option. And it's easy for me to say they should roll the dice on this, but it's not my company I'm talking about. If their revenue is okay, then maybe they should just keep doing this.