Dial Source

Josh Tillman didn't set out to build a software company. In 2005, while studying at UC Davis, he was writing a research paper with friends on telecommunication technology, databases, and outsourced labor. That academic exercise turned into a publication in the American Computer Machinery journal—and caught the attention of some early players at Salesforce.com in the mid-2000s. What started as a college project became something real when a handful of twenty-something engineers began prototyping cloud-based CRM with built-in telephony for real estate, insurance, and other industries.

Dial Source's breakthrough came when Salesforce asked the young team to build their unique hardware and programming language as a native communication system for the platform. "12 years later, we still are the only fully native communication system for Salesforce," Tillman explains. The company ranked as the #1 sales application and #2 support application on the Salesforce app exchange—proof that they'd solved a real problem. Crucially, Dial Source didn't rush to raise capital. They were already doing "low seven figures" in revenue—closer to the high end of "two to three million something like that"—before taking a single dollar of outside funding around 2015.

Tillman describes Dial Source as "a group of professional nerds" designing their own hardware and software from the ground up to solve massive enterprise communication problems. The company facilitated calls and intelligent routing inside the CRM based on customer data, with advanced call recording, compliance automation, and analytics that competitors couldn't match. Early customers included Fortune 500 companies, the Sacramento Kings (their first NBA account), and later Vista Equity Partners subsidiaries. The land-and-expand motion proved incredibly effective: new accounts started with 50-60 seats and paid around $115 per seat minimum, meaning a typical $5,700-$6,900 MRR per new account that cost only $12,000 to acquire—a payback period of less than 3 months.

For over a decade, Dial Source relied almost entirely on word-of-mouth and relationships. "We didn't really even have a marketing presence just a year and a half ago," Tillman admits. The pivot changed everything. In the last 18 months, conferences became the primary growth driver, now accounting for 30% of lead traffic. This shift coincided with hiring experienced sales and marketing leaders from other SaaS companies, which accelerated iteration on messaging. The metrics reflect this success: 121% year-over-year ACV growth, with current revenue between $1-2M MRR. Most impressively, they achieved negative 15% net seat churn and 27% seat additions, driven by a newly built customer success team of internal experts. Gross churn sits at just 13%—around 1% per month—making accounts extraordinarily sticky, with five-year and multi-year renewals common among Fortune 500 clients.

With 40 employees based primarily in Sacramento (and a handful in Austin), Dial Source is a $18M-24M ARR business that controls its entire technology stack. Unlike competitors integrating Twilio or other vendors' APIs, Dial Source owns the hardware, software, and carrier network, enabling unmatched security and compliance for regulated enterprise customers. They've expanded beyond Salesforce into Microsoft Dynamics, recently launching NFL teams and Madison Square Garden Holdings. Tillman has raised $7M total but resists acquisition, even hypothetically turning down $250M offers because he sees "a couple hard years of work" ahead. His exit target is pegged to comparable SaaS exits at multi-billion-dollar valuations, reflecting his belief that Dial Source is leading a market shift toward automation and transparency without adding work for sales reps.