Intro Hive

Jodi Glidden had already built and sold three successful companies before starting Intro Hive in 2011. The inspiration struck while working at BlackBerry post-acquisition. "I thought, I'm just going to log into the CRM and I'll just go get introductions," Jodi recalls. "But when we looked at the CRM, you realize how little people are actually using it." He identified a fundamental problem: either people didn't enter data into the CRM at all, or they wasted roughly 20% of their workday manually entering it. This seemed like a data problem that an engineer could solve.

Jodi's initial hypothesis was that the problem could be cracked in three to six months. It took almost four years. The core issue wasn't the concept—it was data quality. At the time, data sources like Data.com and ZoomInfo were only 65% accurate. "You can't automate data into the CRM that's wrong 35% of the time," Jodi explains. He spent years building infrastructure to achieve ~90% accuracy on first names, last names, companies, and titles, which became Intro Hive's key differentiator.

The product started as a "who knows who" database that could analyze email, calendaring, and phone systems across an enterprise to surface relationship insights. It was built as a private encrypted cloud—single-tenant SaaS with encryption at rest and in transit—a decision driven by PwC's security requirements and the sensitive nature of relationship data.

Jodi and co-founder Stuart leveraged existing relationships aggressively. PwC became a flagship early customer, ultimately deploying the platform across over 100,000 users in multiple countries. But closing that first major deal took time: "It probably got to stage four in the first six months, and then took another two, three years to close."

For the first few years, Jodi and Stuart handled all sales themselves, attending every meeting through close. They hired a VP of Marketing from Salesforce early on, hoping inbound tactics would work. It didn't. "The content marketing and ad-based marketing...we just really got nothing from the inbound for the longest time, almost nothing."

The turning point came around year four when the team shifted strategy entirely. Instead of broad outbound to any enterprise, they narrowed focus to a single vertical: accounting firms and global systems integrators like Grant Thornton, Deloitte, KPMG, and Accenture. Each firm had hundreds of thousands of employees, many of them sellers, and intense security requirements that favored Intro Hive's architecture. "When you have a smaller budget to get the word out, you need to speak to a smaller audience," Jodi explains. They dominated that vertical first, then moved on to others.

The hiring journey had its missteps. Jodi brought on a salesperson too early (around year two) before there was enough pipeline to support them. He learned from previous companies that "you need to do the job of the sales guy until sales are flowing in so fast that you can't do it anymore."

Partnership channels exploded in growth. CRM vendors realized that Intro Hive reduced churn—customers with the platform installed stopped switching CRMs. Partners went from generating 7% of revenue to 30% in a single year. "It's been growing really fast, like exponential," Jodi notes.

Intro Hive now serves hundreds of customers with over 250,000 users and 350-400 employees across offices in Miami, Toronto, London, Chicago, and Chennai. Revenue is "in the tens of millions," with the company on track to hit $100 million in ARR within 2-3 years. They've raised approximately $135 million in funding.

Inbound now accounts for roughly 50% of new business, with partners and word-of-mouth driving significant growth. Close timelines have improved—from 2-3 years for the first major deal to 30-day closes for inbound leads.

Jodi credits persistence, focus, and experienced board members as key to scaling. "If you want the results that only 1% of people can achieve, then you have to be willing to do what 99% of people won't do," he says. One customer ran an experiment showing a 31% revenue lift in employees using Intro Hive versus a control group, yet Jodi believes the company is still underpriced relative to the value delivered. The company plans to accelerate growth through continued organic expansion and strategic acquisitions in adjacent verticals.