“What a distressful day it was for Timothy…”

That’s literally how Timothy, Head of RevOps at SentinelGuard Security, described his Tuesday in the Slack rant that will live forever in company folklore.

His sales team had just spent a small fortune on a super shiny, enterprise-grade intent data platform. You know the type:

Everyone was excited. Finally, they’d “know who’s in market.” Finally, they’d “catch buyers at the right time.”

At least, that was the theory.

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Meet the Cast

Timothy’s team had one clear goal: land CadenceForge as a customer.

They added CadenceForge to every ABM list, plugged it into the Shiny Intent Tool, and waited for the magic to happen.

It did.

Just not the kind Timothy hoped for.

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When “Intent” Shows Up Too Late

Three weeks into the quarter, Timothy gets the long-awaited alert:

“🔥 High Intent Detected: CadenceForge is actively researching cybersecurity tools.”

The Shiny Intent Tool breathlessly explained why:

Timothy’s SDR team sprang into action:

“Hey, we saw you’re exploring cybersecurity solutions…”

Silence.

Then, finally, one reply from a friendly contact at CadenceForge:

“Appreciate the reach-out! We actually just wrapped up our vendor selection. We went with a different platform. Maybe next time!”

Timothy did the B2B equivalent of flipping a table.

That’s when the ugly truth hit him:

By the time the Shiny Intent Tool told them CadenceForge was “in market,” the deal was already done.

CadenceForge had clearly:

Timothy’s “intent data” was really just a delayed broadcast of a game that was already over.

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Enter ConnectCurator.ai (And a Very Different Kind of Signal)

A few days later, Timothy jumped on a call with a friend who casually asked:

“Wait… why are you waiting for CadenceForge to visit your site? Why don’t you look at what they’re actually doing out there?”

That’s how he discovered ConnectCurator.ai.

Instead of obsessing over who clicked your stuff, ConnectCurator focuses on what’s happening at your target accounts, and surfaces signals before they come knocking on your digital door.

Timothy decided to test ConnectCurator on that same account: CadenceForge.

What came back made him want to frame the report and hang it in the sales war room.

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Signal #1 – “They’re Quietly Gearing Up for Growth”

ConnectCurator surfaced this:

Signal: CadenceForge is expanding aggressively in North America, with a strong hiring focus on sales and customer success roles targeting Mid-Market and Enterprise segments.

Evidence (automatically pulled for Timothy):

ConnectCurator didn’t just say “they’re hiring.”

It told Timothy who they were hiring, for which segments, and in what region.

Why This Mattered for SentinelGuard (Timothy’s Company)

Timothy instantly translated this into opportunity:

In other words:

“CadenceForge is ramping up go-to-market in North America. As they scale sales and customer success, their need for reliable, scalable, and compliant cybersecurity grows with them.”

This was pre-intent in the classic sense.

They hadn’t:

But they were clearly moving into a phase where security would become a very real, very expensive concern.

If Timothy had this weeks or months earlier, his outreach could’ve sounded like:

“Hey, we noticed CadenceForge is doubling down on Mid-Market and Enterprise in North America. When GTM teams scale that quickly, your data exposure and security risks scale too.

We help companies at exactly this stage avoid painful, brand-damaging security incidents while keeping sales productive. Want to see how others in your situation handle it?”

That’s a very different conversation from:

“I see you downloaded our whitepaper yesterday…”

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Signal #2 – “Their Users Are Quietly Screaming”

ConnectCurator didn’t stop at hiring.

It pulled in real user sentiment around CadenceForge from public sources.

Signal: Despite positive feedback on user-friendliness, CadenceForge is struggling with technical instabilities and high costs, pushing some users to explore alternatives.

Evidence surfaced by ConnectCurator:

  1. Reddit conversations
    • ConnectCurator analyzed Reddit threads where users described CadenceForge using phrases that would make any product manager sweat:
      • “This platform used to be great, but it’s gone downhill.”
      • “Feels like a garbage platform some days.”
    • Complaints centered around reliability, outages, and general frustration.
  2. G2 review analysis
    • ConnectCurator also ingested and summarized G2 reviews, surfacing recurring themes like:
      • Emails and calendars disconnecting randomly
      • Outages that caused confusion:

        “The platform shows emails as failed even though they actually went out.”

      • Concerns about pricing vs. value:

        “Too expensive for something this unstable.”

Timothy read through the summarized evidence and thought:

“Okay… so they’re growing fast, but their customers are shouting at them in public.
That’s a huge risk for any SaaS brand.”

Why This Also Mattered for SentinelGuard

Security isn’t just firewalls and encryption. For a brand like CadenceForge, it’s also about:

Unhappy users plus outages plus high costs = a company that is:

Timothy realized:

“This gives me the perfect angle:

‘Hey CadenceForge, your customers are actively complaining about stability and reliability. If that ever crosses into anything that even smells like a security incident, it’s game over with your brand. Let’s make sure it never gets that far.’”

Again, this is before CadenceForge ever starts researching “cybersecurity vendors for sales engagement tools.”

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Traditional Intent vs. Proactive Signals (Timothy’s New Religion)

Timothy summarized his epiphany like this:

That difference — reactive clicks vs. proactive context — is what turned Timothy from “intent data fanboy” into “early signal evangelist.”

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What ConnectCurator.ai Actually Did Here

Behind the scenes, ConnectCurator.ai:

  1. Monitored CadenceForge across multiple public channels:
    • Hiring pages and job boards
    • Press/news
    • Reddit threads
    • G2 reviews
    • Website messaging, case studies, and more
  2. Extracted signals about:
    • Growth and expansion (North American GTM hiring)
    • Customer sentiment (reddit & G2 complaints)
    • Operational and reputational risk
  3. Mapped those signals to SentinelGuard’s core offerings:
    • Cybersecurity for fast-growing SaaS
    • Protecting revenue teams and customer data
    • Minimizing brand risk from breaches or failures
  4. Delivered those insights with context:
    • Plain-language explanations (“Why this matters for you”)
    • Evidence snippets (quotes, patterns, and examples)
    • Ready-to-use angles for outreach

So instead of:

“Some anonymous company clicked your pricing page.”

Timothy got:

“CadenceForge is scaling GTM in NA, has reliability issues their users are complaining about, and is entering a phase where security and trust are mission-critical.

Here’s how you talk to them about it — now, before they start shopping.”

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The Moral of Timothy’s Distressful Day

It wasn’t that the Shiny Intent Tool was “bad.”

It was that it only saw the world through the lens of engagement with SentinelGuard’s assets.

By the time those signals showed up, Timothy was playing catch-up.

ConnectCurator.ai flipped that model:

For RevOps, SalesOps, ABM, and founders, that’s the difference between:

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If You’re Tired of Being Vendor #4…

If Timothy’s story feels uncomfortably familiar — big spend on “intent,” still late to the party — you’re not alone.

ConnectCurator.ai helps you:

So the next time your team says:

“We’ll know they’re ready when they start visiting our site…”

You can smile and reply:

“Actually, we’ll know they’re ready long before that.”

And Timothy?
Let’s just say his Tuesdays are a lot less distressful now.

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If you’d like to see what ConnectCurator.ai would surface for your dream accounts, this is your cue to try it.