PartnerHQ

What do they actually do

PartnerHQ runs a live marketplace where B2B companies post paid “bounties” for warm introductions to specific buyer profiles and pay only when an intro results in a scheduled meeting. The public marketplace lists searchable bounties with filters (industry, function, amount), and the site advertises that average bounties are about $500 and payment is due only upon a booked meeting trypartnerhq.com and trypartnerhq.com/bounties and trypartnerhq.com/earn.

Workflows are simple: buyers create a bounty, describe their ideal customer profile, set the bounty amount, then receive intros by email and pay when a meeting is scheduled trypartnerhq.com. Introducers browse bounties, make email introductions to relevant contacts in their networks, and get paid when those intros turn into meetings trypartnerhq.com/earn. The site invites “Join 100+ companies selling with intros,” and their YC profile says the company launched in Feb 2024 with hundreds of paying companies and predominantly inbound demand (97% inbound), indicating the product is live and transacting trypartnerhq.com and Y Combinator profile.

Who are their target customer(s)

• Seed/early-stage startup founder or Head of Growth: Tiny sales team and shallow networks into target accounts make cold outreach inefficient; they want a predictable, pay-per-meeting way to reach decision-makers without hiring more SDRs.
• SMB sales or business development rep: Needs qualified meetings against a tight ICP but LinkedIn and cold email convert poorly; paying per scheduled meeting (around a $500 bounty) ties spend directly to booked conversations.
• Partnerships/channel manager at a growth-stage company: Relies on a few trusted connectors and struggles to surface new, reliable introducers in target industries, slowing partner pipeline and deals.
• Individual network-holder (ex-operator, advisor, VC, recruiter): Has valuable relationships but lacks a simple place to find paid intro opportunities and track/payouts; wants low-friction monetization paid only when meetings occur.
• Enterprise sales leader seeking targeted executive meetings: Teams spend months and large budgets to secure a single qualified enterprise conversation; warm, trusted intros can shorten cycles and reduce wasted qualification time.

How would they acquire their first 10, 50, and 100 customers

• First 10: Founder-led outreach to personal networks and inbound leads; manually seed bounties for known startups, white-glove onboarding/matchmaking, and waive/credit initial fees to prove ROI quickly trypartnerhq.com and trypartnerhq.com/earn.
• First 50: Turn early wins into short case studies and run referral programs for both buyers and introducers; targeted outbound to Seed founders/Heads of Growth via email, accelerator channels, and communities while leveraging the live marketplace and inbound traction for social proof Y Combinator profile and trypartnerhq.com/bounties.
• First 100: Layer in low-cost paid (LinkedIn) and reseller partnerships (accelerators/VCs/agencies); offer a productized enterprise pilot with guaranteed intros, and automate onboarding plus basic introducer verification/ratings to improve conversion and repeat use Y Combinator profile.

What is the rough total addressable market

Top-down context:

Sits within B2B lead generation, partnerships, and sales development budgets where companies pay to secure qualified meetings as inputs to pipeline. Warm introductions directly compete with cold outreach tools and appointment-setting services for the same spend.

Bottom-up calculation:

If 60,000 B2B companies buy 25 warm-intro meetings per year at an average $500 bounty, that implies ~$750M in annual GMV on intros; with a 20% marketplace take rate, TAM for marketplace revenue would be roughly ~$150M. The $500 average bounty is based on PartnerHQ’s stated average trypartnerhq.com.

Assumptions:

• 60k B2B companies globally are willing to pay per meeting for targeted intros.
• Each buys 25 meetings/year on average via a marketplace rather than agencies or cold outreach.
• Marketplace take rate ~20% (illustrative; actual fee structure may differ).

Who are some of their notable competitors

• Connect The Dots: Relationship graph indexing who-knows-who to find warm paths into accounts; helps users identify introducers based on real relationships.
• Affinity: Relationship intelligence CRM used by dealmakers to track networks and identify best paths for introductions to targets.
• Crossbeam: Partner ecosystem platform that maps account overlaps to request partner intros and accelerate co-selling.
• Reveal: Partner account mapping and co-selling tool that enables intros from partners into target accounts.
• CIENCE: Appointment-setting and lead generation agency that sells pay-per-meeting outcomes as an alternative to a marketplace model.