Crosschq’s Playbook for Building a New Category: How They’re Defining ‘Hiring Intelligence’
When you look at the HR tech landscape, it’s easy to get lost in a sea of overlapping categories and buzzwords. In a recent episode of Category Visionaries, Mike Fitzsimmons shared how Crosschq is cutting through this noise to establish “hiring intelligence” as a distinct and vital category.
The Problem That Sparked a Category
The genesis of hiring intelligence comes from a stark reality: “hiring still in this country has a 45% fail rate, which means that our companies are ROI negative on almost half of the hires we make,” Mike explains. This systemic problem pointed to a bigger issue: the lack of data-driven decision-making in hiring.
Defining Hiring Intelligence
“We kind of stood up this term of hiring intelligence because we didn’t think there was good definition for what we’re doing,” Mike shares. At its core, hiring intelligence is about “trying to infuse as much data in every aspect of the hiring process to ultimately optimize processes and drive quality of hire.”
Navigating the Category Landscape
The HR tech ecosystem is complex, with established categories like talent analytics and talent intelligence. As Mike explains, “You actually have a category called talent intelligence, which has leaned more towards internal mobility and things of that nature.”
This complexity required careful positioning. Rather than trying to fit into existing categories, Crosschq chose to define something new: “We’re not trying to confuse anybody anymore. But for us, when we said, hey, we’re just going to stand up and own this, because we don’t think anybody else in the world is doing this in the ways we are.”
Working with Analysts
Building a new category requires strong relationships with industry analysts. Mike emphasizes that this is “vital, right. Because they’re the ones that are going to be talking about it, especially on the influence with some of these enterprise buyers who are turning to a lot of these analysts as core centers of influence to help them navigate where they need to be investing.”
However, he advises a measured approach: “Gartner can be a black box, and I think you have to earn your seat at the Gartner table, and that takes time.” Instead of fixating on top-tier firms immediately, he recommends working with a broader range of influencers: “There’s a whole cohort that’s not Gartner that are influencers, right?”
Proving the Category Through Results
Rather than relying solely on marketing to establish the category, Crosschq focuses on delivering concrete value. Mike shares examples of how their platform has revealed unexpected insights:
- Companies discovering the true cost of their Indeed hiring spend when factoring in quality of hire
- Organizations learning that their assessment tools were actually recommending less successful candidates
The Future of Hiring Intelligence
Mike sees hiring intelligence following the same trajectory as sales intelligence, just on a delayed timeline. “Hiring is ten years behind sales and everything,” he notes. “Revenue intelligence is a very mature category on the sales side of the world of just being able to better visualize your pipelines and optimize and all those good things. We have a fundamental vision that hiring intelligence is going to be the same thing.”
The goal? Making hiring intelligence “an absolute necessity for every organization to have a platform by which they can better forecast and optimize their hiring.”
Lessons for Category Creators
Crosschq’s approach to category creation offers several key insights for B2B founders:
- Start with a fundamental problem that existing categories don’t address
- Build relationships with analysts at all levels, not just top-tier firms
- Prove the category through concrete customer outcomes
- Position yourself in relation to adjacent categories without creating confusion
- Focus on demonstrating value rather than just marketing the category
For founders looking to create new categories, Mike’s experience suggests that success comes from balancing vision with practical execution. It’s not enough to claim a new category – you have to prove its value through real customer outcomes while building the ecosystem of influencers who will help establish its legitimacy.