What Your Competitors Are Tracking (And You Are Not)

The gap between the best-sourced VC funds and the average is widening. While most funds still rely on PitchBook queries and warm intros, the top performers have built sourcing systems that track data most investors do not even think about.

What Top Funds Track

Employee Review Velocity

Glassdoor and Indeed reviews are a surprisingly powerful signal. A company that goes from 5 reviews to 50 reviews in three months is growing fast. The content of reviews also reveals operational maturity — comments about rapid growth, new product launches, and leadership changes all provide signal.

GitHub and Developer Activity

For technical companies, open source activity is a leading indicator. A project that jumps from 500 to 5,000 GitHub stars in a quarter has captured developer attention. Contributor growth, issue activity, and release frequency all provide signal.

Job Description Language

The specific language in job postings reveals strategic priorities. A company that suddenly starts posting roles mentioning "enterprise," "compliance," or "SOC 2" is moving upmarket. One that posts for "growth marketing" and "product-led growth" is investing in self-serve. The language changes before the strategy becomes visible.

Web Technology Stack Changes

Tools like BuiltWith track technology changes on company websites. A startup that adds Salesforce, Marketo, and a payment processor is building commercial infrastructure. One that adds Datadog and PagerDuty is scaling its engineering operations.

Social Media Engagement Patterns

Not follower counts — engagement patterns. A company whose LinkedIn posts go from 10 likes to 500 likes is reaching a new audience. Twitter engagement spikes often precede press coverage.

Patent and Trademark Filings

IP activity reveals product strategy. A company filing patents in a new technology area is investing in long-term competitive advantage. Trademark filings reveal brand and product expansion plans.

What Most Funds Track (And Why It Is Not Enough)

Most funds track:

• Crunchbase funding round data (lagging, by the time it is in Crunchbase everyone knows)
• PitchBook company profiles (comprehensive but query-based, not signal-based)
• Newsletter deal flow (curated by someone else's thesis, not yours)
• Conference attendance lists (useful but narrow)

The gap is that these sources are retrospective and widely available. They tell you what already happened, and they tell everyone at the same time.

Closing the Gap

You do not need to build a custom data team to track these signals. You need a system that monitors them against your thesis and surfaces the most relevant changes daily. The best funds in the world spent years and millions building this capability internally. Signal-based tools make it available to any fund willing to adopt them.

The question is not whether your competitors are tracking these signals. They are. The question is whether you are.