Too Much Noise, Not Enough Signal

TrueNAS is a globally recognized name in enterprise data storage. Their sales organization spans territories across the United States and Western Canada, with an SDR team that prospects into system administrators, IT directors, infrastructure managers, and storage architects at companies ranging from mid-market to large enterprise. With deal sizes in the tens of thousands and sales cycles averaging six months, every prospecting hour counts. It is a nuanced ICP where job titles alone rarely tell the full story.

Before Knock2, TrueNAS had already tried intent data. A previous vendor (Deliverr) flooded their Salesforce with 500 to 1,000 unqualified leads per day. Without proper filtering, territory alignment, or ICP scoring, the data overwhelmed the sales team rather than enabling it.

"The feedback wasn't great on the quality. It was basically dead on arrival. My SDRs sat down and were like, this is so much noise. I don't even know what to focus on here."

Casey Abbott

Director of Revenue Operations, TrueNAS

Casey needed a fundamentally different approach. Not more leads. Better signals. Something that would tell his reps which companies were actively researching TrueNAS products so they could prospect with precision instead of spraying and praying.

Signal Over Volume

• Intent, not just leads. Rather than dumping thousands of raw leads into Salesforce, Knock2 surfaces the companies showing genuine buying intent: who is visiting, what pages they are viewing, and how engaged they are. Reps focus on accounts that matter.
• Salesforce-native integration. One-click OAuth connection with automatic lead source tagging, CRM deal stage visibility, and the ability to filter out existing customers, active opportunities, and partner accounts directly within the dashboard.
• Enterprise-grade transparency. TrueNAS ran a full security evaluation before onboarding. Their business operations, IT, and dev ops teams reviewed Knock2's data architecture and documentation. Knock2 passed the evaluation without requiring custom contracts or complex procurement.

Building Together

What made TrueNAS's adoption of Knock2 different was not just the technology. It was the partnership. From day one, the SDR team shared the specific realities of their workflow directly with Knock2's product engineering team, and enhancements shipped fast.

• Territory-based filtering. TrueNAS's reps are assigned geographic territories spanning dozens of states plus Western Canada. The team needed multi-select state filters at both the contact and account level to see only the records in their territory. Knock2's engineering team deployed this enhancement within 24 hours.
• Title precision. In enterprise storage sales, "IT Director" at a 10,000-person company is a fundamentally different buyer than "IT Director" at a 200-person company. The team needed "contains" and "does not contain" filters for job titles so they could include terms like "systems" while excluding "systems analyst." Knock2 shipped this in the same sprint.
• Performance at scale. TrueNAS generates massive web traffic, producing 50,000+ account records per month. Knock2 identified the bottleneck and worked with the team to implement a 7-day default view window, dramatically improving load times while matching the daily cadence reps actually work in.
• Smarter ICP scoring. The team refined their ICP definition together with Knock2, treating it like onboarding a new sales hire, so the AI scoring could meaningfully separate signal from noise across thousands of records.
• Buying committee discovery. Different company sizes require different outreach strategies. For companies under 1,000 employees, an IT Director is a primary buyer. At larger organizations, niche titles like Storage Director or Infrastructure Architect take priority. Knock2 is building segmented buying committee logic based directly on this feedback.

Intent First, Research Second

TrueNAS's SDR team developed a distinctive sales motion powered by Knock2 that reflects a hard-won insight: telling a prospect "I saw you on our website" often falls flat. What works is knowing which companies are actively researching, then prospecting into those accounts with the right message to the right person.

This intent-first, research-second approach means every touchpoint is relevant and timely. The SDR is not guessing. They know the account is in-market.

$70K Deal Closed at Half the Typical Sales Cycle

TrueNAS's enterprise deals typically take six months to close. With Knock2, the team identified, researched, and closed a $70,000 deal in roughly half that time. The difference: instead of working cold accounts, the SDR team engaged a company already showing active buying signals on the TrueNAS website. By the time a rep reached out, the prospect was already deep in their evaluation. That head start compressed the entire cycle.

"I just wanted to give you a shout out, John. We just closed our first 70K deal that was a Knock2 lead. Happy Friday."

Casey Abbott

Director of Revenue Operations, TrueNAS

The deal validated not just the tool, but the entire approach: signal-driven prospecting outperforms volume-driven lead dumps. When reps know an account is in-market before making the first call, the sales cycle compresses naturally. And with enterprise deals of this size typically taking six months, early wins like this point to a significant shift in pipeline velocity.

From Tool to Operating System

TrueNAS continues to deepen its use of Knock2. On the roadmap, built directly from their input:

• Segmented buying committees that automatically surface different roles based on company size and industry vertical.
• Automated prospecting workflows that identify high-intent accounts, discover the relevant buying committee, and route contacts directly into Gong sequences or Salesforce without manual steps.
• Omnichannel outreach from within Knock2 including LinkedIn connection requests, voice notes, email, and direct calls from a single interface, turning daily prospecting into something that feels effortless.