Our Story – Built by Operators Who’ve Had to Make Payroll
How We Discovered a Better Blueprint for Growing Technical Companies
Industrious Growth was not built by career marketers.
It was built by operators — people who’ve had to make payroll, fix broken systems, and figure out how revenue actually gets generated when the pressure is real.
Where the Blueprint Started
Scott Dalgleish didn’t start his career in marketing.
He started as an electrical engineer in a Folgers coffee plant.
The lessons came quickly:
- Technical truth is often ignored inside organizations
- Bureaucracy kills potential
- Most people cling to the familiar, even when the familiar is failing
Watching solvable problems go unsolved left a mark. What Scott didn’t realize at the time was that these early experiences were quietly shaping a different blueprint for how technical companies grow — one grounded not in traditional marketing theory, but in engineering discipline, software, creativity, and truth.
Those ideas would later become foundational to Industrious Growth.
A Startup, Explosive Growth, and a Pattern Emerging
After moving to Boulder, Scott joined a tiny data-storage company called Spectra Logic — 12 people, $2M in revenue.
Over time, the company grew to more than 360 employees and $63M in revenue.
As Chief Operating Officer, Scott was placed wherever the business was struggling. His role wasn’t to be “the expert.” It was to listen, observe, experiment — and fix what others couldn’t.
One assignment changed everything:
Investigate why the company was getting so little return from major investments in trade shows, outbound lead lists, and PR campaigns.
How could the company be growing rapidly while traditional marketing produced so few sales?
The answer turned out to be simple — and uncomfortable:
High-intent buyers were already finding the company online at the exact moment urgency existed and they were ready to champion a purchase order internally. Those buyers converted at rates traditional marketing couldn’t match — at a fraction of the cost.
This wasn’t brilliance.
It was observation, curiosity, and pattern recognition — the core skills engineering teaches.
It was the first component of the growth system Industrious Growth still uses today.
A Basement Startup, Creative Experimentation, and a Hard Lesson
After Spectra Logic, Susan and Scott Dalgleish started Dragonfly Innovation, a small creativity-focused company selling art kits designed to teach innovation skills to kids. During this period, both Scott and Susan were deeply involved in Destination Imagination, a global creative problem-solving organization.
That work reshaped how they thought about problem-solving and growth. It reinforced the importance of:
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Seeing patterns others miss
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Inventing new approaches when old ones fail
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Combining engineering rigor with creative thinking
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Solving problems sideways when straightforward paths are blocked
Early sales efforts failed using traditional marketing approaches — so they experimented instead.
They turned to early Google Ads.
They built landing pages before landing pages were common.
They tested messaging nobody else was trying.
Traffic came in. Sales followed.
They proved the web could sell even niche products — when engineering discipline and creative experimentation were applied together.
But they also learned a critical business truth:
Even efficient marketing fails when margins don’t support the business. Spending $30 on Google Ads to make a $15 profit on an art kit didn’t work.
Dragonfly Innovation closed, but the creative and technical foundation built there became indispensable — especially for higher-value technical products.
Innovation expertise became the second pillar of the blueprint.
Fixing a Company on the Brink
Scott later joined Phase IV Engineering, a contract engineering firm focused on RFID and wireless sensing.
The company was in serious trouble:
- Projects over budget
- Unhappy customers
- Almost no inbound leads
- A stagnant website
- Leadership clinging to outdated marketing assumptions
The turnaround started with engineering execution. Then Scott and Susan overhauled the website.
The website overhaul was treated like an engineering project: data-driven, iterative, measurable. Susan deployed Google Ads carefully. Results were tracked like taking data on an engineering test.
Unlike Dragonfly Innovation’s art kits, spending $30 on Google Ads to sell a $3000 sensor system worked great. For high-value technical services, the results were immediate.
Within days, new customers were calling — not because they were sold to, but because they were actively searching for help and found exactly what they needed.
Phase IV was rebuilt from near failure into a thriving engineering business. Scott later became CEO and ultimately purchased the company. Susan took over the marketing.
From Services to Products — and a Scaled Exit
Conventional wisdom said a contract engineering firm couldn’t become a product company.
Susan, running web marketing as a contractor, and Scott, overseeing product and technical strategy, didn’t accept that assumption.
Using profits from services work, they bootstrapped an industrial IoT sensor platform: Leap Sensors®.
The product launched. The web marketing launched.
The market responded immediately.
Growth came fast — faster than cash reserves.
Then acquisition offers followed.
Leap Sensors was acquired by WIKA, a global industrial instrumentation company with the scale to take the product worldwide.
This wasn’t a story about being “great.”
It was a story about:
- Leveraging strong engineering to build products people genuinely needed
- Listening to the market and identifying what motivates buyers to champion a PO
- Making products easy to find online — where modern industrial buyers already search
That combination is rare. And when applied correctly, it’s powerful.
Why Industrious Growth Exists
After the acquisition, Susan founded and now runs Industrious Growth, applying these hard-won lessons to other technical companies facing similar challenges.
Scott serves as Senior Advisor, contributing strategic insight, pattern recognition, and operator-level experience — without running day-to-day operations.
Together, they focus on the work that improves companies fastest:
Web marketing that generates high-intent, high-value, PO-ready sales leads.
Industrious Growth intentionally works with a narrow group of technical companies — roughly the top 2% — who:
- Have something genuinely valuable to offer
- Value truth over politics
- Value results over protecting feelings
- Prefer technical rigor to marketing fluff
- Are willing to face hard facts and change what’s holding them back
If that sounds like you and you are looking for industrious growth, you may be in the right place.
Contact Us
Send us a message by clicking here.
Give us a call: 303-879-8791
Send us an email: sales@IndustriousGrowth.com
Book a web meeting with us by clicking on this link.
Want to partner with a true digital marketing specialist focusing on technical products? Let’s talk about your website, SEO, and growth strategy. Whether you’re searching for the best digital marketing company, a hands-on marketing strategist, or a specialized SEO agency for manufacturing.
Our ultimate goal is not just to market your products, but to be a key part of your Industrious Growth.
