Intercom selects Fivetran to modernise data stack for growth

Intercom has announced its selection of Fivetran to assist in modernising its data stack, with an aim to evolve into a data-driven enterprise.

The company will leverage Fivetran's data pipelines to consolidate data from various third-party sources, thereby ensuring prompt access to insightful business information for key decision-makers.

The cooperation follows Intercom's operational issues with its former data transformation partner, which included data loss and quality concerns. Fivetran has been chosen for its reported speed, reliability, user-friendliness, and robust security. The platform integrates data from multiple Intercom sources like Salesforce, Marketo, billing systems, and social media platforms.

It's also played a critical role in helping Intercom transition from a legacy data warehouse to Snowflake by providing necessary connectors.

"Fivetran just works; our team no longer has to worry about our third-party data integrations," Director of Engineering at Intercom, Cormac McGuire, said.

"This means our engineers have more time to dedicate to strategic initiatives. Indeed, while two or three engineers used to spend all week managing integrations from all our vendor services to our previous data warehouse, with Fivetran and our new stack in place, it now takes less than half a week for one person."

Fivetran’s role in enhancing Intercom's data infrastructure underlines the reliance on these solutions as organisations scale and broaden their datasets. Founded in 2011, Intercom supports over 25,000 global organisations, facilitating more than 500 million messages and engaging with approximately 200 million people monthly. The need for a scalable, reliable data infrastructure was underscored by Intercom’s rapid growth and the high volume of interactions it manages.

"Intercom is a great example of a high-growth organisation which is putting data at the centre of everything it does," noted Rachel Thornton, Chief Marketing Officer at Fivetran.

"By modernising its data stack, Intercom has been able to put valuable insights about the company's marketing campaigns, financial performance and product development straight into the hands of key decision-makers, at speed and with great accuracy. We are delighted to be a core partner to Intercom's Data Platform team in its journey to improve data-driven decision-making at all levels of the organisation."

The partnership is part of Intercom’s broader strategy to enhance its technical capability and operational efficiency. Before adopting Fivetran, Intercom faced challenges maintaining optimal data quality and timely access to data, which is crucial for an AI-driven platform that depends heavily on accurate and prompt information for decision-making.

Through this integration, Intercom aims to optimise the time of its data engineers, freeing them from routine data management tasks and allowing them to focus on more strategic initiatives that could drive the company's growth.

Both companies have expressed enthusiasm about the collaboration, aiming for further innovations and improvements in data centralisation, security, and usability in the coming years.

The integration marks a significant milestone in Intercom’s data modernisation journey, as it continues to provide sophisticated customer service solutions globally.