Marketo's stock jumped almost 78 percent on its first day, on the same morning Tableau went public. Wall Street wanted software in the cloud, and Marketo sold it to the marketing department. Its tools watched what a prospect did on a company's website and in its emails. Then they scored that person and sent the next message on their own. By 2013, marketers had budgets and data of their own, and Marketo gave them a way to prove what they earned.

Three Friends From Epiphany

Phil Fernandez, Jon Miller, and David Morandi had worked together at Epiphany, an earlier marketing software company. They founded Marketo in 2006 and set up in San Mateo, California. Their bet was that marketers would pay a monthly fee for one tool to run campaigns, track leads, and hand the warm ones to sales. Jon Miller became the public voice of the idea. He wrote guides that taught a new trade its playbook.

Private, Then Adobe

Marketo priced at $13 a share and began trading on the Nasdaq on May 17, 2013. The stock closed its first day at $23.10. Growth was strong, but profits never came, and the shares drifted. In 2016 Vista Equity Partners took Marketo private for about $1.79 billion. Two years later Vista sold it to Adobe for $4.75 billion. The product lives on today as Adobe Marketo Engage.

Cover: Peasant Family Going to Market, Martin Schongauer. Art Institute of Chicago, public domain. Chosen for a family on the road to market.