Hone builds AI that owns outcomes, not tasks: agentic systems that work towards goals over weeks and months, deploy themselves, and improve over time.

About Hone

Models keep getting smarter, but outside of coding most organizations can't absorb that intelligence, and the gap between model capability and the value derived from it keeps widening. The reasons are many, from human incentives to org design, but at the core we think it's a technology problem. Hone builds engines: AI systems that you hand a goal, like "keep the recruiting pipeline healthy." An engine builds itself, maintains its own agents and code, pulls in people when it needs judgment, and learns from every correction. Leading AI companies and global enterprises already run engines across funnel optimization, procurement, deal sourcing, asset management, financial risk, and product and customer delivery. We measure ourselves by the real-world economic impact our engines create, not benchmark scores.

In October 2026, we announced a $60M seed round from Benchmark and Index Ventures.

A little more about Hone

• Half our team are former founders: They’ve built companies, shipped products, and chosen Hone as the place to build next

• Our customers are building with AI themselves: Cognition, Modal and Lucanet already use Hone. Hear from them on our website

• Our founders have built from research to scale: They researched agents at Stanford, built the core of Devin at Cognition, led enterprise engineering at Mercor, and founded companies that reached over one million users

• Our values shape how we work: Own the Outcome, Set the Standard, Win with Class, and Commit to the Racing Line. Read more on our careers page

• Read more: Bloomberg, Index Ventures’ investment thesis, and our launch announcement

The Role

You'll build Hone’s growth marketing function from zero. You'll own how buyers discover Hone, understand what Engines make possible, and take the next step. That means setting up acquisition channels: the accounts, tools, tracking, content and first campaigns across search, paid media, social, email and partnerships.

This is a hands-on, experimental role. You'll find promising ways to reach buyers, get the first version live quickly, and turn early signals into repeatable sources of qualified demand. You'll decide where to focus, what to spend, and which ideas to improve, scale or stop.

You'll work directly with the founders, sales, GTM teams, partnering on the data and automation behind your campaigns. You'll own channel strategy, creative, distribution and conversion, with results measured through qualified demos and pipeline.

What You'll Work On

• Channel setup and first traction: establish acquisition channels from the ground up, including platform configuration, tracking, audiences, publishing workflows and initial campaigns

• Search and discovery: build our approach to SEO and visibility in AI search, identifying the questions buyers ask and creating useful pages and content that help them find Hone

• Paid acquisition: own channel selection, budgets, audiences, creative and offers, testing what generates qualified demand and scaling what works

• Content and distribution: turn product insights, customer experiences and company perspectives into writing, video and campaigns, with a deliberate plan for reaching the right people

• Website conversion: develop landing pages, sharpen messaging and calls to action, and test how we turn visits into relevant sales conversations

• Launches and campaigns: bring product announcements, customer stories and timely ideas to market through coordinated channels and follow-up

• Experimentation and measurement: run focused tests with clear hypotheses and success measures, connect results to qualified demos and pipeline, and turn what you learn into the next experiment

Requirements

• You've built acquisition channels from zero: setting up the tools, tracking and first campaigns yourself, then turning early traction into a repeatable source of demand

• You've personally owned an acquisition or pipeline target and can explain how your marketing contributed to it

• Deep expertise in at least one acquisition channel, with the resourcefulness to get unfamiliar channels off the ground

• Time at a fast-growing startup, or equivalent ownership growing a product or business

• You're scrappy and experimental: you find resourceful ways to reach buyers, launch tests quickly, and know when to iterate, double down or move on

• You're hands-on: you can write copy, launch campaigns, manage spend, publish content and improve a landing page yourself

• Strong writing and creative judgment: you can make a technical product understandable and give the right buyer a compelling reason to act

• Strong quantitative fundamentals: conversion rates, acquisition costs, funnel analysis, attribution limits and experiment design

• You're comfortable with analytics, CRM and marketing tools, and can work with technical teammates on tracking and automation

• You use AI tools every day to research, explore ideas, produce work and analyze results, while taking responsibility for quality and accuracy

Nice to Have

• You've marketed a technical or AI product, especially one introducing an unfamiliar category

• Experience across organic search, AI search visibility, paid search, paid social or lifecycle marketing

• You've built an audience, publication, community or business of your own

• Experience bringing customer stories to life through interviews, writing or video

• You've worked closely with sales to improve lead quality and understand which campaigns turn into customers

How We Hire

1. Intro with a co-founder

2. Marketing track record and portfolio deep dive

3. Channel strategy and campaign exercise

4. Two-day work trial in San Francisco

5. References

6. Offer

Logistics

• Location: San Francisco, in person, Sunday to Friday

• Compensation: Competitive salary + meaningful equity

• Visa: We sponsor visas and support you through the immigration process

• Benefits: Health and dental insurance, maternity and parental support, and relocation support