Cold outreach has a near-zero signal-to-noise ratio. Most candidates who receive an unsolicited approach are not looking, not interested, and mildly irritated. Response rates in the low single digits are treated as a success.
The problem is not the message — it is the timing.
The Receptivity Window
Career decisions are not uniformly distributed over time. A candidate who ignored your message in January may be actively looking in March. The difference is not your pitch — it is their circumstances. A promotion denied, a new manager, a company restructuring, a competitor who just raised a round. These events create windows of receptivity that are brief and hard to see from the outside.
Intent signals are the mechanism for seeing them.
What Arc Tracks
Arc aggregates signals from multiple sources:
Direct signals — the candidate updates their LinkedIn summary, makes their resume visible on a job board, follows company pages in a new industry, or reduces the privacy settings on their profile.
Indirect signals — the company they work for announces layoffs, loses a major contract, appoints a new CEO, or opens a competing division. Employees at disrupted companies are statistically more mobile.
Market signals — demand for their skill set spikes in the market. When engineers with a particular specialisation are suddenly in high demand, those who have that specialisation become aware of their options.
The Access Score
Arc's Access Score (0–100) synthesises these signals into a single prioritisation metric. A score above 80 indicates the candidate is likely in a receptivity window right now. Below 30 indicates stable tenure with no current intent signals — approach them later, not now.
How to Use It
The candidates list and pipeline board are sortable by Access Score. During active sourcing, filter for candidates above a threshold and prioritise outreach to that cohort. As the score changes — which it does, as new signals emerge — the priority ordering updates automatically.
Timing does not replace relevance. The message still needs to be right. But sending the right message to the wrong candidate at the wrong time is waste. Sending it to the right candidate at the right time is a placement.