Our Story

We Didn't Read About
Lead Gen in a Report.
We Lived It.

35+ combined years running lead generation at scale. Hundreds of millions in revenue generated. Every vertical from mortgage to Medicare. We built the platform we wished existed.

The Beginning

It started with a problem we couldn't solve with existing tools.

After two decades of running high-volume lead generation operations — processing millions of leads across mortgage, auto insurance, legal, solar, healthcare, and dozens of other verticals — we knew the routing platforms on the market were stuck in 2015.

LeadsPedia was powerful but expensive and rigid. Lead Prosper was affordable but too basic. boberdoo was established but aging. None of them had real compliance certifications. None of them had AI. None of them were built for the way modern lead gen actually works: multi-buyer distribution, real-time ping/post, compliance-first operations, and the need for speed measured in milliseconds.

So we built Lead Router. Not as a side project or a VC experiment, but as the platform two operators with 35+ combined years of industry experience would actually want to use every day. Every feature exists because we needed it ourselves. Every decision is informed by the pain of having done this at massive scale.

The Founders

Operators First. Founders Second.

DS

David Stodolak

Co-Founder & CEO

David brings 20+ years of battle-tested experience in lead generation and high-performance call center operations. Starting from the ground up as a call center rep, he built an eight-figure performance marketing business without outside capital — a testament to the operational discipline and market instinct he brings to Lead Router.

As CEO of Solar Direct Marketing and CRO of Connection Holdings, David has generated hundreds of millions in revenue for clients across solar, de-regulated energy, home improvement, health insurance, Medicare, debt relief, and home warranty verticals. His companies earned placement on Inc Magazine's list of America's Fastest Growing Companies for three consecutive years.

David is the host of The LFG Show, a podcast that has become a go-to resource in the performance marketing community, featuring conversations with the industry's top operators about what it actually takes to build and scale lead gen businesses. He's spoken at Affiliate World Asia, Europe, and Dubai across multiple years, and is recognized as one of the most respected voices in the call center and lead generation space.

20+

Years in Lead Gen

3x

Inc Fastest Growing

100s of M

Client Revenue

8-Figure

Business Built (No VC)

The LFG Show PodcastConnection Holdings CROSolar Direct Marketing CEOInc 5000 (3x)Affiliate World SpeakerCall Center Operations Expert
JA

Jason Akatiff

Co-Founder & CTO

Jason entered the affiliate marketing world in 2003 after dropping out of UC Santa Cruz and working various jobs — including selling for Tony Robbins. He taught himself SEO, discovered affiliate forums, and started with mortgage leads and media buying. Over the next two decades, he built and operated lead generation businesses across mortgage, payday, auto insurance, legal, mass tort, health insurance, solar, home services, financial newsletters, and dozens of other verticals.

In 2008, he founded A4D (Ads for Dough), purchasing a small affiliate network for $30K and growing it into one of the most respected performance marketing networks in the industry. With 2,000+ merchants and 17,000+ affiliates, A4D has generated over $500 million in online sales across 100+ verticals. He runs two businesses doing $60M+/year each, growing at 50-100% annually.

The turning point came when Jason pivoted from grey-hat offers to fully compliant, white-hat lead generation — building the kind of business that VCs and PE firms would want to acquire. That philosophy — own your assets, build for compliance, create long-term sellable value — is the DNA of Lead Router. He also founded NIB Direct (mass tort lead gen for law firms), BauBax (the most-funded clothing project in crowdfunding history), and Build with AI (a community for AI-first entrepreneurs).

Jason keynoted Affiliate Summit West 2018, the industry's largest conference, and has spoken at 30+ global events including Affiliate World Europe, Dubai, Mass Torts Made Perfect, and Everflow Masterclass. He's invested 1,300+ hours building with AI tools, making Lead Router one of the most AI-advanced platforms in the lead gen space.

22+

Years in Lead Gen

$500M+

Revenue Generated

100+

Verticals Operated

30+

Global Events Spoken

A4D Performance NetworkNIB Direct (Mass Tort)Affiliate Summit West KeynoteAffiliate World SpeakerBauBax (Crowdfunding Record)Build with AI CommunityEverflow Masterclass17,000+ Affiliates

The Journey

Two Decades of Lead Gen DNA

2003

Jason enters lead gen via affiliate marketing — mortgage leads, blackhat SEO, learning the craft from the ground up.

2006

David starts in call center operations, rapidly scaling from rep to running multi-vertical campaigns generating millions.

2008

Jason founds A4D Performance Network. Grows to 2,000+ merchants and 12,000+ affiliates.

2010s

Both operators expand across verticals: payday, auto insurance, legal, solar, home services, Medicare. Hundreds of millions in revenue generated collectively.

2015

David's companies land on Inc Magazine's Fastest Growing list — three consecutive years. Scales solar and energy lead gen nationally.

2017+

Jason keynotes Affiliate Summit West. Both speak regularly at Affiliate World events globally (Europe, Asia, Dubai).

2020s

The pain intensifies. Legacy platforms can't keep up with compliance demands, multi-buyer distribution complexity, and the speed modern buyers require.

2025

Lead Router development begins. Two decades of operational pain distilled into a compliance-first, AI-native lead distribution platform.

2026

AI engine expands: predictive scoring, anomaly detection, autonomous bid management. The platform that makes legacy routers obsolete.

Why We Built Lead Router

Because the alternatives aren't good enough.

The Pain

We lost deals because our platform couldn't pass security reviews.

What We Built

We built SOC 2 and HIPAA architecture from day one — not as a checkbox, but as the foundation.

The Pain

We spent hours configuring buyer specs that an AI could read in seconds.

What We Built

We built an AI assistant with 28 tools that imports posting specs from a URL in under 60 seconds.

The Pain

We watched leads fail to route and had no idea why.

What We Built

We built a routing engine that logs every decision with full transparency — which contracts matched, which didn't, and exactly why.

The Pain

We managed partner relationships through spreadsheets and emails.

What We Built

We built dedicated portals for partners, buyers, and admins — self-service dashboards that eliminate 80% of support tickets.

The Pain

We couldn't serve healthcare or financial services buyers.

What We Built

We built HIPAA-ready architecture with encryption, audit trails, and BAA support — opening a $2B+ market that non-compliant platforms can't touch.

The Pain

We wanted to license our platform to other agencies but couldn't.

What We Built

We built multi-tenant architecture with 64 isolated tables, per-tenant feature flags, and compliance floors — ready to license as SaaS.

Built by Operators.
For Operators.

We've been where you are. Let us show you what we built.