Want to acquire new customers and grow your company? The key is to use sales prospecting tools to identify potential leads and then connect with them in a meaningful and relevant way.
But which platforms are worth your time and money to help you find the best prospects and close more sales?
This blog post will look at the 23 top-ranking sales prospecting tools on the market and give you a brief overview of what each platform does and what tools are worth your investment.
Outline:
But first, let’s clarify what a sales prospecting tool is and why your sales team needs it. Badly!
A sales prospecting tool helps sales reps find and engage potential customers.
Most sales teams rely on these platforms to feed their sales pipeline, as they offer a fast and efficient way to find new leads. Salespeople can also use these tools to identify decision-makers within organizations and track the progress of their sales pipeline.
Sales prospecting tools are designed to make the process easier by giving you a starting point. They provide a database of potential leads and a wealth of information, including contact info, company info, and social media profiles.
They also enable you to track your progress and see which leads are more likely to convert into sales. With their help, you can focus your efforts on the most promising leads, build a strong pipeline, and increase your chances of making a sale.
Overall, by automating the process of identifying and qualifying leads, you can focus on selling rather than prospecting. Without modern sales and marketing automation, sales teams would be forced to rely on cold calls and email spamming, which can be both time-consuming and ineffective.
Sales prospecting tools can be complex, but first and foremost, they extract data from the internet to find potential leads, which is then sorted, organized into lists, and provided to salespeople.
These tools come in all shapes and sizes. Some of the most common types include platforms for:
Each is designed to do a specific task and can be incredibly effective when used correctly. For example, lead generation tools can help you find new leads by scanning the internet for potential customers, contact management platforms can help you keep track of all your contacts, while email marketing tools can help you build relationships with potential customers by sending them targeted emails.
While lead generation platforms are considered sales prospecting tools, some professionals tend to differentiate them. Their key point is that lead generation is all about creating a list of potential customers, whereas sales prospecting is all about reaching out to those customers and trying to convert them into buyers.
So, lead generation is a numbers game. The more leads you generate, the more chances you have of making a sale. But sales prospecting is all about quality over quantity. It’s about targeting the right leads and then personalizing your pitch to ensure they’re interested in what you offer.
Meanwhile, we stick to the idea that sales prospecting is a broader concept that includes several stages, and lead generation is the first.
With various prospecting tools available, it might be tempting to try them all. But who has time for that these days, really? Also, using too many platforms can be counterproductive and slow you down.
In fact, you need just one or two tools that can perform the following tasks:
Choosing the right software for the job can make all the difference in your sales success. So, which tool is right for you? It can be a daunting task. Hopefully, our guide will come in handy, with free and paid options in the list.
We’ve divided it into 5 sections for your convenience to make the right choice depending on the size of your business and budget.
*We’d like to emphasize that the below list doesn’t include all sales prospecting tools available.
The 1st section presents platforms featuring an all-in-one sales prospecting solution. Using them gives you a comprehensive toolset to meet all your prospecting needs. However, some of these tools might charge quite a lot for their services.
Snov.io is a comprehensive all-in-one platform for prospecting, encompassing all crucial tools for the rapid growth of your business. Each tool is a solution to a specific sales issue.
First, you can find prospects anywhere online with the advanced Email Finder and LI Prospect Finder tools. Then you can clean your email list with Email Verifier and start your cold outreach immediately with the highly personalized Email Drip Campaign feature.
You can also significantly improve your email deliverability and inbox placement with the Email Warm-up feature. And if you want your prospect information to be perfectly organized and link up all your sales processes within one system, use Snov.io’s well-crafted sales CRM system to manage and convert leads efficiently.
Using this platform is highly cost-efficient, as you can have all the above features and more at the price of just one tool.
Pricing: You can try the platform’s features by signing up; paid monthly plans start at $39/month.
Salesforce is a global company specializing in CRM solutions and offering business software on a subscription basis. The company boasts its CRM, which helps you personalize every experience along the customer journey. Its nearly 20 features cover all the aspects of prospecting, from lead generation to sales performance management and forecasting.
Pricing: Free trial; paid plans start at $25/month (billed annually).
Hubspot’s advanced all-in-one sales software allows you to track your leads’ visits to your website in real-time, determine the most promising prospects, and set up email notifications for your team.
When your list of the warmest prospects is built, you can engage them with email sequences, live chat, or making calls from inside your browser. These features create a sales intelligence ecosystem that allows you to reach more leads quickly, book more meetings, and focus your efforts on closing your deals.
Pricing: Free plan; monthly paid plans start at $45.
Crunchbase positions itself as an all-in-one prospecting solution powered by the leader in private-company data. With it, you can find news about 100,000+ technology companies, get an idea about the growth of different industries, and learn about partnerships.
The platform’s Sales Prospecting tool will help you search and qualify prospects based on location, industry, and funding history. The more you know about your prospects, the more chances you have of making a sale!
Pricing: Free trial; monthly paid plans start at $29.
Pipedrive is an all-in-one sales platform with features enabling you to prioritize deals, track performance, and predict revenue.
In addition to essential lead generation and management features, the tool offers real-time reports to show if you’re on track and gives you time to adjust your sales strategy if needed. The metrics can be customized for your business and accurately measure company performance against goals set.
Pricing: Free trial; paid plans start at $19.90/month.
This section includes platforms that are particularly good at helping you at the initial stages of your prospecting when you need to build your prospect list.
LinkedIn Sales Navigator feature is a goldmine for salespeople trying to find prospects and connect with key decision-makers and influencers in a specific industry. The tool is unrivaled for building lists of contacts most likely to buy from your business. These lists can be based on industry and location, which opens great opportunities for you to track leads who might be unavailable at the moment but could become prospects later on.
Advanced search filters provide detailed information about each prospect, and not only yours but your competitors’ as well! This way, you can be one step ahead of your competition with a detailed analysis of their customers, along with their contact details.
Pricing: Free trial; paid plans start at $79.99/month.
FollowerWonk specializes in people search on Twitter, which offers a wealth of opportunities to add new prospective customers to your list.
Using Twitter analytics and specific keywords in people’s bios, for example, “CMO,” you’ll create a list of CMOs, along with detailed info like their location, who they follow, and what topics they tweet about. Having your filtered list ready, you can contact your prospects directly, or you can find their contact info using other tools (see Section #3 of our guide).
Pricing: Free plan; paid plans start at $29/month.
Originally, AngelList was created to help startups and angel investors find more investment opportunities, employees, and partners. However, you can use it perfectly well as a directory of 100k+ companies you can filter by industry, company size, the number of employees, organization type, funding stage, and more.
Once you find someone that looks like they could be your prospect, you can add them to your list and connect directly through the website or using the contact details listed on their profile page.
Pricing: Contact the company for info on subscription plans.
Product Hunt is a place to discover new tech products and creations daily. The platform features highlights of top new products, and the community of geek enthusiasts can upvote their favorites.
The novelties also receive additional exposure on the company’s Twitter and Facebook feeds and newsletter. You can benefit from all this and build your perfect B2B prospect list by filtering through topics and finding companies interested in what you offer.
Pricing: Free.
LeadIQ is a new generation AI-powered sales prospecting tool that uses machine learning to find prospects based on your company’s data. The tool scans and analyzes websites and social media profiles and then notifies you when a potential match for your business is found.
Using the LeadIQ tool lets you capture and sync contact data to your sales tools, extract the information, and connect with the promising prospect—email them or add them to your list and contact them later.
With this tool, you can reach a top-tier personalization level of your outreach as you’ll get the power to follow your target accounts and know when they get promoted, leave a company, or start a new job.
Pricing: Free plan; monthly paid plans start at $85.
Capterra is a popular software comparison platform featuring different digital product and business listings. You can filter through topic and category types, compare, and save the favorites to your dashboard. This opens excellent opportunities to build your B2B prospect list for free!
Pricing: Free.
This section presents the platforms that enable you to find your leads and collect their contact details from websites and social media.
Hunter, previously known as Email Hunter, is a website and Chrome extension that finds email addresses behind any website. Its Domain Search email-finding tool provides a list of the people working in an organization with their names and email addresses.
With 100+ million email addresses indexed, various search filters, and accurate deliverability checks, the tool has been gaining popularity in recent years.
Pricing: Free plan; paid plans start at $49/month.
FindThetLead is an email-finding tool that uses data from multiple sources, including Google, Bing, and all kinds of social media, to find the contact information of potential business customers.
You can search email addresses by industry or type of business and then hone results based on location, company, job title, and other specific criteria, such as whether an individual is an influencer within their field.
Pricing: Free trial; monthly paid plans start at $49.
TAMI is a UK-based platform that finds all sorts of company information online. Using it, you can easily find verified emails, phone numbers, social media profiles, business locations, and even what technology they use for payment processing and shipping.
The service uses AI and patent technology to automatically search for contact information on the web, which you can then export to your CRM and build out your prospect list. TAMI refreshes all contact data in real time.
Pricing: Free trial; get in touch with the company for information on paid plans.
Datanyze is a SaaS prospecting platform that is especially good at finding accurate information about any business or individual. No need to do it manually—the platform with in-built AI and machine learning will uncover data points like social media profiles and websites for you in no time.
The convenient thing is that you can get contact details, including email addresses, direct dial, and mobile numbers, directly from LinkedIn profiles and company websites without leaving your browser and then export profiles directly from Google Chrome.
Pricing: free trial; monthly paid plans start at $29.
In this section, we’ve collected tools you can use to determine whether a prospect is worth your time and develop a more personalized approach.
ZoomInfo offers a massive B2B database with information you can use to qualify leads and create tailored prospect lists. The company boasts 30k+ businesses whose sales & marketing teams rely on its database to identify, connect with, and close more customers.
With the platform’s sales intelligence, you can quickly find the right people to target with your sales messaging. You’ll also have a better understanding of their business needs and be able to create content relevant to them.
Pricing: Free trial; contact the company for information on paid plans.
Leadshark is a B2B sales prospecting tool that allows you to effectively build lists of prospects and search for specific information about them for better qualification.
The company is proud of its lead database, which updates every time someone searches for leads. The database provides accurate contact information, including email addresses, phone numbers, social media profiles, and locations. This creates a roadmap for you to understand your leads’ needs, desires, and which time zone they’re in to help you monitor their schedule.
Pricing: Monthly paid plans start at $9.
Vainu delivers accurate and up-to-date company data. You get the information you need to plan and execute effective sales and marketing initiatives using 100+ filters to search for best-fit prospects from the platform’s real-time database encompassing some 65 million companies.
The service is costly. However, suppose you still decide to use it. In that case, you’ll get the most out of its advanced features. For example, your reaction will be the fastest possible when a new company matches your criteria, or a prospect shows signs of interest in your business.
Pricing: Free trial; annual plans start at an eye-watering €6,600.
Crystal Knows ambitiously calls itself “an adaptive sales platform that reveals the personality of any B2B prospect.” It means that by using it, you can confidently adapt to any buyer.
The platform analyzes public data and uses a unique algorithm to detail your prospect’s unique personality profile based on the DISC profile. For example, you’ll see your prospect’s communication preferences and how they tend to make decisions, so you can adapt your pitch and communication style and qualify your prospects with high precision.
Installing the Gmail plugin lets you get real-time suggestions about your prospect’s personality and communication style directly in Gmail.
Pricing: A free trial period; please contact the company for information about paid plans.
The last section of our guide is focused on companies specializing in sales engagement. They provide tools specially designed to help salespeople better interact with their prospects, build appropriate communication with them, and thus move them forward in the sales funnel faster.
Outreach is an AI-powered sales engagement platform that ramps revenue growth by optimizing every interaction throughout the customer lifecycle. It manages all customer interactions across email, voice, and social and leverages machine learning to help you forecast better and adjust your sales strategies.
Its real-time pipeline analysis and buyer engagement signals will be in handy to proactively fix deal risks and push the forecast higher.
Pricing: Please request pricing at the company’s website.
Marketo is one of the oldest B2B marketing automation platforms, operating since 2007.
One of its specific features is behavior tracking, which can help you make behavioral segmentation of your prospect database and better engage the right prospects. So, make the best of the platform’s rich behavioral data, built-in intelligence, and sophisticated journey flows to identify, engage, and accelerate your opportunities.
Marketo also integrates with other platforms such as Google Analytics, Salesforce, and Microsoft Dynamics 365 to achieve your shared, growing pipeline goals.
Pricing: Pricing is based on the database size; please get in touch with the company for more details.
Overloop is a modern sales prospecting platform that helps you better engage with your prospects by sending personalized multichannel outbound campaigns at scale and then tracking results. The platform offers a CRM and marketing automation tool together. This is a great combination to manage leads, nurture them over time, and follow up on them promptly.
Integrations with other platforms, like Salesforce, simplify the process of importing your contacts and keep them all in one place.
Pricing: $99/month plan includes all the platform’s features.
Mailshake is a sales prospecting tool that helps you identify the most engaged of your leads, so you can focus on leads that will convert. It’ll show key company decision-makers, so you know who to target for your next sales pitch.
The platform deploys an AI writer for custom new email content for your outbound outreach campaigns. It will tell you what messages resonate best with your prospects based on their behavior and interests. Even more, it will suggest changes in your email content that could help boost your response rate in the future.
A cherry on top, Mailshake offers a free email warm-up to give your email account a strong reputation before you start your campaigns.
Pricing: Monthly paid plans start at $58 with a 30-day full refund guarantee if you’re unsatisfied with the result.
Prospecting is key to a healthy sales pipeline, and sales teams know it. That’s why many rely on B2B sales prospecting tools to help them find new leads, qualify them, nurture them, and engage them to feed the sales pipeline.
If you’re looking for a way to streamline your sales process and boost your sales numbers, consider using sales prospecting tools. You can choose an all-in-one platform or select a pool of the most appropriate tools to hit your business targets and adjust your budget. These tools are constantly evolving and can make a big difference in your bottom line in the long run.
G2, the world's leading software marketplace, has recognized Snov.io as a top performer in email…
Discover how to spot and address common customer pain points in sales with practical examples…
Snov.io presents a fresh curation of the top free and paid LinkedIn automation tools for…
Check out the detailed LinkedIn weekly invitation limit guide. We collected the safest ways to…
Got promoted? Congrats! Here’s a detailed guide on how to add a promotion on LinkedIn…
Find out how to get someone’s email on Snapchat in a matter of seconds with…