Cold email has a glaring flaw—it’s the very fact that you’re sending a cold email. People have an inherent distaste for it, leading to marketers losing leads from the very first email they send.
You can’t sell on the first email. But, you can make a strong introduction that starts a conversation. All it takes is a well-thought-out personalization strategy.
We’re not just talking about first names, company details, or job positions—everybody does this. Standing out requires relevant, in-depth personalization through lead intelligence.
- What is lead intelligence?
- Types of lead intelligence
- Lead intelligence and cold outreach
- Lead intelligence software
What is Lead Intelligence and Why Include it In Cold Email
Let’s say you’ve got an email list with prospects' first name, company, and job position. That’s just contact information. Now imagine if you knew specific details regarding company updates, industry news, or specific actions prospects made. That’s what lead intelligence is all about.
Instead of generic personalization, you can send your prospects timely, relevant, and valuable cold emails, incorporating value propositions and unique selling points to a prospect’s specific need.
This makes lead intelligence an integral step in every sales process, resulting in a more nuanced offer that makes the most sense from your prospects’ perspective.
Types of Lead Intelligence to Leverage in Email Marketing
Including lead intelligence in your sales process can take time, especially if you do it manually. Although automated enrichment options are available, they can be complex and costly. Here are some of the most popular types of lead intelligence you can use today:
Behavioral Data/Activity from Website Visitors
Tracking your site visitors' activity provides information such as the pages they frequent, the content they engage with most, or how long they stay on a page. You can use this data to enrich inbound outreach campaigns for warm leads.
Contact Information and Company Details
Whether you’re scraping contact information through lead finder tools or a subscription form on your website, a prospect’s contact information and company details should always be included. The data becomes the foundation for lead enrichment and qualification.
Demographics
Lead scoring, qualification, and building ICPs rely on understanding your target prospects’ demographics. Marketers can use demographic data to segment prospects, making personalization at scale possible.
Lead Scoring
SDRs should focus their effort on high-value, quality leads. These leads can afford your solution, are in the market for a solution, and have the authority to purchase your solution. We identify such leads through lead scoring or qualification frameworks.
Email Engagement Data
Are prospects consistently engaging with your emails? Which prospects ignore your emails or send your emails to spam? Prospects who engage with your emails have a higher chance of converting, making it essential to understand key email marketing metrics.
Public Social Media Accounts
Professional social media platforms like LinkedIn are the best places to enrich your lead list. Even without automation tools, you can easily find your prospect and see publicly available information that will significantly improve your cold outreach efforts.
Company News and Updates
Instantly B2B Finder can help you find company news and updates and automatically include that information in your outreach campaigns, streamlining enrichment. It’s one of the most cost-effective lead intelligence tools since you don’t have to spend on extra software.
How to Include Lead Intelligence in Cold Outreach Campaigns
Integrating lead intelligence into cold outreach can be as simple or complex as needed. It can qualify leads, enrich cold emails, or help SDRs close a sale. Here are examples of how it can be used in your cold outreach campaigns:
Lead Generation and Qualification
Marketers can streamline the sales process by using lead intelligence data to qualify leads as you do lead generation. For example, using Instantly B2B Lead Finder allows you to look for verified prospects that fit your ICP frameworks through advanced search filters.
Email Copy Enrichment at Scale
Several automation tools can enrich your email list with relevant information from platforms like LinkedIn. Since it's hyper-personalized, you can then use the information to create a relevant, timely, and unique email copy.
If you want a more streamlined approach, you can use Instantly B2B Lead Finder’s “News” filter to see a prospect’s milestones, news, or company updates, which you can then include automatically in your email copy for every prospect on your list.
Building Buyer Profiles
Streamlining lead qualification demands that we build our buyer profiles first. Lead intelligence helps us develop a buyer profile by allowing us to create a tailored assessment of how well our services align with prospect needs.
Lead Intelligence Tools to Checkout This 2024
The best way to utilize lead intelligence is through automation. Here are the top tools we recommend in 2024.
Instantly B2B Lead Finder
Enhancing lead lists, finding prospects that fit your buyer personas, and building verified email lists has never been easier, thanks to Instantly B2B Lead Finder.
With the new “News” filter, you can create hyper-personalized, relevant, and timely email copy for qualified and verified leads with just a few clicks.
Pricing:
- Growth Leads - $37.9/mo (billed annually)
- 1000 Verified Leads monthly
- Hyper Leads - $169.3/mo (billed annually)
- 10,000 Verified Leads monthly
Albacross
If inbound marketing generates most of your leads, Albacross is a must-try. It can track user activity on your site, score purchasing intent, and reveal B2B companies that visit.
Not only can it reveal which companies visit, but it also helps users find decision-makers within those companies.
Pricing:
- Self Service - $85.51/mo.
- 100 identified companies
- Growth - Custom pricing
LinkedIn Sales Navigator
Sales Navigator is one of the most powerful lead intelligence platforms. You can enrich lead lists and find recently active prospects, see buyer intent data, and gain access to InMail (the ability to message members without connections directly).
Pricing:
- Core - $70/mo.
- Advanced - $117/mo.
- Advanced Plus - Custom pricing
Key Takeaways
Lead intelligence data transforms cold outreach into strategic, enriched, and hyper-personalized introductions. Marketers can tailor value propositions to prospects’ relevant and timely needs. As a quick recap, here are some essential details you might’ve missed:
- Lead intelligence grants access to behavioral data, intent data, and demographics
- Lead intelligence data can be found using enrichment or automation tools
- Popular examples of lead intelligence include lead scoring and company updates
- It can be used in lead qualification, building buyer personas, and copy enrichment
With lead intelligence ready, all that’s left is to send hyper-personalized outreach emails to verified and qualified leads. There’s no better tool on the market for that than Instantly.ai—Try it today!