If you’ve ever sent a campaign to a list of B2B leads and watched half your emails bounce—or worse, get marked as spam—you know how brutal bad data can be. Hunting down accurate email addresses and up-to-date contact details is nobody’s idea of fun, but if you want results, you can’t avoid it. This guide is for sales and marketing folks who want to stop wasting time (and money) on leads with missing, old, or flat-out wrong info. We’ll walk through how to use Dropcontact to clean up your lists, find valid emails, and give your outreach a real shot.
No fluff, just a step-by-step on what actually works—and what to skip.
Why Bother Enriching Your B2B Leads?
You can buy or scrape all the leads you want, but most lists are a mess. Here’s what happens if you don’t enrich your data:
- High bounce rates: Damages your sender reputation, lands you in spam, and lowers deliverability.
- Wasted time: Your team chases ghosts—old job titles, wrong companies, dead email addresses.
- Lousy personalization: You can’t tailor your outreach if you don’t know who you’re talking to.
Enriching leads means filling in the blanks: fresh email addresses, correct names and titles, LinkedIn profiles, and company info. Do it right, and you’ll reach real people—not just empty inboxes.
What Does Dropcontact Do—And What Doesn’t It Do?
Dropcontact promises to find and verify professional emails, update info, and fill in gaps in your B2B lists. But let’s cut through the marketing talk:
What works: - Finds and validates most work emails (especially for professionals in Europe). - Updates job titles and company info. - Fills in missing first/last names, company names, and LinkedIn URLs. - Integrates with popular CRMs (Pipedrive, HubSpot, Salesforce, etc.) and tools like Google Sheets.
What doesn’t: - Not perfect for every market. Results are best for European leads; US data is decent but not bulletproof. - Won’t return personal emails (Gmail, Yahoo, etc.)—it’s focused on business addresses. - Can’t work miracles with truly old, garbage data. If your list is from 2014, don’t expect magic.
Bottom line: It’s one of the more reliable enrichment tools out there, but don’t expect 100% accuracy. No tool can deliver that.
Step 1: Prep Your Lead List
Before you throw your list into any tool, do a little cleanup. You’ll get better results and avoid wasting credits.
- Ditch obvious junk: Remove leads without a company name, or with weird email domains (e.g., “@email.com”).
- Make sure you have: First name, last name (if possible), company name, website, and any existing email addresses.
- Format for upload: Dropcontact handles CSV, Excel, or direct integrations. If you’re using a CRM, check if Dropcontact offers a native integration—it’ll save you a bunch of headaches.
Pro tip: If you’re scraping leads, don’t just grab emails. Company and job info make enrichment way more accurate.
Step 2: Choose How You’ll Use Dropcontact
Dropcontact gives you a few ways to work:
1. Web app (upload CSV/Excel)
- Good for one-off jobs or smaller lists.
- Drag and drop your file; mapping fields is straightforward.
- You’ll see a preview before the tool runs, so you can catch mistakes.
2. CRM Integrations
- Connect Dropcontact to your CRM (HubSpot, Salesforce, Pipedrive, etc.).
- Set up automatic enrichment: new leads, or the whole database, get updated in the background.
- No need to futz with files—just let it run.
3. API
- For the tech-savvy or teams with custom workflows.
- Real-time enrichment as leads come in.
- Useful if you’re building your own lead-capture system.
Which should you pick?
If you’re just getting started, use the web app or CRM integration. The API is great, but you’ll need dev resources.
Step 3: Run Your List Through Dropcontact
Here’s how it usually goes:
- Upload or sync your list.
- Map your fields: Make sure Dropcontact knows what’s what (first name, company, etc.).
- Choose enrichment options: You can often pick what to enrich—emails, job titles, LinkedIn, etc.
- Start the process: Depending on your list size, you might wait a few minutes or a couple of hours.
When it’s done, you’ll get back:
- Validated business emails (with confidence scores)
- Corrected names and company info
- Job titles, company websites, LinkedIn URLs
- Notes on what was changed or filled in
What’s worth enriching?
Always go for email and company data. LinkedIn URLs are nice to have for personalization, but don’t pay extra for bells and whistles you won’t use.
Step 4: Review and Export Your Results
Don’t just trust any enrichment tool blindly. Scan your results before blasting out emails.
- Spot-check a sample: Are the emails and names correct? Any weird domains slipping through?
- Look for “guessed” emails: Dropcontact is clear about which emails are verified and which are best-guess. Be cautious with guesses—these addresses might bounce.
- Remove low-confidence data: If you see confidence scores below 90%, consider dropping those leads or reaching out via LinkedIn instead.
Pro tip: If you find a lot of “guessed” or low-confidence emails, double-check your input data. Sometimes bad input equals bad output.
Step 5: Import and Use Your Enriched Leads
Now you’ve got a clean, enriched list. Here’s how to make the most of it:
- Import back into your CRM or outreach tool. Use tags or custom fields to note enrichment status or email confidence.
- Prioritize high-confidence leads for email campaigns. Save the rest for LinkedIn or phone outreach.
- Keep your list fresh: Set up automatic enrichment if you can. People change jobs constantly; stale data gets you nowhere.
What to avoid:
Don’t just dump every “enriched” lead into a campaign. Quality matters more than quantity. You’re better off with 100 real contacts than 1,000 guesses.
What About Privacy and Compliance?
Dropcontact claims GDPR compliance and doesn’t store or resell your data. That’s a good start, but remember:
- You’re still responsible for how you use the data.
- Always have a legit reason to contact people (don’t spam).
- If you’re working with European leads, double-check your opt-in practices.
If you’re in doubt, talk to your legal team. Don’t rely on a SaaS company’s boilerplate.
What to Ignore (or Watch Out For)
A few things to keep in mind:
- Don’t believe the “zero bounce” hype. No enrichment tool can guarantee 100% accuracy. Expect some bounces, and monitor your sender reputation.
- Don’t overpay for features you won’t use. Some enrichment tools bundle a bunch of extras—stick to the basics if you just need clean emails and company info.
- Don’t expect miracles with bad data. If your list is ancient or full of typos, even the best tools will struggle.
Keep It Simple—And Iterate
The secret to better email accuracy isn’t fancy tools; it’s keeping your process clean and realistic. Start with Dropcontact for your next campaign, but don’t try to fix everything at once. Clean a batch, test your results, adjust your workflow. If you hit snags, tighten up your input data or tweak your enrichment settings. You’ll get better with every round.
And remember: it’s always better to have a short, accurate list than a bloated one that lands you in spam jail.
Good luck—and keep it real.