How to use Hunter to enrich your CRM with accurate contact data

If you’ve ever tried prospecting or keeping your CRM up to date, you know how quickly things get messy. Old emails bounce, people change jobs, and half the time you’re stuck copying and pasting data from LinkedIn. If you want to actually talk to real people—not ghosts—your CRM needs accurate, fresh contact info. That’s where tools like Hunter come in.

This guide is for sales folks, SDRs, marketers, or anyone stuck cleaning up a CRM. I’ll walk you through how Hunter works, how to actually use it to enrich your CRM (without drowning in CSVs), and how to avoid the common traps. No fluff, just what matters.

Why Accurate CRM Data Even Matters

Let’s get this out of the way: your CRM is only as useful as the data inside it. If you’re reaching out to dead email addresses or missing key contacts, you’re wasting time and money. Good data means:

  • Fewer bounces and spam complaints
  • Reaching the right decision makers
  • Cleaner reporting and forecasting
  • Happier sales teams (seriously, ask them)

If you’re still hunting for contact info by hand or relying on old lists, you’re leaving money on the table.

What Hunter Actually Does (and What It Doesn’t)

Hunter’s pitch is pretty simple: it finds email addresses and contact details tied to companies or domains, and checks if they’re valid. You can use it to:

  • Find and verify professional email addresses
  • Pull full lists of contacts from company domains
  • Enrich existing records with missing details (like name, role, or LinkedIn)

But here’s what it doesn’t do:

  • It won’t magically find personal emails for everyone
  • It can’t guarantee 100% accuracy—no tool can
  • It won’t keep your CRM synced unless you set that up

Hunter is best at finding work emails for people at specific companies, especially when you already have a domain or a name. If you need phone numbers or deep social profiles, look elsewhere.

Step 1: Get Your CRM Ready for Enrichment

Before you start importing data left and right, do a little prep work:

  • Decide what you actually need. Are you missing email addresses? Job titles? Both? Don’t just enrich for the sake of it.
  • Clean up duplicates. If your CRM is full of repeats, you’ll just make it worse by dumping in new data.
  • Back up your CRM. Seriously. Bad imports happen, and undo buttons are rare.
  • Check your CRM’s import options. Some handle CSVs well, others have APIs or direct integrations. Know what you’re working with.

Pro tip: Make a test list of 10-20 contacts to run through the whole process before scaling up.

Step 2: Choose the Right Hunter Tool for the Job

Hunter has a few different ways to find and verify contact info. Here’s what actually matters for CRM enrichment:

1. Domain Search

  • Plug in a company’s website and Hunter returns a list of publicly available emails tied to that domain.
  • Great for: building lists of contacts at target accounts.

2. Email Finder

  • Enter a person’s name and company, and get their likely work email.
  • Great for: when you have names but missing emails.

3. Email Verifier

  • Checks if an email is likely to work before you use it.
  • Great for: scrubbing old lists or double-checking new ones.

4. Bulk Tasks

  • Upload a CSV and Hunter processes everyone at once.
  • Great for: updating lots of CRM records without manual work.

5. Integrations & API

  • Hunter has direct integrations for some CRMs (like HubSpot), browser extensions, and a decent API for custom workflows.

Ignore: The browser extension is handy for one-off lookups, but not scalable for real CRM enrichment.

Step 3: Pull and Prepare Your Data

Here’s where most people get tripped up. You need your CRM data in a format Hunter can process—usually a CSV file.

  • Export the right fields. At minimum: first name, last name, company, and domain (if you have it).
  • Remove junk. Delete contacts with missing names or companies—Hunter can’t work magic with blanks.
  • Limit your batch size. Start with a few hundred records at most; big jobs can take time and credits.

Pro tip: Sort your list by highest value or most urgent accounts. No point enriching cold leads you’ll never touch.

Step 4: Enrich with Hunter (Step-by-Step)

Here’s the meat of it. Let’s say you’re missing emails for a list of contacts:

A. Use Bulk Email Finder

  1. Go to Hunter’s Bulk Email Finder tool.
  2. Upload your CSV (make sure columns are labeled clearly).
  3. Map the columns—Hunter needs to know which is “First Name,” “Last Name,” and “Company Domain.”
  4. Start the search. Hunter will process the file and return probable email addresses.
  5. Download the results as a new CSV.

B. Verify Emails Before Importing

  • Use Hunter’s Bulk Email Verifier on the new emails.
  • Remove any “invalid” or “risky” emails from your list.
  • This step saves you headaches later (and keeps your sender reputation safe).

C. Add Extra Data (If Needed)

  • Hunter often includes job titles, phone numbers (rarely), and LinkedIn profiles.
  • Decide if you need to map these fields to your CRM or ignore them.
  • Don’t clutter your CRM with junk—only import what’s useful.

Step 5: Re-import and Map Data Back into Your CRM

Getting the data back in is usually where things break down. Here’s how to avoid a mess:

  • Check data mapping. Make sure each CSV column matches the right CRM field.
  • Avoid overwriting good data. Only update empty fields, or use your CRM’s “update existing” option.
  • Test with a small sample. Import 10 contacts, spot-check, then do the rest.
  • Keep an audit trail. Note when and how you enriched data in case you need to roll back.

Pro tip: If your CRM supports it, use a sandbox or test environment first.

Step 6: Automate (But Don’t Overdo It)

Hunter offers API access and some direct integrations (HubSpot, Salesforce via Zapier, etc.). Automation sounds great, but:

  • Start manual. Don’t build automations until you trust the process.
  • Watch your data credits. Hunter isn’t free, and bulk jobs can burn through credits fast.
  • Set up alerts for errors. Automations break or APIs change—don’t assume it all “just works.”

If you’re technical, the API is solid for pushing updates directly into your CRM. For most teams, sticking with bulk CSV imports every month or quarter is plenty.

What Works, What Doesn’t, and Pitfalls to Avoid

What Works

  • Finding verified work emails for most professionals at mid-sized or larger companies.
  • Cleaning up old, bounce-heavy lists.
  • Enriching target account lists for account-based sales.

What Doesn’t

  • Finding personal Gmail/Yahoo addresses (Hunter avoids these).
  • Getting valid emails for early-stage startups or obscure companies—public data just isn’t there.
  • Finding phone numbers reliably (they’re rare).

Pitfalls

  • Over-enriching: More data isn’t always better. Only pull what you’ll actually use.
  • Not verifying: Importing unverified emails will hurt your bounce rate and sender reputation.
  • Ignoring privacy: Always check compliance (GDPR, CAN-SPAM, etc.) before blasting cold emails.

Keep It Simple, Iterate, and Don’t Chase Magic Bullets

Enriching your CRM with Hunter is pretty straightforward if you keep it simple. Don’t try to automate everything from day one or chase every last data point. Start small, see what actually helps your team, and adjust as you go.

The best CRM is the one your team actually uses—so focus on adding useful, accurate contact info, not just filling empty fields. Good luck, and may your bounce rate stay low.