Should You Buy or Create Your Own B2B Lead Lists? Pros and Cons

Are you weary of the relentless pursuit of promising leads? Are you finding it challenging to meet your sales benchmarks? You’re not alone.

80% of marketers perceive their lead generation efforts as marginally or moderately effective, while 4% deem them entirely ineffective.

In fact, the most significant challenge in generating new leads, as reported by 57% of marketers, is inducing targeted prospects to engage.

So, what’s the solution? A well-reasearched B2B lead list! It could be the nitro boost your sales strategy needs. 

However, here’s the burning question: should you invest in pre-built lead lists or dedicate time to curate your bespoke one?

We recognize the pitfalls and uncertainty associated with purchasing pre-made lead generation lists. Plus, we also understand the time-consuming nature of cultivating your own. As such, this dilemma begs the question: which path provides a competitive edge?

This comprehensive guide unpacks the nuances, advantages, and drawbacks of the purchase versus build conundrum. Furthermore, it'll offer a strategic blueprint to construct a tailored lead list for your specific needs.

What is a B2B Lead List?

A B2B lead list is your roster of potential contacts for sales outreach. These compilations comprise businesses matching your Ideal Customer Profiles (ICPs) and encompass various data, including:

• Company particulars like name and size
• Vital decision-makers information
• Contact specifics such as email, phone, and more

While these elements are fundamental, superior lead lists for businesses go beyond, offering a richer dataset for each prospect. On that premise, let's check out the elements defining a top-notch B2B lead list.

7 Factors of Excellent B2B Lead Lists

Here are elements that define an excellent list of leads:

1. Sales Intelligence: Acquiring the right sales intelligence metrics is pivotal in the prospecting list process. It significantly impacts your top-of-funnel sales and bottom line. 

2. Extensive and Diverse Pool of Prospects: A massive reservoir of potential clients increases response rates and minimizes data inaccuracies or decay.

3. Integrity of Data Sources: High-quality B2B lead lists comply with ethical standards and regulations (e.g., GDPR, CCPA) – to avoid legal and reputational issues.

4. Comprehensive Data Points: Exceptional lists go beyond basic information, encompassing:

• Company technology integration
• Contact preferences of decision-makers
• Revenue
• Recent business initiatives
• Targeted regions for market expansion

5. Relevance to Buyer Personas and ICPs: Target audience alignment with buyer personas ensures accurate targeting, avoiding a scattered approach.

6. Intent Data Utilization: Using intent data derived from online behavior refines prospect searches and determines their likelihood of purchasing.

7. Accuracy: The precision of a lead list significantly impacts return on investment.

Considering these elements defining a superior B2B lead list, let’s come to our next step. How can you assess the dichotomy between purchasing business leads and building your lead repository?

Should You Buy or Create Your Own B2B Lead Lists?

Deciding between crafting your lead repository or acquiring a pre-existing one involves a delicate balance of advantages and drawbacks. Let's uncover the ideal scenarios for B2B companies to buy or build lead lists.

What Are the Pros and Cons of Buying Lead Lists?

The Pros:

• Cost Effective: Acquiring a pre-built lead list is cost-effective for those operating on tight budgets. It spares excessive resource utilization. Hence, this option suits companies operating with:

• Limited resources
• A compact sales team

• A Faster Sales Pipeline: It serves as a quick fix for short-term needs, rejuvenating a sluggish sales pipeline.

The Cons:

Less Authority: Purchasing lead lists for your marketing or sales efforts can relinquish control over data quality and sourcing. Therefore, it can lead to uncertainties regarding data origins and maintenance. 

What Are the Pros and Cons of Building Your Lead Lists?

The Pros: 

• Better Option for Long-term Goals: Building your lead list proves effective if you have long-term goals with a tailored lead generation approach. 
• Accurate Metrics: It’s perfect when your business serves niche markets and verticals. This is due to the need for intricate and precise prospecting data.
• More Conversions: Internally constructed lead lists boast higher conversion rates, saving time and circumventing issues like high bounce rates and spam reports. 

The Cons:

• Time-consuming: In-house list building demands intensive resources. Besides crafting a tool stack, human resources become essential for compiling, verifying, and enriching the data. Thus, it amplifies the demand for manpower and investment.

So, What’s the Better Choice?

Considering the insights shared, it's evident that the final decision depends on your business's current situation or goals. 

For example:

Let’s say you are rolling out a new product. Then, you can benefit from buying a B2B lead list to generate demand rather than waiting for months on your own.

Suppose your company offers highly specialized consultancy services for sustainable energy projects in emerging markets. In this case, constructing your own lead list would be advantageous. 

The latter enables you to meticulously research and curate a database specific to niche sectors. In fact, constructing sales lead lists represents an organic and sustainable method to cultivate a top-tier database. It steers your outreach endeavors toward success.

That being said, let’s now check out our framework for designing a comprehensive B2B lead list:

How to Create a Result-Driven B2B Lead List: A 4-Step Actionable Framework

Let's take you through the four fundamental steps to orchestrate an impactful, ROI-driven lead list.

Step 1: Establish Your ICPs and Buyer Personas

Every effective lead generation initiative commences with pinpointing the target buyers. However, when constructing your lead list, it necessitates an extra layer. Defining your ideal customer profile and devising buyer personas is critical for optimization:

• Your ICP delineates the optimal clients for your enterprise
• Buyer personas enable your sales team to comprehend the ICP better

Together, these two components outline pivotal attributes of your potential prospects, such as:

• The sector in which they operate.
• Company size they're affiliated with.
• Revenue figures and objectives.
• Pain points, needs, and aspirations.

To refine your ICP and buyer personas in this initial stage:

• Devise multiple ICPs and conduct A/B tests to discern the most promising prospects for success.
• Delve into your existing customer data to gauge which companies have previously made purchases from your business.
• Explore the market to identify your competitors' clientele and investigate why these customers prefer your competitors over your offerings.

The foundational research in this initial phase of creating your lead lists will augment your endeavors in the subsequent steps.

Clarify Your Target Decision-Maker Profiles

Precisely defining the appropriate decision-maker early on is vital. It helps avoid investing time in pursuing the wrong leads. On the contrary, it heightens the possibility of securing a response or appointment by delivering a highly tailored pitch message.

Here are recommended strategies for pinpointing the optimal decision-makers based on your research:

• Conduct interviews with potential individuals in your ICP companies and current clients to outline the decision-making process.
• Revisit your buyer personas and outline the decision-making unit for each persona, specifying the job titles and responsibilities linked to it.
• Review the factors influencing the purchasing process and review your ICP's historical buying decisions to discern any pertinent trends.

Step 2: Establish Vital Parameters for Refining Your Lead Lists

Segmenting your leads is the secret to unlocking the true potential of your lead list. By segmenting, you streamline your B2B outreach, expedite your endeavors, and yield superior results.

Consider these parameters to segment your lead list effectively:

• Demographics: These unchanging factors lay the groundwork for personalizing your approach. Data like age, education, profession, location, and language form the initial layer of lead segmentation.
• Technographics: Crucial in B2B lead segmentation, consider technographic data, including:

• Website technology stack
• Mobile app development tools
• Data analytics and business intelligence tools
• Sales/Marketing software
• Integration capabilities
• Cloud service usage
• Cybersecurity measures
• Monthly tech expenditure
• Utilized automation tools

• Sales Triggers: Incorporate this layer into your list for events or actions that offer interaction opportunities, such as:

• Downloading e-books
• Job changes
• Demo requests

Segmentation based on sales triggers helps categorize prospects with similar interests or behaviors, enabling personalized pitches.

Step 3: Develop a Comprehensive Tech Stack

Once the groundwork is set, the real question is: How do you source, organize, and evaluate leads for your list? The answer lies in a robust tech stack.

Lacking appropriate sales tools can hinder the lead list construction process, inevitably slowing down your outreach.

Empower your sales team with a top-tier tech stack to expedite the list-building journey. Some favored tools include LinkedIn Sales Navigator, Crunchbase, Google Sheets, etc.

Remember, the efficacy of your tech stack significantly influences your list-building endeavors. Take the time to research and test various tools to ensure you're leveraging the best options.

Step 4: Design a Streamlined and Connected Workflow

The final stretch in forming B2B lead lists involves refining it for optimal use. This step is pivotal as the caliber of your leads is directly tied to the efficiency of your analysis, validation, and refreshing process.

Here's a breakdown of best practices to implement this workflow:

• Assess: Purge your data by meticulously checking for duplicates, inaccuracies, outdated contacts, and any other factors that could impede performance.
• Verify: Determine crucial validation points like job titles and company size. Use automated tools or establish a manual workflow for data validation based on these criteria.
• Update: Set up regular campaigns to refresh your lists, eliminating obsolete information. This effort should include adding new leads and updating existing data to heighten accuracy and relevance.

Build Your Lead List with Revnew

Building lead lists might appear overwhelming, but your dedication will increase lead conversions and revenue growth. If you require additional support to bolster your revenue figures, Revnew can serve as an extension of your internal sales team, providing our specialized expertise for B2B list building services. 

Save this comprehensive guide and establish a solid handcrafting lead list process. Don't hesitate to explore and refine as you progress, and keep quality as your top priority over quantity.

Get in touch with us today for more information.