Top 5 tools for outreach campaigns that helped me

How to choose the right marketing automation tool for lead generation? 

The very first thing to think about before choosing the right platform is to ask yourself, "What exactly do I need this tool for?" 

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- Do you need it for lead generation? (most likely)

- Do you need it for lead nurturing?

- Do you want to use it for multichannel outreach or not? (Just email, email + LinkedIn, etc.)

- Do you want to have AI tool assistance, or is it not necessary?

- Do you need the platform to just send out sequences, or do you need to find people, too? 

- Will you use it yourself or hand it over to the sales team? 

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Different platforms combine various features for lead generation, and in this article, I will share some of the platforms for email marketing and social media marketing that were useful to me.

I will also highlight my favorite features and point out the ones that perform better than the others. 

If you don’t know where to start with your outreach campaigns, you can check my article on how to do that. It shares practical insights about lead generation. 

Top 5 tools for outreach campaigns:

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1. Snov.io
2. PhantomBuster
3. Saleshandy
4. Apollo.io
5. Instantly.ai

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Snov.io

Snov.io is a pretty extensive tool for lead generation and outreach campaign automation. It also helps find potential leads through different search options. Besides that, it has email finders, verifiers, and trackers. 

This tool will fit you best if your goal is to find potential leads and reach them through email campaigns or LinkedIn sequences and track your campaign results. 

Snov.io also launched a new feature called Email Warm-Up, which can help you with email deliverability by building or restoring your domain reputation. This can be handy if you have a brand-new email address. 

Overall, it's a great option for marketing automation.

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My favorite features 

They have great template options that could simplify the email sequence and LinkedIn automation setup process for you. Those templates are fully adjustable and can be modified as you wish. 

The next feature I consider helpful is a domain search. You can pick a website you need, and the system will show you the names and emails of high-quality leads who work at that company and can be reached. 

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Last but not least, this platform has a CRM integration system if you want to do all your lead management in one place. 

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Pros 

🟢 Has sequence templates that help to build campaigns faster

🟢 All-in-one setup when you wouldn’t need any additional tools for lead generation

🟢 Is a good fit for multichannel outreach 

🟢 Has personalized extensions such as Email Finder, Email Verifier, and Email Tracker

🟢 Fair pricing 

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Cons

🔴 Limited number of credits 

🔴 A/B testing is only available in the Pro version 

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Prices

Starter: $39/m

Pro: $99/m

Custom: unknown

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PhantomBuster

My go-to with PhantomBuster is collecting large data sets of contacts using a variety of different options and then utilizing them in multichannel outreach campaigns. 

There are tons of ways to collect your contacts, which helps increase volume if that’s important for your campaign. 

This tool is a great choice if your main channel of communication is LinkedIn and you want to use it at its full capacity, and that’s exactly how I used it.

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My favorite features 

LinkedIn Event Guests Export. This particular way of collecting contacts saved me a bunch of time in the past. 

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The next one is all things Instagram. It is extremely helpful if you want to expand your reach beyond emails and LinkedIn and work with social media channels, too.

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And the last one here is the Contact’s Job Changes Tracker. This can be valuable if you want to spot people who are switching their careers, which means they can be considered high-intent accounts. 

Pros 

🟢 Has options to collect contacts from social media channels (IG, X, LinkedIn)

🟢 Has tons of options when it comes to LinkedIn Automation

🟢 Outreach campaigns are intuitive to set up and efficient to track

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Cons

🔴 The platform does not have A/B testing options

🔴 Only 14-day free trial

🔴 Can be expensive for small teams/companies

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Prices

Starter: $69/m

Pro: $159/m

Team: $439/m

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Saleshandy

This is one of the most popular email marketing tools on the market, and a lot of sales teams use it. 

It is simple and user-friendly to use and can be a perfect match for you if you are looking for a simple and efficient tool for email campaigns and lead nurturing. It also has some built-in AI tools, which I will talk about below.

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My favorite features 

AI Sequence Copilot definitely takes first place here. 

While I wouldn’t use it to write the actual messages, it can be good for gathering some ideas on how you can approach your outreach campaign and email sequences, what kind of strong sides to highlight, and to get an understanding of how your business might be perceived. 

There is a built-in task tracker to help you monitor your responsibilities. I like it because it helps you keep everything in one place, and it can be efficient if the whole sales team is working in it. 

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The platform also has fairly extensive built-in analytics to track conversion rates and other campaign metrics.

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Pros 

🟢 Has everything you need for email marketing campaigns

🟢 Has campaign test options to see how campaigns perform before starting the real one

🟢 AI Copilot is a good addition to your campaign planning

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Cons

🔴 Doesn’t have a lot of templates to choose from

🔴 Only 7-day free trial

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Prices

Starter: $36/m

Pro: $99/m

Scale: $199/m

Scale Plus: $241/m

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Apollo.io

Apollo is a useful tool when it comes to searching for contact lists and companies, retrieving emails, verifying them, and launching email sequences inside the app. I’ve done a lot of contact collection and exporting there myself. 

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My favorite features 

An AI research feature that adds more filtering options based on contact details. For example, I could filter campaigns by B2B or B2C segments (the same goes for B2C or B2B marketers). 

Another feature is the ability to have calls and meetings inside Apollo and track their performance, sync them with the CRM system, and transcribe the text, which I think is pretty cool for lead management, and if that’s a part of your marketing funnel.

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One of the recent features that they added is the website visitor tracking. It can help you retarget decision-makers who visit your website and use these contacts in your campaigns. 

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Pros 

🟢 One of the most efficient tools for lead generation 

🟢 Has sequence templates 

🟢 You can have calls and connect meetings inside the platform

🟢 AI tool filtering feature 

🟢 Website visitors tracking feature included

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Cons

🔴 Email finder might not work that well if you import your own data set

🔴 Limited amount of available credits even in paid versions

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Prices

Basic: $49/m

Professional: $79/m

Organization: $119/m

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Instantly.ai

This is another tool for email marketing that can help you warm leads, conduct cold outreach campaigns, and engage with your contacts. 

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My favorite features 

The first feature I’d highlight is the domain and lookalike domain searches. It can be useful if you want to stick to similar companies and industries that you already know are working and find high-quality leads through them. 

Next is the search by funding type. If you want to reach out only to companies that have already gone through Series B funding, you can do that. Keep in mind that this information might not be publicly available for all the companies, so you might miss out on some of them. 

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The AI Agent feature can be helpful if you want extra assistance replying to emails. You can also share information about your website by just sharing a link to it or by uploading a PDF file.

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Pros 

🟢 Has some extensive search options

🟢 Has CRM Integration

🟢 AI Agent feature available 

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Cons

🔴 A/B testing is only available with the Hyper Growth plan

🔴 Sequence automation is only available in the paid version

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Prices

Growth: $37/m

Hypergrowth: $97/m

Light Speed: $358/m

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Closing thoughts 

There are a lot of tools for lead generation and marketing automation out there. You need to make your decision based on your and your sales team's priorities. 

For me, the most important things are the ease of use, email sequence template availability, integrated CRM system, and efficient tracking of conversion rates.

Remember, you don’t have to stick to one email marketing tool forever; you can always experiment, test, and change the platform in the process.

Lead generation can be a complicated process, but once you figure it out and find your own path, it will not feel that overwhelming anymore. 

If you want to explore other helpful marketing tools, here’s my personal top of digital marketing tools. 

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