RocketReach Enhancements

Company and Contact database RocketReach released a set of functional enhancements to its prospecting platform, including company exports, Intent Data, and a Bullhorn integration.? The database provides access to 60 million global companies and 700 million profiles.? Other content includes technographics and AI-powered recommendations.

RocketReach was founded in 2015 and bootstrapped until 2020, when it closed on a Series A led by Brighton Park Capital (the round size and market cap were not disclosed).? The firm was profitable early on, targeting SMBs via SEO marketing, and continues to be so.

RocketReach employs a PLG motion with a freemium offering for individuals and teams.? Its PLG strategy garners five million visitors and 400,000 self-service signups per month.? Both monthly and annual subscriptions are offered.

“Our best sign of intent…is someone who searched on Google, found us, signed up, used the platform and said, ‘You know what, I kind of like this, I’m going to use it again,’” stated RocketReach CEO Scott Kim .? “We have a very simple motion because of that.? And that’s how we grow – we continue to focus on making that first visit…delightful.”

While PLG is their primary GTM strategy, RocketReach has also built a sales team focusing on the mid-market segment.

“Our product is not singularly focused on a single vertical.? Everyone needs great contact data.? And we make our product super easy to use for any vertical.? Whether you’re a recruiter, sales, business development, marketing, [or] investor,” Kim explained to GZ Consulting.

RocketReach is less exposed to the tech sector than other vendors, with only a minority of its revenue tied to technology sales.? Other sectors include marketing and advertising, consulting, staffing and recruiting, nonprofits, PE/VC investors, and financial services.

“We are finding a lot of opportunity and value that we can deliver to customers that are not historical tech companies,” stated Kim.? “As long as you’re using Google, you might stumble across our product.? And that is everyone.”

Kim emphasized that simplicity is core to the company’s product strategy.? Most of its users are SMBs and mid-market customers looking for immediate value.? Thus, the product must be intuitive.? While the company has videos, tutorials, and support teams, “Our goal is so that you can onboard yourself because the product is so easy to use.”

Thus, AI and other emerging technologies will be deployed to ensure simplicity and ease of use.

“We always try to take a customer-centric approach – let’s reduce the load on them to make it more effective for them.? And make it simpler for them to onboard,” said Kim.

Simplicity is how Kim positions RocketReach versus its top two competitors: ZoomInfo and Apollo.? While Kim credited ZoomInfo with deep functionality, SMB and mid-market companies don’t require “all the bells and whistles” ZoomInfo offers.

Furthermore, the high percentage of free users helps them define a focal universe of contacts that are regularly looked up, allowing the company to identify in-demand contacts and verify them regularly.

The release includes a Bullhorn connector for recruiters that feeds contacts into the application tracking system (ATS).? Duplicate checking is performed before sending records, with enrichment rules followed for pre-existing contacts.

“Bullhorn integration and company exports are two highly requested features, and we are excited to bring these capabilities to our customers,” said RocketReach VP of Sales Wynne Brown .? “This integration will make it easier for our customers to keep their ATS data up to date, and it will help them to be more productive and efficient.”

Intent Data is powered by Foundry (FKA IDG Communications) and spans 7,800 topics.? Foundry data looks at website visits, keywords from its co-op, events, and content engagement to identify in-market prospects.

Intent Data filters are included in RocketReach’s prospecting, with the intent file updated weekly.? Only the selected topics with scores above 75 (high intent) are displayed.

Intent Data is only available in the custom offering.? At least six topics are provided, with the option to license additional topic bundles.? A combined multi-topic score is displayed, and users can mouse over the score to see the individual topic scores.

The recently added Company Exports feature downloads company CSV files.? Company credits are counted separately from contact export credits.? RocketReach does not yet support Send to CRM for creating account records, but it is on the roadmap.

Send to CRM functionality is available for Salesforce and HubSpot.? Both standard and custom fields may be exported.? Duplicate checking is performed, with field-level rules determining whether always to populate the field or only populate empty fields.

RocketReach also supports Send to SEP functionality for Outreach and Salesloft.? While records are created or enriched, RocketReach does not kick off a sequence or cadence in the SEPs.

RocketReach does not yet support I-frames in partner platforms.? Thus, users can send records to other platforms, but there is no integrated record viewing, updating, or prospecting within Salesforce, HubSpot, Outreach, Salesloft, and Bullhorn.

Most of its users are from small companies, so Send to CRM is sufficient to meet their needs.

Data is sourced from web crawling, a community program, and third-party sourcing.? RocketReach collects firmographics, contacts, and technographics, with Intent Data licensed from Foundry.

Predictive algorithms are employed to populate and score missing emails.? Emails are scored for estimated deliverability, and users can filter by email availability and quality.? Verified emails have a deliverability score of 90%+, and emails with an A score have a deliverability rate of 98%.? Emails for catch-all domains (those that do not report bounces) are scored lower unless other evidence (e.g., signature blocks, LinkedIn presence) raises the algorithm’s confidence level.

Company data includes SICs, NAICs, industry keywords, addresses, phones, sizing data, competitors, company descriptions, and domains.

Contacts are mapped to department and department/function.? For example, RocketReach supports 12 Marketing functions and 15 Technology functions.? Contacts include emails, phones, LinkedIn URLs, current employer, work histories, education, and certifications.

Contacts are notified after contact data is verified.? If the contact opts out, there is a notification process so the customer can remove the details from their CRM.? An opt-out link is also displayed on RocketReach’s home page, and RocketReach ingests feeds from opt-out services.

RocketReach works with its outside counsel to ensure compliance with global privacy rules and maintains an internal DPO.

“Our DPO is actually within our Product and Development organization – one of the founders of the company,” expanded Kim.? “Every time we think about making material changes to our product and incorporating AI, they have to work with our third-party counsel to … [review] what we’re trying to do and what’s the problem we’re trying to solve.”

Phone data is mined, licensed from third parties, and collected from its community program.

Both company and contact prospecting are supported.? Users may individually select variables or type in a search description, with AI converting the request into one or multiple selects.? Users may save search criteria.

“In all the services like ours…you got all these filters, and you’re like, ‘Okay, I need this filter, this filter, this filter, this filter,’ and you have to parameterize all of them.? And that is cumbersome and difficult.? As opposed to Google,” remarked Kim.? “We have this in beta right now: you can go to our search box, and just type like you’re typing on Google, which is how people want to interact with our service.”

Company selects include state/province, US and Canadian Metro areas (MSAs), radial screening (i.e., distance from a city), industry codes, AI-based industry classifications (beta), and technologies.

“This is a new feature – using AI to classify companies and then allow you to search for those,” explained RocketReach Head of Product Chris Long to GZ Consulting.? For example, “cruise lines would have only returned a handful before, but now you’re getting a lot more.”

Contact screening includes skills, work history, and education variables, which are particularly useful for recruiters.? Another variable is time in position.? Sales reps can focus on new hires or promotions, while recruiters will likely target individuals without recent job changes.

RocketReach also supports suppression and saved lists.

RocketReach is available as a freemium, but the free version is limited to five lookups per month, making it more of a demonstration offering than a free service.? RocketReach offers both single and team contracts.? A single annual contract begins at $48 per month (Essentials) with unlimited email display, 1,200 exports, prospecting, list enrichment, and a Chrome extension.

For $108 per month (Pro), the export count triples to 3,600, and phone numbers are included.? The Pro Edition supports HubSpot, Outreach, Salesloft, Bullhorn, and Zapier, but not Salesforce, which is only supported in the $249 per month Ultimate Edition or Custom Plans.? The Team Pro edition supports 2-5 users at $83 per user per month.

Ultimate includes 10,000 exports, API support, and the Salesforce connector.? Ultimate is priced at $249 per month for a single user and $207 per month for two to five users.

Admins can allocate exports at the user level, providing higher limits to those most likely to require higher counts (e.g., SDRs, Marketers, and Admins performing CRM list enrichment).

Custom pricing, with unlimited exports, is not disclosed for team contracts above five seats.

RocketReach has a 4.5 rating on G2 and is a Leader in Lead Intelligence and Sales intelligence.? Its time to implement is under one day, and its ROI is less than six months, according to its reviewers.

Additional Resources

• RocketReach: Website | Integrations
• GZ Consulting Topics: Intent Data | Prospect Lists | Contacts | Foundry | SalesTech

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