Best sales prospecting tools for small B2B teams, by job
Sales prospecting tools help you find the right people and companies to contact, research them and get their contact details before you reach out. For most small B2B teams, Apollo.io is the best place to start: one tool searches what Apollo says are 240 million contacts, reveals work emails and phone numbers and sends email sequences, with a free plan and Basic at $49 per seat a month, billed yearly. Pick bravabase if you want a short list of people already showing a buying signal, each with contact details and a drafted first message, and LinkedIn Sales Navigator if your buyers are active on LinkedIn and you want to research them there.
Quick picks
Ranked by fit for a small B2B team, and labelled with the job each tool does: find people, research them, or get their contact details. Each tool’s pricing line gives the monthly cost for 1, 5 and 25 people, worked out from its published prices.
| Tool | Best for | Starting price |
|---|---|---|
| Apollo.io | Finding people: a large database with emails, phone numbers and sequences in one tool | Free plan; Basic $49/seat/month, billed yearly |
| bravabase | Finding people ready to buy: a daily list with a buying signal, contact details and a drafted message | $99/user/month; 500 quality leads a month, emails and phone numbers use the 1,500 monthly AI credits |
| LinkedIn Sales Navigator | Researching buyers: searching and following people on LinkedIn | Core $119.99/month ($1,079.88 billed yearly) |
| Clay | Researching and enriching: filling in almost any data point from 150+ sources | Free plan; Launch $185/month ($167 billed yearly) |
| Lusha | Getting contact details: emails and phone numbers from a browser extension | Free plan; Starter $49.90/month ($37.45 billed yearly) |
| Hunter | Getting contact details: work emails from a name or company website | Free plan; Starter $49/month ($34 billed yearly) |
| Cognism | Getting contact details in Europe: phone-verified mobile numbers | Quote only; 5 seats included |
| Seamless.AI | Getting contact details at volume: emails and phone numbers, sold with unlimited users | Free licence; paid plans quote only |
| ZoomInfo | Finding people at enterprise scale: contact and company data with intent signals | Free ZoomInfo Lite; paid plans quote only |
How we picked
We shortlisted the tools founders, consultants, agencies and small sales teams compare for prospecting. What matters most to this buyer:
- Finds the right people: Search by role, company and market, or surface people with a reason to buy now. A tool that only fills in a list you already have ranks lower for this job.
- Contact details you can use: Work emails and phone numbers, and how many credits each one uses.
- Cost for your team size: Per seat, per team or by quote. We work out the monthly cost for 1, 5 and 25 people from each published price, and say when there is none.
- A free way to start: A free plan or trial, so you can test it on your own market first.
- No ops person needed: You can start prospecting the same day without building workflows.
We read each tool’s own pricing page and product docs on 13 November 2026, then ranked the tools by fit for founders, consultants, agencies and small B2B sales teams finding the right people to contact. Where a vendor publishes no price or limit, we say so.
We make bravabase. It is second on this list because it starts from people with a dated reason to buy now and hands you each one with a fit score, a drafted first message and their work email or phone number, which use the plan’s 1,500 monthly AI credits, for $99 a month. Apollo.io ranks above it for most small teams because it has a free plan, lets you search its whole database with your own filters and sends email sequences itself. bravabase includes 500 quality leads a month and doesn’t send bulk email. Prices change often: check each tool’s site before you buy.
The 9 best sales prospecting tools, ranked
Prices are the lowest published plan, checked on each tool’s own site on 13 November 2026.
1. Apollo.io
Best for finding people: a large database with emails, phone numbers and sequences in one tool.
- What it does best: Searches what Apollo says are 240 million contacts and 30 million companies by role, industry, company size and more, reveals work emails and phone numbers, and sends email sequences from the same place. Basic adds advanced filters and signals and 6 buying-intent topics; Professional adds AI lead scoring.
- Pricing: Free plan with 900 credits per seat a year, 2 sequences and basic filters. Basic is $49 per seat a month, billed yearly, with 30,000 credits per seat a year and a 14-day trial. Professional is $79. An email uses 1 credit and a phone number 8. Monthly billing costs more. Every seat on an account is on the same plan. Cost on Basic, billed yearly: 1 person $49 a month, 5 people $245, 25 people $1,225.
- Who it suits: Founders and small teams who know who they want and are happy to build their own lists.
- Drawback: Its intent topics and filters are tools you set up and sort through yourself, and AI lead scoring needs Professional at $79. The $49 price needs a yearly commitment, and each phone number uses 8 credits.
Visit Apollo.io ↗ · Apollo.io pricing, checked November 2026 ↗ · Apollo pricing explained →
2. bravabase
Best for finding people ready to buy: a daily list with a buying signal, contact details and a drafted message.
- What it does best: Brava, its AI agent, learns your business from your website and keeps looking for people who need what you sell: people discussing your topics, job changes, companies hiring or raising money, the tools a company uses, and lookalikes of your best customers. Each lead comes with a fit score from 0 to 100 and the reason, and a personal first message you approve. Brava gets their work email and phone number when you want them. You can also import a Sales Navigator search or a CSV.
- Pricing: $99 per user a month, or $948 a year ($79 a month). Includes 500 quality leads a month, each with a real buying signal, 1,500 AI credits a month for work emails, phone numbers and posts, 2 always-on Discovery agents and free message drafts. Top up 1,000 credits for $35. 7-day free trial with 250 credits. A work email or phone number uses credits only when Brava finds one. Each person on a team has their own plan. Cost, billed yearly: 1 person $79 a month, 5 people $395, 25 people $1,975; or $99, $495 and $2,475 billed monthly. See pricing.
- Who it suits: Founders, consultants, agencies and small sales teams who want a short list of people to contact this week, not a database to search.
- Drawback: You get up to 500 quality leads a month, so it isn’t built for pulling thousands of contacts by job title, and it doesn’t send bulk cold email: for big lists and sequences, Apollo.io costs less. Work emails and phone numbers use the 1,500 monthly AI credits, and there is no free plan, only a 7-day trial.
How Brava finds leads → · What counts as a buying signal → · Pricing →
3. LinkedIn Sales Navigator
Best for researching buyers: searching and following people on LinkedIn.
- What it does best: LinkedIn’s own sales tool: advanced lead and company search on LinkedIn’s data, saved leads and accounts, and 50 InMail credits a month. Each lead page shows the contact details the person shares on their profile, plus any from your CRM.
- Pricing: Core, for one person, is $119.99 a month, or $1,079.88 a year. Advanced, which LinkedIn pitches at sales teams that need collaboration tools, is $159.99 a month or $1,799.88 a year per licence, and up to five licences can be bought online. Advanced Plus is priced by LinkedIn’s sales team. Free trial on Core and Advanced if you have no paid LinkedIn plan and haven’t had a LinkedIn trial in the past 365 days. Cost, billed yearly: 1 person $89.99 a month on Core; 5 people $449.95 a month on five Core licences, or $749.95 on Advanced; 25 people $2,249.75 a month on Core or $3,749.75 on Advanced at list price, though more than five licences can’t be bought online.
- Who it suits: Anyone whose buyers are active on LinkedIn.
- Drawback: Contact details are limited to what people share on their profile or what’s already in your CRM, so most teams add a contact-data tool, and InMail is capped at 50 a month.
Visit LinkedIn Sales Navigator ↗ · LinkedIn Sales Navigator pricing, checked November 2026 ↗ · LinkedIn Sales Navigator pricing →
4. Clay
Best for researching and enriching: filling in almost any data point from 150+ sources.
- What it does best: Takes a list of companies or people and fills in the gaps from what Clay says are 150+ data sources and its Claygent AI research agents: work emails, phone numbers, company news and almost any other data point you can describe. Paid plans track signals too: job changes, promotions, new hires, company news and social on Launch, and web intent on Growth. Every plan has unlimited seats.
- Pricing: Free plan with 500 actions and 100 data credits a month, up to 200 rows per table and no phone numbers. Launch is $185 a month, or $167 billed yearly, with 15,000 actions and 2,500 data credits a month. Growth is $495, or $446 billed yearly. 14-day trial. Cost, billed yearly: $167 a month for 1, 5 or 25 people, because seats are unlimited; the team shares the credits, so a bigger team uses them up faster.
- Who it suits: Hands-on teams and agencies who like building their own workflows.
- Drawback: The signals and research are there, but you build the workflow that turns them into a list. It takes time to learn, and you manage two kinds of credit: actions and data credits.
Visit Clay ↗ · Clay pricing, checked November 2026 ↗ · bravabase vs Clay →
5. Lusha
Best for getting contact details: emails and phone numbers from a browser extension.
- What it does best: Reveals emails and phone numbers from what Lusha says are 515M+ verified contacts, through a Chrome extension, its own search and an API. It also tracks dated buying signals such as job changes, funding rounds and hiring surges.
- Pricing: Free plan with 40 credits a month and 1 seat. Starter is $49.90 a month, or $37.45 a month billed yearly, for 1 seat and 400 credits a month. Pro is $69.90, or $52.45 billed yearly, for 2 seats and 600 credits a month. Premium is $399.90, or $299.95 billed yearly, for 5 seats and 3,400 credits a month, and you can add seats online up to 25. An email uses 1 credit and a phone number 5. Cost, billed yearly: 1 person $37.45 a month on Starter, 5 people $299.95 on Premium, 25 people $1,048.45 on Premium, with the same 40,800 credits a year shared across the team.
- Who it suits: Sellers who already know who they want to reach and need a phone number fast.
- Drawback: Phone numbers use 5 credits each, so Starter’s 400 credits buy 80 numbers a month, and extra Premium seats add no credits.
Visit Lusha ↗ · Lusha pricing, checked November 2026 ↗
6. Hunter
Best for getting contact details: work emails from a name or company website.
- What it does best: Finds and verifies work emails from a name or company website, builds lists of target companies with Discover, and sends simple email sequences. Every plan includes unlimited team members.
- Pricing: Free plan with 50 credits a month. Starter is $49 a month, or $34 billed yearly, with 2,000 credits a month. Growth is $149, or $104 billed yearly, with 10,000. An email found uses 1 credit and a verification half a credit. Cost, billed yearly: $34 a month for 1, 5 or 25 people, since team members are unlimited; the team shares the 2,000 credits.
- Who it suits: Anyone who has a list of companies or names and needs the work emails.
- Drawback: It is built around email. Phone numbers appear only when one is published publicly, and Hunter itself says that coverage is limited (Hunter help).
Visit Hunter ↗ · Hunter pricing, checked November 2026 ↗
7. Cognism
Best for getting contact details in Europe: phone-verified mobile numbers.
- What it does best: A B2B contact database built for selling into Europe, with phone-verified mobile numbers and signals such as intent, hiring, job changes and funding. Cognism says its data complies with GDPR and CCPA.
- Pricing: No published prices: Cognism quotes each team. Its Standard and Pro plans each include 5 seats, and 1 credit reveals one contact. The pricing page offers no free plan or trial; you can ask for a free data sample. Cost: 1 to 5 people share the same 5-seat plan, at a quoted price; for 25, ask for a quote.
- Who it suits: Teams calling buyers in the UK and Europe who have a data budget.
- Drawback: No published price and no free plan, so you can’t see the cost until you talk to sales.
Visit Cognism ↗ · Cognism pricing, checked November 2026 ↗
8. Seamless.AI
Best for getting contact details at volume: emails and phone numbers, sold with unlimited users.
- What it does best: Searches for contacts and companies and returns emails and phone numbers. Its paid plans are sold with unlimited users, bulk credits, job-change alerts, buyer intent and enrichment.
- Pricing: A free licence with 50 credits that don’t refill. Paid plans have no published price: the pricing page is an enquiry form. A Basic licence gets 250 credits a month and Pro 10,000. Cost for 1, 5 or 25 people: by quote.
- Who it suits: Teams making a lot of calls who want contact details in bulk.
- Drawback: You can’t see a price without talking to sales, and the free licence’s 50 credits never refill.
Visit Seamless.AI ↗ · Seamless.AI licence and credit types, checked November 2026 ↗
9. ZoomInfo
Best for finding people at enterprise scale: contact and company data with intent signals.
- What it does best: Contact and company data (ZoomInfo says it covers 500M+ contacts and 100M+ companies), with buying signals, intent data and AI scoring of the accounts most likely to buy, sold in packages such as Professional and Copilot.
- Pricing: ZoomInfo Lite is a permanent free plan, and the paid sales plans offer a free trial. Paid prices aren’t published: they depend on features, licences and credits, and each export uses 1 credit. As an estimate, buyers on Vendr paid a median of $33,500 a year, from $7,267 to $156,000, across 1,581 purchases (Vendr, checked November 2026). Cost for 1, 5 or 25 people: by quote.
- Who it suits: Larger sales teams with a data budget and someone to manage the contract.
- Drawback: No published prices, and Vendr’s median contract runs to tens of thousands a year, so it is rarely a fit for a small team.
Visit ZoomInfo ↗ · ZoomInfo pricing, checked November 2026 ↗ · ZoomInfo pricing explained →
Questions, answered
What are sales prospecting tools?
Software that helps you find the right people and companies to contact, research them and get their contact details before you reach out. Most do one of three jobs: find people (Apollo.io, Sales Navigator, ZoomInfo, and bravabase, which is our product), research and enrich them (Clay), or get their contact details (Lusha, Hunter, Cognism, Seamless.AI). Prospecting is the outbound half of finding customers; for capturing people who come to you, see the best lead generation tools.
What tools do you use for prospecting?
Most small teams use one tool per job: one to find people (Apollo.io, Sales Navigator, or bravabase, which is our product), one to get contact details if that tool doesn’t (Hunter for emails, Lusha or Cognism for phone numbers), and a CRM to track who you’ve contacted. Apollo.io on its own covers finding, contact details and email sequences. bravabase covers finding people with a reason to buy now, their contact details and the first message. Compare contact-data tools in the best tools to find work emails and phone numbers.
What are the top 10 sales tools?
Ten worth knowing for a small B2B team, by job: Apollo.io, to find people, get contact details and send sequences; bravabase (our product), for leads with a buying signal, contact details and a drafted message; LinkedIn Sales Navigator, to research buyers on LinkedIn; Clay, to enrich lists from 150+ sources; Lusha, for emails and phone numbers; Hunter, for work emails; Cognism, for phone-verified mobile numbers in Europe; Seamless.AI, for contact data at volume; ZoomInfo, for enterprise contact and company data; and HubSpot, a CRM that is free for up to two users and 1,000 contacts, to track every contact and deal. Our roundups of the best sales tools cover cold email and inbound tools too.
How much do sales prospecting tools cost?
All prices billed yearly, from each vendor’s own pricing page (checked 13 Nov and rechecked 15 Nov 2026). One person: free plans from Apollo.io, Hunter, Lusha and Clay; paid plans from $34 a month (Hunter Starter) to $167 (Clay Launch), with Lusha Starter at $37.45, Apollo.io Basic at $49, bravabase (our product) at $79 and Sales Navigator Core at $89.99. Five people: Hunter $34 and Clay $167, because they don’t charge per seat; Apollo.io Basic $245; Lusha Premium $299.95; bravabase $395; Sales Navigator $449.95 for five Core licences or $749.95 for Advanced. 25 people: Hunter $34 and Clay $167, with the credits shared; Lusha Premium $1,048.45; Apollo.io Basic $1,225; bravabase $1,975; Sales Navigator $2,249.75 on Core or $3,749.75 on Advanced, at list price. Monthly billing costs more for each of them. Cognism, Seamless.AI and ZoomInfo quote each team; Vendr puts ZoomInfo’s median contract at $33,500 a year.
Are there free sales prospecting tools?
Yes, with limits. Apollo.io’s free plan gives 900 credits per seat a year and 2 sequences. Hunter gives 50 credits a month, Lusha 40, and Clay 100 data credits a month with no phone numbers. ZoomInfo Lite is free, and Seamless.AI’s free licence has 50 credits that don’t refill. Sales Navigator and bravabase (our product) offer free trials instead: bravabase’s is 7 days with 250 AI credits and up to 100 quality leads.
Which AI is best for sales prospecting?
For finding people with a reason to buy now, bravabase (our product): its AI agent watches for buying signals, scores each lead and drafts the first message for you to approve. For AI research on a list you already have, Clay. Apollo.io adds AI research to a large database, and AI lead scoring on its Professional plan. General assistants such as ChatGPT can research a company and draft a message, but you still need a contact-data tool for verified emails and phone numbers. More in the best AI lead generation tools.
Is Apollo or Sales Navigator better for prospecting?
Apollo.io if you want to find people, get their emails and phone numbers and email them from one tool, starting free. Sales Navigator if your buyers are active on LinkedIn and you want to research them there; it shows only the contact details people share, so most teams add a contact-data tool. See Apollo pricing explained and Sales Navigator pricing.
What is the difference between prospecting and lead generation tools?
Lead generation covers every way of getting new leads, including people who find you through your website. Prospecting is the outbound part: you choose who to contact, research them and reach out first. Some tools do both. For inbound tools such as HubSpot and RB2B, see the best lead generation tools.
How do you prospect successfully?
Start with people who have a reason to buy now: a new role, a hiring push, fresh funding or a post about the problem you solve. Research each one, write a short message about their situation, and follow up. Read how to spot buying signals, or see how Brava, the AI agent in bravabase (our product), finds these people for you.
What are the 5 P’s of prospecting?
There is no single standard list. HubSpot’s version is Purpose, Preparation, Personalization, Perseverance and Practice: know why you’re reaching out, research first, tailor the message, keep following up and learn from your numbers (HubSpot). Other trainers use different five-P lists for selling; Prospeo compares several, from Forrester’s to the Center for Sales Strategy’s (Prospeo). What they share is research before you write.
What is the 2-2-2 rule in sales?
A follow-up rhythm: get back in touch 2 days, 2 weeks and 2 months after a first contact. Sources differ on where the clock starts. HubSpot counts from your first outreach (HubSpot), while SaaS Hero counts from a discovery call or a purchase, and uses it to keep new customers (SaaS Hero).