How to build a qualified prospect list with Apollo

You build a qualified prospect list in Apollo by searching for companies that match your ideal customer profile, finding the right people at those companies, and then checking each person before they go on the list. In Apollo's search, you filter companies by industry, employee count, location, revenue, funding, and the technology they use, and you filter people by job title, seniority, location, and email status. You can save the search so new matches appear later, select the people you want, and add them to a list in Apollo or export them as a CSV file. Revealing emails and exporting records uses Apollo credits, so most people try to narrow the list before they pay for it.

A filtered search isn't a qualified list yet. Apollo's filters match what its database says about a person, so a search for heads of marketing at 50 to 500 person software companies returns everyone whose record says so. That includes people who changed jobs since the record was last updated, companies that already pay you, your competitors' staff, and people with no work email. The search also can't tell you why a particular person is worth contacting now rather than six months from now.

That's the work that turns a search into a prospect list. A good list holds people who fit your profile today, at companies you'd actually want as customers, each with a work email you know you can use and a short reason they made the cut. It's also usually shorter than the search that produced it, because a short list of good prospects gets better replies than a long one padded with near misses.

Kite does that work in Apollo for you. It writes the search from your profile, checks every match, scores who's left, and saves the list where your team will use it.

Start by telling Kite, in the Kite web app or in Slack, who you want on the list and how many people you need:

"Build a list of 50 marketing leaders at US B2B software companies with 50 to 500 employees, and save it in Apollo."

Kite is an AI marketer. It researches your business, builds a growth strategy, and ships the work that brings you new customers. Because it has already researched your company, it knows your ideal customer profile, your current customers, and your competitors before you ask. It turns your request into one profile it can test, such as "VP or head of marketing at a US software company with 50 to 500 employees that sells to other businesses," and tells you the filters it plans to use. Confirm the profile or change it, and Kite starts. If your wiki has no profile and your request doesn't name one, Kite asks you for the roles and companies rather than guessing.

You don't need an Apollo account for Kite to find prospects, because Kite has its own Apollo connection built in. Connect your own Apollo account when you want the finished list saved in Apollo, checked against the contacts you already have there, or added to one of your sequences.

Kite puts every part of your profile that Apollo can filter on into the search itself, so it only pays attention to people who could plausibly fit. It starts with companies. Apollo's company search filters by employee count, location, revenue range, latest and total funding, keywords that describe the business, and the technologies a company uses. Kite can also exclude locations, which matters when you sell only in certain regions.

Next, Kite searches for people at those companies. Apollo's people search filters by job title, seniority, and the person's location, and it can include similar titles so "Head of Growth" and "VP Demand Generation" aren't missed when you asked for marketing leaders. Kite can also filter on whether a company uses or doesn't use a particular technology, which is useful when your product replaces one tool or works alongside another.

Whatever no filter can express, Kite screens afterward. Examples include "sells to other businesses rather than consumers" or "runs its own marketing team rather than an agency." For a large list, Kite works through the companies in batches and starts checking people from the first batch while it's still finding more companies.

Kite looks for a recent event at each company that makes this a good moment to get in touch. Apollo lists a company's open job postings and searches news articles about it by category and date, so Kite can see when a company is hiring a demand generation manager, has just raised a round, or has launched a new product. Kite ignores events older than about 90 days, because an old funding round is no longer a reason to write today.

A recent event is a reason to contact someone, not a substitute for fit. Kite only keeps a company with a fresh event if it also matches your profile, and it records the event, its date, and its source so the outreach can open with it.

Kite qualifies each person in order from the cheapest check to the most expensive one. It confirms the person still holds the role at that company, using their public profile or the company's own team page, and it drops anyone whose current role no longer matches. Next, it removes your existing customers, your competitors, and anyone who has opted out of hearing from you. Only then does it look closely at each remaining person against the rest of your profile.

Every person who passes gets a fit score from one to five with a one-line reason, such as "Head of growth at a 140-person payments software company that's hiring two demand generation roles." When the list runs past about fifteen people, Kite splits it into primary and secondary groups so you know where to start. Kite keeps a count of how many people failed each check, so you can see whether your profile is too narrow or the market is simply small.

If too many people fail, Kite goes back to Apollo with the same profile and keeps finding replacements until it reaches the number you asked for. When the market truly runs out, it delivers the shorter list and shows you why. It never pads the list with people who missed the profile.

Kite enriches only the people who passed every check, so you don't spend credits on prospects you'll never use. Apollo's person enrichment returns the work email, LinkedIn profile, current title, and seniority. Its company enrichment returns the company's domain, industry, employee count, revenue, funding, and technology.

Kite keeps each email's verification status exactly as the provider returns it, whether that's verified, catch-all, risky, or unverified. An address that couldn't be found stays marked as not found rather than guessed. When you need verified addresses only, Kite enriches more candidates than the number you asked for, because at smaller companies a large share of found addresses come back catch-all or unverifiable. It includes only business details, so personal email addresses and phone numbers stay off the list.

With your Apollo account connected, Kite saves the finished list in Apollo so your team can work it where they already prospect. Before it creates anything, it searches your Apollo contacts and accounts by name, company, and email, so someone you already track isn't added twice. It also reads your contact stages, lists, and team members so the new records match how your team already works.

Kite creates each company as an account with its name and domain, then creates each person as a contact with their first and last name, work email, and job title, linked to their account. It puts every contact on the list you named, sets a contact stage when you ask for one, and can put primary and secondary prospects on separate lists. If you'd rather keep the list somewhere else, Kite can save it to a connected spreadsheet or CRM instead, or share it as a CSV file in the conversation.

When the list is ready, Kite posts a summary in the conversation where you asked. The summary says how many prospects it delivered against how many you asked for, how many failed each check and why, and how many have a work email. The full list comes with it as a table, so you can scan it without opening Apollo.

From there, Kite can write a short, personalized first message for each primary prospect, opening with the recent event it found. It can also add the contacts to an Apollo sequence you choose, and because that starts sending email, Kite asks you to approve it in the thread before anyone is enrolled. If you want a fresh batch every week, ask Kite to run the same job on a schedule, and it will skip anyone already on the list.

When Kite finishes, you have a list of prospects who fit your profile today, each with a reason they're on it, and a record in your conversation with Kite of how the list was built.