Step-by-step guide to prospecting and generating leads using Builtwith

This is a step-by-step guide on how to use Builtwith in conjunction with LinkedIn Sales Navigator. Builtwith is a super handy tool when it comes to tracking companies for the various tools and technologies that they use as part of their tech stack.

What is Builtwith and what it does?

What makes Builtwith a wonderful prospecting tool is the fact that it provides an accurate list of companies using a particular technology. Let’s say if I were to sell to companies using Salesforce or Hubspot, using Builtwith I can obtain a list of current companies using Salesforce of Hubspot and this gives me the initial start in terms of the accounts that I need to go after to sell this my products or services to such companies.

How Builtwith is used as a Sales Prospecting tool?

With that being said Builtwith is probably best suited for companies selling in the B2B space because if you’re trying to do outbound, it really eases the job of giving you the data of the key accounts that you should go after. It simplifies your initial batch of research which people usually used to do on Google and they would create complex scripts to track certain kinds of technologies which is actually being done by Builtwith now and you pay a couple of hundred bucks a month to get that very recent data of all the companies that would lie in your ideal customer profile persona.

Okay now that we know the power of Builtwith, let’s quickly take a look at the process that we use to go from knowing the names of these companies to actually finding the particular decision-makers in these companies and then finding their contact details (work email addresses and phone numbers) and how we use it information to structure or outreach campaigns.

In this blog post, we would discuss in detail the prospecting process and would not discuss the actual outreach campaign preparation. We’ll delve into details about how you would use Builtwith to export the data you need, then how you make use of that data when it comes to going into sales navigator and using an external tool like the Data Chroma to actually prospect at scale using LinkedIn and then finding verified email addresses, and creating your verified list that you need to outreach to.

List building using Builtwith 101.

Before discussing the process in detail, I’m listing down the tools you would need to carry out this process. By no means, this implies that these are the only tools that you can use to execute this process. This is the tool stack that I’ve found the most success with.

1. Builtwith
2. LinkedIn sales navigator
3. Data Chroma

TLDR version of the process.

1. Use Builtwith to download the list of companies using a particular technology.
2. Use Data Chroma to find company LinkedIn profiles of these companies. (Input = Company website)
3. Convert LinkedIn company profiles to respective LinkedIn sales navigator profiles.
4. Add these LinkedIn sales navigator accounts to a sales navigator account list.
5. Create a lead search and use this account list as a custom list.
6. Export and enrich the lead search using Data Chroma to get all details on prospects including work emails and phone numbers.
7. Use this list to either launch a cold email drip campaign or a LinkedIn drip campaign.

Let’s now look into this process in detail.

Let’s consider an example scenario wherein we’re trying to find Pipedrive customers and we want to reach out to them (to sell an alternate CRM solution). Here are the exact steps on how to build this prospect list using Builtwith, LinkedIn Sales Navigator, and Data Chroma.

Use Builtwith to download the list of all websites using Pipedrive

This requires you to have a paid version of Builtwith. I would suggest getting the $495/month pro plan because that gets you the access to download unlimited reports.

1. Log in to Builtwith and search for Pipedrive in the search bar
2. Next from the search results, click on Download List of All Websites using Pipedrive’
3. Download the CSV/Excel file and open it.
4. Of all the columns in the exported CSV, there is one column that we’ll use to carry forward the next steps in our process and it is: ‘Company Domain’.
5. The next steps include finding the Company’s LinkedIn profile from Company’s Domain name so that we’re able to see the current employees working in the company on LinkedIn.

Search results for companies using Pipedrive

Exported Data from Builtwith

Use Data Chroma to find out Company LinkedIn profiles corresponding to the domain names we’ve found in the exported file.

This requires you to have a paid plan with Data Chroma (starts at $49/month).

1. Log in to Data Chroma and look for the module ‘Company Domain to Company LinkedIn Finder’.
2. Configure this module — create a google sheet and put all websites in a column and run this module.
3. On successful completion, the module will give you the LinkedIn profiles and Sales Navigator Account profiles corresponding to the domain names.
4. We have gone from knowing the names of the companies that use Pipedrive, to knowing their Linkedin and sales navigator profiles which we can use to find the exact employees we want to reach out to in these companies.

Run the module ‘ Company Domain to Company Linkedin Finder’ in Data Chroma

Input for the module ‘ Company Domain to Company Linkedin Finder’ in Data Chroma

Results from the module ‘ Company Domain to Company Linkedin Finder’ in Data Chroma

Add these companies to an account list in LinkedIn Sales Navigator

You would also need an active LinkedIn Sales Navigator License for this process ($99/month/user).

1. Log in to your LinkedIn Sales Navigator Account.
2. Click on Account Lists and then click on ‘+ Create account list’ and select ‘Manually add accounts’
3. Give your account list a name and click on create.
4. Now go back to Data Chroma and look for the module ‘Sales Navigator Account List Append’ under the prospect modules.
5. Configure this module — add Company Sales Navigator profiles (obtained in the previous step) to a column in google sheet and use the sheet as input in the module setup form.
6. Run the module.
7. Once the module finishes the operation, you’ll see that the company accounts have been added to your account list.
8. We will use this account list as a custom list while making a lead search in sales navigator in the next step of this process.

Click on ‘Create account list’ to create a new account list

Select manually add accounts

The newly created account list has no accounts initially

Run the module ‘Sales Navigator Account List Append’ in Data Chroma

Accounts added to the sales navigator account list after running the module in Data Chroma

Create a targeted lead search in sales navigator and use the account list as a custom list filter.

1. Inside LinkedIn Sales Navigator, create a lead search by clicking on ‘All Filters’.
2. Apply all necessary filters — in our example scenario, we want to reach out to the VP of Marketing in all these companies, so I’ll enter ‘VP Marketing’ under the title filters.
3. Next under ‘Custom Lists’, select the account list that you created and added companies to in the previous step. This will tell Sales Navigator to find ‘VP Marketing’ in only these companies who are part of this account list.
4. Apply more filters as per your requirement and create a targeted search. Make sure to narrow down the search to less than 2500 total leads.
5. In the next step, we’ll export and enrich this lead search.

Use the account list as a custom list while creating a lead search

Next, use Data Chroma to export and enrich this lead search.

The export file will include all information about the prospect (as present on LinkedIn) along with the verified work email address (verified at the time of export).

1. Go back to Data Chroma and look for the module ‘Sales Navigator Lead Search Query Export’.
2. Configure this module. Copy the browser URL for the lead search that you want to export and enrich and use this as the input in this module.
3. Under the option ‘Enrich work emails?’, select Yes.
4. Run the module.
5. Once the module completes the operation, download the result file.

Use the module ‘Sales Navigator Lead Search Query Export’ in Data Chroma

Copy the browser URL for the sales navigator lead search

Export from Data Chroma containing all prospect information including work email and phone number

In the result file, you’ll find all information about your prospects including work email addresses and phone numbers. Use this information as the input for your outreach campaigns.

1. Use the verified work email addresses as the input if you plan on launching cold email marketing campaigns.
2. Use the phone numbers if you plan on cold calling
3. Use the Linkedin profile URLs to launch a Linkedin drip campaign using a tool like — Weconnect or Expandi.

So that sums up the complete prospecting process of using Builtwith to find companies using a particular technology and then using LinkedIn Sales Navigator with Data Chroma to find the exact prospects to reach out to in these companies.

This process remains the same for other scenarios of using Builtwith to find a certain set of companies. For example, if you were to find and outreach to Founders of a certain category of Shopify stores, you’d first download all websites that use Shopify with the help of Builtwith and then use Data Chroma and LinkedIn Sales Navigator to find these founders and their complete contact details from LinkedIn.