Hey Folks - I'm looking to get smarter on setting up an end-to-end email-based lead gen system and wondering what tools people are using and their various trade-offs. I'm mainly focused on developing a B2B direct sales outbound email lead gen system for my office plant company (targeting a geo, company size, and type of person within that company), but seems like this could also apply just as well to developing proprietary search acquisition deal flow. This space seems super crowded and with Zapier, it seems like there's almost an infinite universe of possibilities to set something up that is reasonably low touch, high volume and reasonably high quality.

Would appreciate any pointers, or if someone has what they deem to be the ultimate amazing setup that they are willing to share with me or the community, that'd be awesome.

Oct 2019 Update
This post led me down a meandering journey talking with people, collecting perspectives, and experimenting with different systems. The system that I've now settled on and made operational is as follows. I'm including my affiliate links to these systems which pay a small commission to me for referrals. Happy to demo my system to anyone. Email me at --@----.com to introduce yourself and get some time.

- LinkedIn Sales Navigator - I'm using the Saved Searches to find people and get them onto an appropriate list.

- Snov.io - I'm using the chrome add-in to snag email addresses off LinkedIn Sales Navigator and from the company webpages. It then automatically gets them onto a prospect list, retrieves and verifies their email addresses. From there I have different drip campaigns setup to run off of each list. The campaigns are logic driven and are very easy to customize based on the user interaction (such as opening an email, clicking on a link, or not opening at all). Drip marketing runs directly through my GSuite Email system, and the system tracks emails automatically until I get a reply, which I then handle manually. You can limit the emailing activity by enforcing sending caps and sending intervals in order to avoid spam classification. You can also experiment with from addresses, schedules, subject lines, copy, etc and get a good feel for what works with live experiments.

-Pipedrive - My Snovio work syncs with Pipedrive and my GSuite Email to create profiles and tie individuals to deals with email history). I'm also creating a series of response templates I can deploy and customize using PD email to streamline the interaction after the drip marketing system does its job of getting someone engaged. Pretty slick!

Happy Searching,

Nick